Ko Sa is one of just a handful of Vietnamese Catholic refugees registered to attend the mass by Pope Francis, who arrives in Thailand on Wednesday carrying a message of peace and religious tolerance.
BANGKOK - Clutching her entrance badge to see the Pope, Vietnamese Catholic refugee Ko Sa says attending the pontiff's mass this week is a great honour -- a rare bright spot in her "miserable" life in limbo as an asylum seeker in Bangkok.
Many live in fear of arrest and long detention in immigration centres while they scrape by on under-the-table jobs for a few dollars a day. Some wait years for resettlement in a third country."It's difficult to describe the feeling... It is a great honour for us to see him," said 34-year-old Ko Sa, sitting on a mattress on the floor of a rented house where she lives with eight other people.
Some prominent activists are Catholic -- a denomination comprising 7% of the population -- and the communist government has long had an uneasy relationship with organised religion. He was among many Catholics who voiced anger over a 2016 toxic spill by a Taiwanese steel firm that killed tonnes of fish and decimated livelihoods.
They eventually made it to Bangkok where they attended a local church frequented by migrant labourers.
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