Vatican: At the end of a week marked by a series of alarmist reports about his rapidly declining health, Pope John Paul yesterday presided over a three-hour canonisation ceremony in St Peter's Square, writes Paddy Agnew in Rome.
Looking and sounding less tired than a week ago when he had announced the appointment of 31 new cardinals, the Pope both led the prayers and read a homily during a ceremony which saw three missionaries, Italian Daniele Comboni and Germans Arnold Janssen and Josef Freinademetz, proclaimed saints.
Father Janssen was the founder of the Divine Word Missionaries order and Father Freinademetz was one of its first missionary priests. The order, which publishes the Word magazine and runs Kairos TV in Maynooth, opened their first house in Ireland at Donamon Co Roscommon in 1939. They have houses today in Dublin and Maynooth.
Yesterday's service rounded off a busy weekend for the Pope, who on Saturday had received the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, in a private Vatican audience.
Speaking at what was the first meeting between the two men, the Pope warned the head of the Anglican communion that "new and serious difficulties have arisen" in relations between the two churches, adding: "These difficulties are not all of a merely disciplinary nature; some extend to questions of faith and morals".
The Pope's remarks would appear to be a reference to the controversial question of homosexual clergy, a subject on which the churches remain divided. Whilst the Catholic Church teaches that the practice of homosexuality is a sin, the Anglican Communion was recently rocked when the Episcopalian Church in the United States appointed an openly gay bishop, Gene Robinson, in New Hampshire.
The Pope's admonitory remarks were later echoed by German Cardinal Walter Kasper, head of the Pontifical Council for Christian Unity, who in an informal conversation with reporters on Saturday afternoon acknowledged that the issue of homosexual clergy is not only an internal problem for the Anglican Communion but also "impinges on our ties" with Anglicans.
However, senior Vatican figures and the Archbishop of Canterbury were keen to emphasise their "enthusiasm" for the ongoing, 40-year-long dialogue between the two churches.
Speaking after his audience with the Pope, Dr Williams said: "I found this \ a deeply moving occasion. I'm wearing today the ring which Pope Paul VI gave to my predecessor, Archbishop Ramsey. This morning I had a sense of great privilege at being admitted to this tradition of friendship between the Popes and the Archbishops of Canterbury."
Asked about the Pope's health, the Archbishop of Canterbury replied: "We're all very much aware that the Pope struggles with ill-health and I think the most important impression that I would want to share from my meeting today is of that extraordinary and indomitable spirit and will which lives in him. The words he spoke were weighted with immense power and strength."