Faith, Power, and Displacement: The Catholic Church and Urban Transformation in Timor-Leste

Catholicism predominates urban life in Timor-Leste. From education to healthcare to the built environment, the Catholic Church pervades the social, political, and economic infrastructures of the world’s most Catholic nation. This influence gained international attention in 2024 when half of the country’s citizens–over 600,000 people–attended Pope Francis’ open air Mass as a part of his apostolic journey. This paper examines the overlooked displacement of over 1,000 Timorese families to make way for capital building projects associated with the papal journey. It uncovers the capital partnerships between the State of Timor-Leste and the Church as they co-constitutively make claims to Timorese land over and against informal settlements by indigenous communities. An ethnographic exploration, this paper brings together interviews, event observations, and site analyses to argue that the monumental architectures of the papal visitation both obscure and stridently declare the Church’s imbrication in financial and real estate monopolies in Timor-Leste.