With bated breath, Brazil anticipates the arrival of the recently appointed papacy. The pope will be spending a week in his home country of Brazil to explore how the people are doing and to discuss topics of the utmost importance. On the top of Pope Francis’s concerns are the economy and the state of joblessness amongst youths. His message appears to appeal to how youths are growing up isolated due to the nature of chronic unemployment.

A Clear Message

The pope’s message speaks true of more than just Brazil; many countries around the world are seeing massive unemployment, especially amongst the younger generation. At the rate that things are going, many of the young workers may never have had the opportunity to work at all. Of course, the message that the pope brings is not a singular one and his concerns are broader than just the young and unemployed. In addition to this, the way that the elderly are treated as useless and thrown away is another major concern for him in the same vein as the young. Pope Francis has his heart in the right places as he concerns himself with the plights of the disenfranchised and the poor.

Not everyone is celebrating the visit by Pope Francis. The Catholic population of Brazil is at its lowest levels ever according to polls, coming in at only 57%. Compared to the 1980s when the country had at 89%, the drop in the last few decades is massive. Even so, the mass that the pope is attending is expected to have over a million Catholics in attendance.

While the turnout for this week’s mass will be excellent, another major concern for this papacy is that Catholics are losing faith. The number of Catholics who attend weekly mass is going down and on average less than 29% of Catholics go every week. On the other side of things, there will be a great number of protestors riled up for the visit to bring to attention the church’s stance on a number of controversial topics. Protestors will be bringing up a number of hot issues that have been hitting countries everywhere: same-sex marriage rights, abortions, and other big issues that people feel that the Catholic Church needs to reconsider.

Faith to Spare

Supporters of the pope are not terribly worried that he is impressionable or swayed without cause though. Pope Francis has a history of hard work and living amongst the working class to provide a wealth of temperance and personal experience for him. His faith is strong and everyone is sure that he has a good head on his shoulders.

Without a doubt, there will be a large number of items on the Pope’s plate during his visit but until he opens his mouth and actually begins to discuss what his greatest concerns are, everyone will have to wait to see what he has on his mind. This visit is sure to have lasting effects on the Catholic population and the devotion of the Catholic population in Brazil though, and potentially other countries as well.