After delivering a speech calling for unity and healing at Quebec City's Citadelle Wednesday evening, Pope Francis will hold a mass in a basilica to an audience of 2,000 this morning.
The mass will be broadcast on large screens outside the Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupré Basilica and on the Plains of Abraham at 10 a.m., as well as in a number of movie theatres in the province.
The basilica, a national shrine with high, vaulted ceilings, sits near the shores of the St. Lawrence River, 35 kilometres northeast of Quebec City.
In his public address at the Citadelle of Quebec, Pope Francis again expressed 'deep shame and sorrow' to residential school survivors for the wrongdoings of some Catholic institutions. His message drew mixed reactions, though some feel it may be the closest the Pope comes to apologizing on behalf of the entire Catholic church in Canada.
St. Anne, by religious tradition the grandmother of Jesus, is particularly significant to Innu communities as grandmothers often deliver messages between households, said Andrée Paul, who is Innu from Pessamit in Quebec's North Shore region and has been volunteering at the basilica for almost 30 years.
In his speech Wednesday in Quebec City, the Pope said he wanted to express "deep shame and sorrow" for the residential school system in Canada, in which "local Catholic institutions had a part."