Wednesday, April 02, 2008

Funeral of Pope John Paul II

The funeral of Pope John Paul II was held on April 8, 2005, six days after his death on April 2.

The funeral was followed by the novemdiales devotional in which the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Catholic Churches observe nine days of mourning.

On February 22, 1996, Pope John Paul II introduced revisions to the centuries-old ceremonies surrounding papal death, repose and burial. The revisions enacted through the apostolic constitution Universi Dominici Gregis applied to his own funeral.

Pope John Paul's funeral brought together the single largest gathering of heads of state in history, surpassing the funeral of Winston Churchill.

Coinciding with the funeral in Vatican City, archbishops and bishops at cathedrals throughout the world celebrated memorial Masses for grieving Catholics.

In a historical rarity, Protestant and Eastern Orthodox Christian leaders, as well as leaders in Judaism and Islam, offered memorials and prayers of their own for their congregants sharing in the grief of Catholics.

At the funeral itself, Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I attended from the honorary first seat in the sector reserved for delegations from churches not in full communion with Rome; this was the first time an Ecumenical Patriarch attended a papal funeral since the Great Schism.

The Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, was present at a papal funeral for the first time since the Church of England broke with the papacy in the 16th century.

Also for the first time ever, the head of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahido Church, Patriarch Abune Paulos attended a papal funeral.

It is thought that billions of people had watched the funeral either through actually being in Vatican Square, watching it on television live, or watching a taped version or replayed version later that day.

The latter may be particularly true in the United States, where the funeral happened early in the morning and on a weekday.

It is unknown whether the funeral of the pope was the most watched event in history; if so, it would overtake another funeral to hold that spot, that one being the funeral of Diana, Princess of Wales.

The Vatican welcomed some four million visitors during the memorial week, which cost an estimated six million euros.
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