ROME – On the evening of April 19, 2005, just hours after his election, the man who had just become Benedict XVI confided to Alberto Gasbarri, a longtime veteran of Vatican Radio and the chief organizer of papal trips, that he likely wouldn’t travel much because he didn’t feel he had the same aptitude for it as John Paul II.
Yet Pope Benedict ended up making 24 international trips over 8 years, an average of three per year, just one short of the 4 such journeys St John Paul II averaged each year of his almost 27-year papacy. By the end, so convinced was Benedict of the importance of travel that it was his perceived inability to make it to Brazil for World Youth Day in July 2013 which consolidated his decision to resign.
