page_title: Pope Francis's visit to the Philippines
section_title: Day 4: January 18, Sunday
hierarchical_section_title: Pope Francis's visit to the Philippines / Visit / Day 4: January 18, Sunday
caption_attribution_description: Aerial Shot of Rizal Park, Manila, Philippines during the Papal Visit, January 18, 2015.
context_page_description: Pope Francis made a pastoral and state visit to the Philippines from January 15 to 19, 2015. He was the third pontiff to visit the Philippines, after Paul VI and John Paul II, and the first in the 21st century and 3rd millennium with the last visit by John Paul II in 1995. Besides Manila, Francis visited Tacloban and Palo, Leyte, to encourage the victims of Typhoon Haiyan. John Paul II had also gone beyond Manila to Cebu, Davao, Bacolod, Iloilo, Legazpi, Bataan, and Baguio, from February 17 to 22, 1981. The Filipinos nicknamed Francis Lolo Kiko as a term of endearment, which he commended. Around 6–7 million attended Francis' final Mass at Luneta, surpassing the crowd at World Youth Day 1995 in the same venue. The theme of Francis' 2015 visit was "Mercy and Compassion".
context_section_description: At around 9:25 am PST, Pope Francis entered the main gate along España Boulevard at the University of Santo Tomas. He walked through the Arch of the Centuries and met briefly with representatives of various religions. Among those present were:
  Nektarios Tsilis of the Metropolitan, Orthodox Metropolitanate of Hong Kong and Southeast Asia
  Venerable Master Hsing Yun, a Chinese Chan Buddhist monk representing the Fo Guang Shan Monastery in Taiwan
  Rabbi Eliyahu Azaria, head of the Jewish Synagogue in Makati
  Maharaj Rajesh Sharma, a Hindu priest
  Ephraim Fajutagana, Obispo Máximo of the Philippine Independent Church and concurrent chair of the National Council of Churches in the Philippines
  Bishop Cesar Vicente Punzalan III, chairman of the board of the Philippine Council of Evangelical Churches
  Lilian Sison, former UST Graduate School dean member, Religions for Peace – Philippines
  Julkipli Wadi, Dean of the UP Institute of Islamic Studies
  Imam Ebra Moxir, President of the Imam Council of the Philippines
  Former Supreme Court Chief Justice Reynato Puno, chairman of the Philippine Bible Society.
  After the meeting, Pope Francis circled the university in the popemobile and then met with about 24,000 youth representatives gathered at Santo Tomas Field. The general public were also present in other parts of the university.
  At the Quirino Grandstand in Luneta Park, the pope held his third and concluding mass in the Philippines. The Metro Manila Development Authority estimated that six million people attended, exceeding the five million during John Paul's Mass there for World Youth Day in 1995; BBC reports this as the largest papal gathering in history. After the Mass the crowd sang the 1995 World Youth Day anthem "Tell the World of His Love", followed by the visit's official theme song "We Are All God's Children" led by Jamie Rivera.
caption: Rizal Park, Manila, Mass
exif: {}