Pope travels to Adriatic shrine

[emad]

BBC News snip

By David Willey
BBC, Loreto



The ailing Pope was wheeled to the altar to begin the service
Pope John Paul was greeted by tens of thousands of pilgrims as he arrived at a shrine on Italy's Adriatic coast to beatify three future saints. Beatification is the last stage before full sainthood. The three were all members of Catholic Action, a lay Catholic movement which tries to bring a religious dimension into politics.

The journey to Loreto will be the 84-year-old Pope's last trip of the year outside Rome . Rather fewer than the 200,000 people that the organisers expected turned up to see the Pope.The crowd was much smaller than that when the Pope last attended a similar youth rally at this popular Catholic shrine here in 1996.

Elaborate stage management behind the scenes, from the moment the Pope's helicopter touched down in a valley near the sea, prevented the crowd and television viewers from seeing just how weak and immobile the pontiff has become.
More:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/3628512.stm

"all members of Catholic Action, a lay Catholic movement which tries to bring a religious dimension into politics." .....

BLESSED CLIFFORD BAXTER? JEFF SKILLING? AUGUSTO PINOCHET ? I think we should be told...