Quito, Ecuador • Hundreds of thousands of people filled a park in Ecuador's main port city Monday for Pope Francis' first big event of his three-nation South American tour, hoping for a glimpse of Latin America's first pope returning to his home soil for a Mass dedicated to the family.
Many pilgrims spent the night outdoors, and some walked for miles to reach the park on Guayaquil's northern outskirts where the crowd sang hymns and sought pockets of shade amid the scorching sun and high humidity. Firefighters sprayed them with water hoses to provide relief.
In his homily, Francis praised families as the bedrock of society and said miracles are performed every day inside a family out of love. But he said sometimes the love and happiness runs out.
"How many women, sad and lonely, wonder when love left, when it slipped away from their lives?" he asked. "How many elderly people feel left out of family celebrations, cast aside and longing each day for a little love?"
Francis has dedicated the first two years of his pontificate to family issues, giving weekly catechism lessons on different aspects of family life and inviting the entire church to study ways to provide better pastoral care for Catholic families, people who are divorced, gays and families in "nontraditional" situations.
A preliminary meeting of bishops on these issues ended last year in bitter divisions between liberals and conservatives, particularly over ministering to gays and to Catholics who divorce and remarry outside of the church. Church teaching holds that Catholics who enter into a second marriage without having the first one annulled cannot receive Communion.
In his homily Monday, Francis said he hoped the second meeting of bishops on family life, scheduled for October, would come up with "concrete solutions to the many difficult and significant challenges facing families in our time."
"I ask you to pray fervently for this intention, so that Christ can take even what might seem to us impure, scandalous or threatening and turn it ... into a miracle. Families today need miracles!" he added.
The Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, said Francis wasn't referring to the gay or divorce issue specifically but was making a more general reference that he hoped the bishops would "help the church chart this path of leaving a situation of sin to one of grace."
On his arrival in Guayaquil, the pontiff headed to the Shrine of the Divine Mercy, where 2,000 invitees gathered including child cancer patients, residents of homes for the elderly abandoned by their families and some of Guayaquil's poorest people.
He told those gathered that he would pray for them "and I won't charge you a thing. All I ask, please, is that you pray for me."
The crowd in Los Samanes park was festive, with young and old overjoyed at seeing the first pope in their lives.
"I'll ask the pope to intercede so that God gives me my health," said Guillermina Aveiga Davila, 90. "I want to reach 100."
Pope Francis waves upon his arrival to the Mariscal Sucre International airport in Quito, Ecuador, Sunday, July 5, 2015. History's first Latin American pope returns to Spanish-speaking South America for the first time on Sunday to visit Ecuador, Bolivia and Paraguay. (AP Photo/Fernando Llano)
A gust of wind blows Pope Francis' skull cap upon his arrival at Quito Airport, Ecuador, Sunday, July 5, 2015. The Pontiff is visiting Ecuador, Bolivia and Paraguay on the occasion of his Apostolic trip from July 5 to July 12. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)
Ecuador's President Rafael Correa, right, welcomes Pope Francis upon his arrival at Quito Airport, Ecuador, Sunday, July 5, 2015. The Pontiff is visiting Ecuador, Bolivia and Paraguay on the occasion of his Apostolic trip from July 5 to July 12. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)
Pope Francis laughs as he meets the journalists aboard the papal airplane on the occasion of his visit to Quito, Ecuador, July 5, 2015. The Pontiff is visiting Ecuador, Bolivia and Paraguay during his Apostolic trip from July 5 to July 12. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)
Pope Francis waves to the crowd as he rides aboard the Popemobile in streets of Quito, Ecuador, Sunday, July 5, 2015. Francis is making his first visit as pope to his Spanish-speaking neighborhood. He'll travel to three South American nations, Ecuador, Bolivia and Paraguay, which are beset by problems that concern him deeply, income inequality and environmental degradation. (AP Photo/Dolores Ochoa)
A woman prays with a rosary outside of the Vatican ambassador's residence as she waits for the arrival of Pope Francis in Quito, Ecuador, Sunday, July 5, 2015. Francis is making his first visit as pope to his Spanish-speaking neighborhood. He'll travel to three South American nations, Ecuador, Bolivia and Paraguay, which are beset by problems that concern him deeply, income inequality and environmental degradation. (AP Photo/Ana Buitron)
Pilgrims walk towards Samanes Park to take part in a vigil in Guayaquil, Ecuador, Sunday, July 5, 2015. Pope Francis is making his first visit as pope to his Spanish-speaking neighborhood. He'll travel to three South American nations, Ecuador, Bolivia and Paraguay, which are beset by problems that concern him deeply, income inequality and environmental degradation. (AP Photo/Fernando Vergara)
A man holds a banner of Pope Francis as he walks toward Samanes Park where Pope Francis will offer a mass, to take part in a vigil in Guayaquil, Ecuador, Sunday, July 5, 2015. Francis is making his first visit as pope to his Spanish-speaking neighborhood. He'll travel to three South American nations, Ecuador, Bolivia and Paraguay, which are beset by problems that concern him deeply, income inequality and environmental degradation. (AP Photo/Fernando Vergara)
Pope Francis waves to the crowd as he rides in the popemobile through Samanes Park, where he will celebrate Mass, in Guayaquil, Ecuador, Monday, July 6, 2015. A crowd estimated at 1 million people, greeted Francis on the packed dirt of Samanes Park for a late-morning Mass. (AP Photo/Fernando Vergara)
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