‘Pray for me’, pope urges at 1st Angelus

Agence France-Presse

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(UPDATED) 'Pray for me,' the new Pope said in his first Angelus since his surprise election on Wednesday

FIRST ANGELUS. Pope Francis leads his first Angelus prayer from the window of the apartments at St Peter's square on March 17, 2013 at the Vatican. AFP PHOTO / GIUSEPPE CACACE

VATICAN CITY (UPDATED) – Pope Francis appeared before more than 100,000 people massed in St Peter’s Square on Sunday, March 17, for his first Angelus prayer and asked the faithful to pray for him.

“Thank you for your welcome, and for your prayers,” the first pope from Latin America said from a window of the papal apartment high above the square. “Pray for me,” he added.

Dozens of flags from Francis’s native Argentina were waving in the crowd as the former cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio recited the traditional Sunday Angelus prayer, the first of his papacy.

The occasion has traditionally been a moment to comment on international issues, but Francis instead used the occasion to emphasise his Italian roots.

The former Buenos Aires archbishop, whose parents hailed from Italy’s northwestern Piedmont region, said he chose to name himself after St Francis of Assisi because of his “spiritual ties with this land”. – Rappler.com

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