Pope Francis will speak to a joint session of Congress, meet President Obama and address the United Nations, but it will be his appearances in Philadelphia that have local Roman Catholics excited.

Five buses will be leaving Friday from Connecticut filled with pilgrims who are happy simply to bask in the popular pope’s presence during the World Meeting of Families at the Pennsylvania Convention Center on Saturday and during the Mass he will celebrate Sunday.

It may not be the easiest of trips.

“We’re told it may be a 3-mile walk,” from the buses to the venue, said Judy Esposito of East Haven, who’s seen two other popes with her friend Carol Scussel — both Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI in New York and at Mass with Benedict at the Vatican.

“It’ll be worth it to see the pope,” Esposito said. “Anything’s worth it.

“He’s a real people pope and he’s so gentle and kind and loves the poor people,” she said. “He’s just like a regular person. He doesn’t even live in the Vatican. It’s very, very emotional. You really have to be there to know what it feels like. I can’t believe we’re going again.”

She and Scussel have also been to Fatima twice and to Lourdes, shrines to the Blessed Mother. And they’re keeping themselves in shape for the potentially grueling trip.

“We go down to the beach in East Haven and walk that neighborhood there to get used to walking,” Esposito said. “I’m sure the pope will give me the strength to walk, even if I have to sit on a curb for a while.”

She agrees with the pope’s pronouncements, such as making annulments easier to procure. “He’s getting a little lenient on annulments … which is good” because younger people see the church as being too judgmental on those who end their marriages.

“We’ve got to get the young people into the churches,” she said. “We need our young people to get more involved and do more service work.”

Scussel, who’s also from East Haven, said she’s “very excited” by Francis’ visit. “He seems like a pleasant person and he’s got so much energy that follows him,” she said. “I hope that we can get close enough” to see him, said Scussel, but, “just to be able to be at his Mass, we’re kind of excited over that.”

Remembering seeing Pope Benedict at Yankee Stadium, Scussel said, “It’s very exciting. It’s just very spiritual. There’s so much electricity with so many people. You just can’t help but feel the energy that he portrays … There isn’t any word for it.”

Scussel said she follows the pope’s words on being less judgmental about homosexuality. “I just believe … he’s just trying to say things and do things to bring people up to date on it,” she said.

Walter Kendrioski of Guilford will be going to Philadelphia with his wife, Michele. He said Pope Francis has made it easier to teach his children the best way to live their lives.

“He’s actually following the rules to the letter of the law, being humble and following the life of a religious man,” Kendrioski said.

Kendrioski said he wants to “motivate them to do the right things in this world” and the pope’s example “makes it a lot easier. You can take his actions, he’s following the points that he’s brought out in the Bible” and isn’t living in a big mansion or driving an expensive car.

“As a Christian, we’re really called to do that: get out of that competition for the fanciest cars,” Kendrioski said. “It makes it easier to say, ‘See, he’s walking the walk.’”

While he’s in the United States, Francis will also celebrate a canonization Mass for Father Junipero Serra at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, the first ever held in the United States, and will visit prisoners in Philadelphia and students at Our Lady of Queens School in New York, among other events.

The Knights of Columbus, based in New Haven, are heavily involved in the pope’s visit, said Andrew Walther, the Knights’ vice president for communications.

The international fraternal organization is helping support the World Meeting for Families, printed 350,000 Mass booklets for the Sept. 27 ceremony and are printing 250,000 prayer cards and books for the canonization ceremony for Serra, who founded missions in what is now California and Mexico. The 24-page Mass booklet is intended as a keepsake,

“We also have a number of Knights that are going to be serving as ushers in New York” and “thousands of Knights volunteering in Philadelphia,” Walther said. “We’ve been helping financially in all three destinations as well,” he said.

The Knights also noted that music for the Philadelphia mass includes songs composed by Peter Latona, a member of Knights of Columbus Potomac Council 433 in Washington, D.C.