Pope Leo XIV on Wednesday visited a remote prison in an often overlooked Central African nation known for human rights abuses, urging the inmates to use the privation of their conditions as an opportunity for personal growth.
On a muggy afternoon in the simmering heat of Equatorial Guinea, the pope stepped inside the barbed-wire topped walls to speak to the men and women who had waited for hours in an off-white courtyard, dressed in bright orange and dark khaki uniforms with matching plastic sandals that looked newly issued.
When Leo stepped through the entrance, festive marimba music started playing on a sound system and the prisoners, who were standing in formation, started singing boisterously and swaying in what by all appearances were choreographed movements. Many of them waved small national flags or pennants featuring the image of the pope as guards in white shirtsleeves and black trousers stood in front of them. Large banners announcing Leo’s visit festooned the back of the courtyard.
The pope listened quietly as three inmates in the city of Bata spoke to him from a podium, then shook each of their hands and exchanged a few words.
Just before he rose to speak, a heavy afternoon rain pelted the prisoners with large drops.
In the pope’s remarks, he told them that “although prison may seem like a lonely and desolate place,” it could also be “a space for reflection, reconciliation and personal growth.”
Over the course of the papal journey, the world’s media has focused on the pope’s potent comments on President Trump and the war in Iran, but the visit to the prison in Bata was the kind of small, pastoral moment that Leo seems to prefer.
As members of the international traveling press corps looked on, he sat on a white armchair embossed with a papal crest under a temporary canopy with red carpet flooring that had been erected for his visit. During his speech, he stood protected under a large white umbrella held by a Vatican security guard while the prisoners, who remained standing in strict formation, were quickly drenched.
Human rights groups have long criticized the government of Equatorial Guinea’s leader, Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo — the longest-serving president in the world — for employing systemic torture, coercing confessions and imprisoning defendants without fair trials. The groups have also accused the administration of allowing unsanitary and malnourished conditions in the nation’s prisons.
“Life is not defined solely by one’s mistakes, which are often the result of difficult and complex circumstances,” Leo told the sodden prisoners. “There is always the possibility to start over, learn and become a new person.”
Leo made no mention of the unfair trials that might have landed some of the prisoners before him behind bars. Nor did he dwell on the harsh prison conditions, other than to note that “the administration of justice aims to protect society” and that to be effective, “it must always promote the dignity and potential of every person.”
“True justice seeks not so much to punish as to help rebuild the lives of victims, offenders and communities wounded by evil,” Leo said.
The pope thanked the staff of the prison for “combining security with respect and kindness.”
It was the first time in 44 years that a pope has traveled to the tiny country of Equatorial Guinea, where about 75 percent of its roughly 1.8 million people are Catholic, according to the Vatican.
The pope had already flown hundreds of miles Wednesday morning to say Mass at Africa‘s second-largest cathedral, in the city of Mongomo, before flying another 130 miles to Bata, a port city on the Atlantic. Pope John Paul II also traveled to Bata, in 1982 — the year President Mbasogo took power after a military coup — though he did not visit any prisons.
The prison in Bata, which houses about 600 people, is located on the edge of a hardscrabble town in a long, squat, salmon-hued building. Its unblemished color stood out in a city where many unvarnished and worn cement structures lined the route to the prison. The paint job was so pristine that it looked as if the building may well have been spruced up for the pope’s visit.
At the end of the meeting, the prisoners and the pope recited the Lord’s Prayer. Within an hour of Leo’s arrival, he left the building, sung out by the prisoners dancing in the rain.
Motoko Rich is the Times bureau chief in Rome, where she covers Italy, the Vatican and Greece.
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