Pope: My mission is accomplished

As he breathed his last on Saturday night in Rome, Pope John Paul II summed up his life’s work: "My mission is accomplished."

This was related by Papal Nuncio Archbishop Antonio Franco, who said the Pope was lucid until the end.

The Pope’s mission "has been to bring us closer to Jesus Christ and to bring Jesus to each one of us. This has been the message from the first moment," Franco said in a statement.

In the Vatican, an aide to the Pope read out the late Pontiff’s last message to pilgrims, in which he said "love converts hearts and gives peace."

"To humanity, which sometimes seems lost and dominated by the power of evil, selfishness and fear, the risen Lord gives the gift of his love which forgives, reconciles and reopens the soul to hope," said the message, read to a crowd of over 100,000 by Archbishop Leonardo Sandri.

On hearing the message, many people broke into tears.

Franco, the Vatican’s representative in the Philippines, said the "Pope’s death gave the Filipino faithful a feeling of sadness, but a consolation was that the Pope remained lucid during his last moments."

Franco will preside over a Mass to be held for the late pontiff at the Manila Cathedral at 9 a.m. on Wednesday. Prayers were offered for the Pope during yesterday’s Sunday Masses in churches all over the country.

More than one billion Catholics around the world are mourning the Pope’s death.

Franco said on Church-run Radio Veritas that the Mass is apart from the daily prayers offered for the Catholic Church’s late spiritual leader.

"Let us continue to pray, like in the last days accompanying the Holy Father, and joining the crowd of people flocking to St. Peter’s Square (in Vatican City) to pray and to be close to (him) in prayer and faith," he said.

On Friday, Franco called on the Filipino faithful to continue praying for the Polish-born Pope, whose real name is Karol Jozef Wojtyla, and entrust him to God’s love and mercy.

He regularly communicated with the Vatican to ask for updates on the Pope’s health.

Meanwhile, Ambassador to the Holy See Leonida Vera said the late Pope told her on different occasions of his love for the Philippines and the Filipino people.

"The Pope kept telling me how he loved the Philippines and he was praying for the country, and was thankful for the love the Filipino people were giving him," she said.

More than four million people turned out to meet the Pope during his visit to Manila in January 1995 for the World Youth Day celebrations, though only one million were expected.

The Pope died at 9:37 p.m. Saturday (3:37 a.m. Sunday in Manila) in his private apartment at the Vatican after an 8 p.m. Mass celebrated by his aides at his bedside, during which he was given the last rites for a second time, Vatican spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls said.

The Mass was presided by Archbishop Stanislaw Dziwisz with the participation of Cardinal Marian Jaworski, Archbishop Stanislaw Rylko and Monsignor Mieczyslaw Mokryzycki, Navarro-Valls said in a statement.

Navarro-Valls added that "during the course of the Mass, the Viaticum (a holy communion for the dying) was administered to the Holy Father and, once again, the sacrament of the anointing of the sick."

The Pope was administered last rites for the first time soon after his condition deteriorated severely late Thursday.

Present at the moment of death were his two secretaries Dziwisz and Mokryzycki, Jaworski, Rylko, the Rev. Tadeusz Styczen, three nuns — Handmaidens of the Sacred Heart of Jesus — who assist the Pope and their superior, Sister Tobiana Sobodka.

The Pope’s personal physician, Dr. Renato Buzzonetti, with the two doctors on call, Alessandro Barelli and Circo D’Allol, along with two nurses on call, were also present.

Immediately after the Pope’s death came the required officials: Cardinal Angelo Sodano, the Vatican’s No. 2 official and secretary of state as well as the camerlengo or chamberlain; Cardinal Eduardo Martinez Somalo; Archbishop Leonardo Sandri, the Argentine cleric who is undersecretary of state and who became John Paul II’s official voice for the public; and Archbishop Paolo Sardi, deputy camerlengo.

After them came Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, dean of the College of Cardinals, and Cardinal Jozef Tomko, an old friend.

The Vatican said the first meeting of the General Congregation of Cardinals, which will carry out church business until John Paul II’s successor is elected, will be held Monday at 10 a.m.

The Vatican noted that the Pope’s final hours were marked by the "uninterrupted prayer of all those who were assisting him in his pious death and by the choral participation in prayer of the thousands of faithful who for many hours had been gathered in St. Peter’s Square."

A memorial Mass for the repose of the Pope’s soul was held at 10:30 a.m. yesterday, Divine Mercy Sunday, in St. Peter’s Square, with Sodano presiding. At 12 noon, the Marian prayer of Easter time, the Regina Coeli, was recited. — With AFP