c. 1999 Religion News Service

UNDATED _ Pope John Paul II arrived in Mexico City late Friday (Jan. 22) afternoon, bearing his agenda for the Roman Catholic Church in the Americas in the coming millennium.

The pope’s specially outfitted plane touched down shortly after 4 p.m. EST to begin a six-day trip that will also take him to St. Louis for two days, including a meeting with President Clinton.

His first act following the formalities of his airport welcome was to sign late Friday afternoon a”post-synodal apostolic exhortation”_ the papal response to the deliberations of the bishops of the Americas, who met at the Vatican in late 1997 to prepare for the year 2000.

In the document, which will be made public Saturday (Jan. 23), the pontiff will call on Catholics of North, South and Central America to join in”a new evangelization.”The call is reflected in the theme of his visit _”A new millennium is born; let us reaffirm the faith.” As the pontiff left Rome early Friday morning, the Vatican said the pope will seek to underline the unity of a region made up of many nations with diverse cultures and languages. He will attack the excesses of consumerism and the abuses of economic globalization, narcotics trafficking and the arms trade and deplore the suffering of street children, immigrants, members of minority groups subject to prejudice, aboriginal and indigenous people, the old, the ill, the abandoned and the unemployed.

The extreme poverty that plagues much of Latin America has provoked a peasant revolt in Mexico’s southernmost state of Chiapas. Although Mexico’s episcopal conference has tried to distance itself from the conflict, some priests _ and diocesan Bishop Samuel Ruiz _ have openly supported the poor farm workers, drawing fire from both landowners and President Ernesto Zedillo.

Mexico’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in an official note Wednesday that the pope and Zedillo will not discuss Chiapas during their private talks Saturday.

Subcommandante Marcos, the leader of the peasant and mostly indigenous native guerrillas known as Zapatistas, accused the government of using”pretenses and cosmetic measures”to give the pontiff”a false representation”of the situation in southern Mexico.

While Chiapas is not likely to arise, the pope is certain, however, to bring up the still unsolved assassination of Cardinal Juan Jesus Posadas Ocampo, archbishop of Guadalajara, who was shot to death May 24, 1993.

Zedillo welcomed John Paul on this, his fourth visit to Mexico and the 85th the peripatetic pontiff has made since he was elected pope little more than 20 years ago. Mexico was also the site of his first trip after becoming pope.

Predominantly Catholic Mexico is of special interest to the pope.

Although Catholics make up 95 percent of Mexico’s population of 96 million people, church-state relations were severely strained for 125 years, starting with President Benito Juarez’s Laws of Reform in 1857, which outlawed religious orders, sequestered church holdings and began the process of forcing the church underground.

Mexico and the Vatican established full diplomatic relations only in 1992 after the government agreed to recognize the church as a legal entity.

A throng of well-wishers, waving small white and yellow papal flags and red, yellow and green Mexican flags, clapped, cheered and chanted”the whole world loves John Paul”as the aging and frail pope emerged from his plane, and slowly walked down the stairs for the greeting ceremony.

On the tarmac, a large sign read”Bienvenido”_ welcome _ and a mariachi band played”Cielito Lindo”_”Pretty Little Sky”_ as the pontiff descended.

Although the 78-year-old Roman Catholic pontiff suffers from what is believed to be Parkinson’s disease, has trouble walking _ he routinely uses a cane _ and speaking clearly, he is determined to actively lead the church into the third millennium of Christianity.

And the church in the Americas _ with its more than 500 million Catholics, more than half the world’s total _ is of special importance to the pope and the future of Catholicism.

An issue of great concern to the pope _ as it was to the 200 bishops who attended the Special Assembly of the Synod of Bishops for America which this trip brings to a formal end _ is the inroads that Pentecostals and Protestant evangelicals are making among Hispanic Catholics throughout the hemisphere.

In his airport remarks, John Paul seemed to underscore that concern, saying it is”not possible … to understand Mexico without the faith brought from Spain to these lands.” In his message to the Americas, John Paul calls on the church to renew its efforts to help the poor and oppressed, raise new vocations and intensify the exchanges of missionaries between north and south.

During his 13 hour flight from Rome, John Paul told reporters he still wants to visit Russia and China and that he could not decide if the fact that the United States had been left the only superpower was good or bad.”When I came … the first time 20 years ago there was a confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union. Now the United States is alone. I don’t know if that’s good or bad, but that’s the way it is,”he told the reporters.

And he said he was satisfied with the results of his trip to Cuba, which took place just a year ago.

Although Russian President Boris Yeltsin has issued a standing invitation to John Paul to visit Russia, the Russian Orthodox Church has raised objections to the trip.

DEA END POLK