Abstract
For the popes, traveling has developed into a key instrument for mobilizing masses, spreading messages, and shaping public Catholic identities. Traveling ranks high within the papal efforts to (re)construct a Catholic landscape in Europe. Thus, comparing the European travel schedules of Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis in the context of their global journeys can help to understand their different conceptualizations of Europe. While both popes share the focus on Marian shrines, mass events, Parliamentary addresses, and interfaith encounters that has been established by their predecessors, their geopolitical strategies differ completely. Benedict XVI placed visits to major European nations and regions at the center of his travel schedule and tried to strengthen a historical Catholic identity. Francis shifted the focus of papal traveling to other continents and approached Europe from the periphery. He has visited the European institutions in Strasbourg and tried to shape an interreligious public identity of Europe.
Highlights
Landscape and Public DiplomacyRoman Catholicism represents a universal Church, but its headquarter, center, and historical identity are European
The basic argument, as put forward here, is that travelling is so important for understanding papal geopolitics and their attempts to re-construct a Catholic landscape, because it is a key instrument for the popes to bring public and classical diplomacy together by mobilizing and addressing a specific audience, but effectively a wider public
The choice of locating two World Youth Days
Summary
Roman Catholicism represents a universal Church, but its headquarter, center, and historical identity are European. The basic argument, as put forward here, is that travelling is so important for understanding papal geopolitics and their attempts to re-construct a Catholic landscape, because it is a key instrument for the popes to bring public and classical diplomacy together by mobilizing and addressing a specific audience, but effectively a wider public. Europe, as it will be shown, is despite a deep transformation, still the top destination of papal travelling. The analysis of the two popes highlights, in both cases, first their common and shifting interest in Europe in the context of their global travelling and their differences in their mapping of what is important in the European landscape and who are the European publics they are interested in
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