MILAN (AP) - Pope Francis focused his one-day visit Saturday to the wealthy northern Italian city of Milan on those marginalized by society, visiting families in a housing project and exhorting clergy and nuns gathered in a cathedral to minister to the peripheries.
The papal itinerary, which also included a stop at the city's main prison, underscored Francis' view that the peripheries offer a better view of reality than the well-tended and prosperous city centers.
The pope told thousands of faithful assembled at the housing project that it was important for the Roman Catholic Church "not to remain in the center to wait, but to go toward everyone, in the peripheries, to go toward also non-Christians and non-believers."
And later in the heart of Milan at the grand, Gothic-era Duomo Cathedral, he urged priests, nuns and deacons to take their mission to the peripheries "to rekindle hope that has been put out and sapped by a society that has become insensitive to the pain of others."
"In our fragility as a congregation, we can become more attentive to the many fragilities that surround us and transform them into a blessing," Francis said.
The visit to the world's largest diocese, with more than 5 million faithful, and the home of his main competition in 2013 for the papacy, Cardinal Angelo Scola, marked a resumption of the pope's regular pastoral visits after a yearlong hiatus because of the Jubilee Year of Mercy commitments in Rome.
Scola greeted the pope at the Duomo, and presented him with a golden chalice and another gift more in line with Francis' example: He announced the diocese had bought 50 apartments to give to the homeless.
Francis maintained his familiar, down-to-earth presence throughout the visit, disappearing briefly into a port-a-potty while visiting the housing project.
Speaking to deacons at the Duomo, he acknowledged that their unique role as men in ordained ministry who can be married gave them "an authoritative voice ... of tensions that reside in families," noting off-the-cuff with a wry glance, "You have mothers-in-law."
And addressing a priest's question, he emphasized the importance of teaching youth how to discern what is important, nothing that "our youth are exposed to a continuous zapping. They can navigate on two or three open screens at the same time, reacting at the same time to various virtual scenarios."
During the visit to the housing project, the pope made private visits to three families, one couple in their 50s struggling with infirmity, another couple in their 80s dealing with illness and a third family originally from Morocco that is engaged in teaching Arabic.
The housing project on the edge of Italy's wealthy finance and fashion capital is home to more than 1,000 people, including many elderly and foreigners living on the margins of society.
Children presented Francis with two gifts, one a handmade priest's stole embroidered by a neighborhood cooperative that he wore immediately, and the second a painting of the local church's statue of the Madonna, which has recently been restored.
Francis said the presence of the Madonna to welcome him to Milan reminded him of his boyhood with friends, "when we returned from school and there were our mothers at the door for us."
Before leaving, he took time to shake hands and sign autographs with the faithful, who snapped photographs with cellphones.
It is the fifth papal visit to Milan, including two by Pope John Paul II and one by Pope Benedict XVI.