his papacy to read an Easter blessing Sunday, March 27, when he appeared at the window of his Vatican apartment to greet thousands of pilgrims in Saint Peter’s Square.
"We felt we were saying goodbye to him," Bloomberg news agency quoted Kathleen Corren, a retired social worker from Middlesbrough, England, as saying. "We thought this was going to be the end for him and wanted to be there for him," said Corren, who traveled to Vatican City for the event.
She and other pilgrims were apparently close to tears as they saw how an aid removed the microphone as it became evident that the 84-year old pontiff was unable to speak this Easter, for the first time in his 26-years as spiritual leader of the world’s over one million Catholics. Pope John Paul II has only spoken once in public, on March 13, since undergoing a tracheotomy, February 24, to ease breathing difficulties.
The Pope traditionally blesses pilgrims gathered in the square on Easter Sunday and reads a prayer, known as the Urbi et Orbi or "to Rome and the world", after Easter mass. Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Angelo Sodano read the prayer in the Pope’s place, which centered around the need for peace in the Middle East and Africa as well as giving aid to those suffering from poverty and hunger.
"LIVING WORD"
"Stay with us, Living Word of the Father, and teach us words and deeds of peace: peace for our world consecrated by your blood and drenched in the blood of so many innocent victims: peace for the countries of the Middle East and Africa, where so much blood continues to be shed," Sodano said, according to a transcript seen by BosNewsLife.
"Peace for all of humanity, still threatened by fratricidal wars, stay with us, Bread of eternal life, broken and distributed to those at table," he said. "Give also to us the strength to show generous solidarity towards the multitudes who are even today suffering and dying from poverty and hunger, decimated by fatal epidemics or devastated by immense natural disasters. By the power of your Resurrection, may they too become sharers in new life," the cardinal added on the Pope’s behalf.
He also warned in his prayer for materialism saying that "the men and women of the third millennium" need the "Risen Lord." "Stay with us now, and until the end of time [and] grant that the material progress of peoples may never obscure the spiritual values which are the soul of their civilization," he added.
FRUSTRATED PONTIFF
The Pope appeared clearly frustrated at not being able to speak as in the past, when he addressed the Easter crowd in more than 60 languages. Doctors reportedly advised him to limit his speech after the surgery, but it became clear he may not be able to speak at all.
The latest ailment adds to the health problems of the ailing church leader, who also suffers from Parkinson’s disease, which has left him unable to walk and confined to a wheelchair.
John Paul II was hospitalized twice in February after influenza and larynx spasms caused breathing problems. The Pope, who stayed at Rome’s Gemelli clinic in 1981 after being shot in an assassination attempt, underwent rehabilitation for breathing and speaking after the surgery on his throat.
Polish-born Karol Josef Wojtyla is the third longest-serving pontiff in church history and the first non-Italian pope since Adrian VI more than 400 years ago, experts say. (With reports from Rome and Vatican City).
