By Cassandra Garrison, Joshua McElwee and Marco Aquino
CHICLAYO, Peru, Nov 13 (Reuters) - Crowds in Peru's northern city of Chiclayo gathered early on Friday ahead of Pope Leo's arrival for the centerpiece event of his 12-day South America tour, an outdoor Mass with the people who called him their bishop for eight years.
Throngs were headed to an arid field just outside Chiclayo, a city 10,700 km (6,648 miles) from Rome, where the former Robert Prevost, elected leader of the Catholic Church last year,
is still known as "Padre" (Father) or "Amigo" (Friend).
"We want to see him in person," Noemí Chuman Pasco, 55, a Chiclayo resident who knew Leo when he was bishop from 2015 to 2023, said ahead of his arrival. "May he give us his blessing."
The pope, originally from Chicago, is visiting Peru on the emotional final leg of a three-nation tour. He declared on Wednesday that the country where he served as a missionary for about 20 years was his homeland.
Leo was due to arrive in Chiclayo from Lima around 9 a.m. (1400 GMT) and will stay in the area until Sunday to lead eight events, including a private dinner with the priests who once reported to him as bishop. Chiclayo, Peru's fourth-largest city, where agriculture supports the economy, has a population of about 620,000.
Magdalena Sequel, 78, a Chiclayo grandmother, said she was overjoyed anticipating the pope's arrival and remembered attending Masses he would celebrate as bishop at a local Catholic shrine.
"He was always ... very kind and affectionate with everyone," she said. "He was a humble person, and that humility showed."
Crowds for Leo's visit to Peru have been the largest of his 18-month papacy, with some 3 million gathering in Lima on Wednesday after his arrival from Argentina. The pope also visited Uruguay on the tour.
In Chiclayo, people camped overnight at the Pampas de Pimentel, a vast desert park west of the city where Leo was due to lead Mass.
Leo, who began his South America tour less than a month after lung cancer surgery, has appeared in good form on one of the most intense foreign tours arranged for a pope in decades.
In Peru, he has enthusiastically greeted crowds on rides in an open-air popemobile, making unannounced appearances on the balcony of the Vatican embassy in Lima, where he was staying, and singing local songs at events.
(Reporting by Joshua McElwee, Marco Aquino and Cassandra Garrison, additional reporting by Leila Miller and Pilar Olivares; editing by Rod Nickel)
