VATICAN CITY // Pilgrims and dignitaries from the world over streamed into Rome on Saturday for the naming of John Paul II and John XXIII as saints in the first ever double papal canonisation.
In front of the Vatican, families and groups of scouts armed with folding chairs and sleeping mats braved skies threatening rain to stake out their places in a swelling queue to get onto St Peter’s Square, which was to open only in the early hours of Sunday.
“We’ve come early to get the best places on the square. I don’t think we will be getting much sleep tonight, but we’ll be singing and praying,” said French priest Etienne, who had come over from France with 50 pilgrims.
Poline Tallen from Nigeria, who was dressed in a blue and yellow boubou dress with images of John Paul II’s face on it, said she had travelled for the ceremony because the Polish pope “had a great impact on me. I met him in 1983 here in Rome, and it changed my life.”
Nearby, the leader of a boisterous crowd freshly arrived from Lebanon said “we have nothing with us, just our flags. But we’re happy to be here even if it rains!”
Schoolchildren wearing yellow John Paul II backpacks mingled with nuns lugging suitcases off coaches at Rome’s main Termini train station, where Italy’s civil protection agency had set up a huge medical tent.
Priests strumming guitars and singing Hallelujah had taken to the streets of the city’s historic centre late on Friday, while others holding high crosses led prayers amid curious crowds of ice-cream eating tourists.
Also in Rome for the ceremony were 98 official foreign delegations, including Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe and Polish Solidarity leader Lech Walesa.
Ukrainian prime minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk cut his trip short amid growing fears Russia could be about to invade his country.
Tapestry portraits of the new saints were on show high above the crowd in St Peter’s Square, while posters in the surrounding streets showed John Paul II and John XXIII already boasting shiny halos, presided over by a benevolently smiling Pope Francis.
The late pontiffs will join the roster of saints at what will be the first-ever double papal canonisation on Sunday, seen as an attempt to unite conservatives and reformists.
Poland’s charismatic, globe-trotting John Paul II became an icon to many conservative Catholics, while Italian John XXIII – nicknamed “Good Pope John” – garnered his liberal reputation by calling the reform-led Second Vatican Council (1962-1965), which breathed new life into the Church.
The canonisation of two of modern-day Catholicism’s most influential figures will be presided over by Pope Francis and attended by his elderly predecessor Benedict XVI, bringing two living pontiffs together to celebrate two deceased predecessors.
Delegations from across the world will join thousands of bishops, priests, and scarlet-cloaked cardinals and the 800,000 or so pilgrims expected, who will be able to follow the ceremonies in different languages on 19 giant screens in some of the Italian capital’s most picturesque spots.
Churches were to remain open all night on Saturday for prayer vigils ahead of the mass in St Peter’s Square on Sunday to honour two Roman Catholic leaders whose pontificates spanned from the height of the Cold War with the Cuban missile crisis to the fall of the Berlin wall.
* Agence France-Presse
