Mourning Cloaks The World After Pope's Death

[NATO AIR]

Official rememberances here, truly a worldwide figure, I added Poland's reaction for the post...

http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/europe/04/02/mourning.pope.ap/index.html

Mourning cloaks the world after pope's death
China makes cursory mention of pontiff's passing
Saturday, April 2, 2005 Posted: 8:56 PM EST (0156 GMT)

(AP) -- From the Caribbean to Cairo, Egypt, people mourned the Saturday death of Pope John Paul II. Below is a sampling of memorials and Masses across the globe.

Poland
The people in Pope John Paul II's hometown fell to their knees and wept Saturday as news of his death reached them at the end of a special Mass in the church where he worshipped as a boy.

"His life has come to an end. Our great countryman has died," parish priest the Rev. Jakub Gil told worshippers.

In Warsaw, church bells rang and traffic halted. At Pilsudski Square, the former Victory Square where he conducted a mass in 1979 in then-communist Poland, people laid flowers in the form of a cross. Others walked to church holding candles.

The pope was deeply loved in mainly Roman Catholic Poland, where his 26-year pontificate served as a source of national pride. Gratitude remains strong for his role in helping topple communism and free Poland from Soviet domination.

 

[Annie]

Official rememberances here, truly a worldwide figure, I added Poland's reaction for the post...

Thanks Nato, that was one of the best 'roundups' I've read.

 

[onedomino]

"Throughout a hard and often difficult life, he stood for social justice and on the side of the oppressed, whether as a young man facing the Nazi occupation in Poland or later in challenging the Communist regime. He never wavered, never flinched, in the struggle for what he thought was good and right." -- British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

A life well spent. Rest in peace, John Paul II.

 

[ScreamingEagle]

World Pays Tribute to Pope John Paul II, `a Hero for the Ages'
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000087&sid=a2wYZyTCjH28&refer=top_world_news

The fact that Red China allowed a tribute to Pope John Paul II is totally amazing and is certainly a tribute to his ability to promote peace around the world.

China's government-sanctioned version of the Catholic church, which doesn't recognize the pope and isn't recognized by the Vatican, sent its condolences. The Catholic Patriotic Association of China said it ``is very sorrowful'' that the pope died, the government said through its official Xinhua News Agency

.

There is sorrow around the world for a Pope who reached out to all.

``I'm very upset, and I'm not even Catholic,'' Spiro Parissis, 32, a Greek-Orthodox security guard at one of Sydney's Skyscrapers, said today. ``In the end, he showed us how to respect one another.''