Pope to make official visit in September

Pope Benedict XVI will make the first ever official papal visit to Britain with a four-day trip in September, the government announced Tuesday.

The September 16-19 visit by the 82-year-old pontiff, at the invitation of Queen Elizabeth II, will see the first official meeting between the British monarch and a pope.

The visit, which follows recent tensions between the Vatican and the Anglican Church, will also see the pontiff make an exception to his rule and conduct a beatification in person in the local archdiocese.

"We've never known anything like this before in our country's history," said Scotland minister Jim Murphy, announcing only the second of any kind by a pope in more than four centuries.

Pope Benedict's predecessor John Paul II drew huge crowds when he came to Britain in 1982 -- the first pontiff to visit for 450 years -- but it was a pastoral trip, rather than an official visit.

In Scotland, the pope will be received by Queen Elizabeth at the Palace of Holyroodhouse, the sovereign's official residence in Edinburgh. He will also hold a public mass at Bellahouston Park in Glasgow.

In England, he will give a major speech to civil society leaders at the Houses of Parliament in London, and beatify 19th century theologian John Henry Newman in a public mass at Coventry Airport in central England.

He will also visit the Archbishop of Canterbury -- the head of the Anglican church -- at his Lambeth Palace residence and pray with other church leaders at Westminster Abbey.

"This is an historic visit at an important time," Murphy said.

"The papal visit represents an unprecedented opportunity to strengthen ties between the UK and the Holy See on action to tackle poverty and climate change."

The trip has the status of a state visit, though remains officially a papal trip.

Hallmarks of a state visit, such as a procession through London and a stay at Buckingham Palace -- the queen is in Edinburgh and Pope Benedict prefers to stay in religious buildings -- will be missing.

Excluding policing, the visit is expected to cost around 15 million pounds (23 million dollars, 17 million euros), to be shared between the government and the English and Scottish churches.

The National Secular Society has petitioned the government not to spend taxpayers' cash on the visit.

The trip follows tensions last year between the Vatican and the Anglican Church after the Holy See made it easier for disgruntled Anglicans to convert to Catholicism.

The pope also ruffled feathers last month by criticising Britain's equality legislation seen as friendly to homosexuals.

Cardinal Keith O'Brien, the leader of Scotland's Catholics, said his followers were "thrilled" at the trip.

"His visit this year will bring us all renewed encouragement," the Archbishop of St. Andrews and Edinburgh said.

"These are difficult times for us all and I would like to think that the visit will indeed help to inspire us all and help us to go forward together positively."

Archbishop Vincent Nichols, the leader of Catholics in England and Wales, said the visit "does take us into new territory of real close cooperation between the government and the Catholic community.

"There is excitement and eagerness.

"We are confident that the presence and message of Pope Benedict will encourage everyone to aspire again to a vision of life in our society marked by mutual trust, compassion and truth."

Around six million Catholics live in Scotland, England and Wales. Churches have been swelled by recent Polish immigration.