Thousands fill St Peter's square
Gathering beneath a brilliant sky, thousands of pilgrims converged on St Peter’s Square today as cardinals held a Mass before shutting themselves inside the Sistine Chapel to begin their election of a new Pope.
Thousands of people passed through metal detectors to get into St Peter’s Basilica for the midmorning Mass celebrated by the 115 crimson-robed cardinals who will elect the successor to John Paul II, while thousands more followed the service on giant screens set up in the square.
Many gazed up at the chimney on the slanted roof of the chapel, where white smoke will eventually signal to the world that the church’s 265th Pontiff has been elected.
The famous stove in the chapel, where the “princes” of the church will convene later in the day, also will bellow black smoke to signal any inconclusive session of voting.
The cardinals were to sequester themselves inside the chapel in the afternoon after a solemn procession from the Vatican’s Apostolic Palace.
“We are really living something historic,” said Rigel Salazar, 42, a merchant from Ciudad Valles, Mexico. “It’s a great opportunity to be here.”
Salazar said she planned to be in the square every day this week “to see what colour the smoke comes out.”
At the edge of the large column-lined square, people walked by a news-stand selling the Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano, which today featured four-pages of photos of each of the 115 cardinals voting – one of whom will almost certainly be the new Pontiff.
Although the conclave can elect any baptised Catholic male as Pope, that has rarely been done.
For those in the square, anticipation was growing over the identity of the next Pope.
“Now what we are all hoping for is that the Lord illuminates the cardinals, and that is the purpose of the Mass, that the Lord through them makes the decision” of who will be the next Pope, said the Reverend Luis Serrano, a 28-year-old priest from Isla Margarita, Venezuela, who is studying theology in Rome.
“It is a very strong burden, choosing the Pope who will guide the church.”
He said he felt no envy of the cardinals charged with choosing the pontiff.
“They must feel fear and anxiety,” Serrano said. “They are humans like anyone else. I wouldn’t want to put myself in their shoes.”
Paul Campisi, an engineer from Albany, New York, said he believed the next Pope would not differ in his direction from John Paul II’s.
“You can’t change religion with the times,” said Campisi, 42. “Religion has to be the stability. How can you change the teachings of the New and Old Testaments? It is what it is.”
| Related Stories: |
|
