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Pope Will Visit Mexico Next Year

Pope Francis Vatican
Pope Francis at the Vatican on Oct. 6, 2015.

Photo by Andreas Solaro/AFP/Getty

Pope Francis will follow up his much-discussed trip to the United States by visiting Mexico in the early months of 2016, Televisa reports. Details at this point are limited, but the outlet says that he is expected to see the Our Lady of Guadalupe shrine in Mexico City, which per a Vatican statement in 1999 is the most-visited Catholic shrine in the world.

There are an estimated 100 million Catholics in Mexico, constituting more than 80 percent of the population. (In the U.S. those numbers are 70 million and 22 percent.)

The pope spoke before his U.S. trip about the possibility of walking into the country from Mexico as a gesture of support for immigrants. (He ended up flying from Cuba.) He has also already scheduled a trip to Ecuador, Bolivia, and Paraguay for July next year.