It’s clear the Vatican is preparing itself and the world for the imminent death of Pope John Paul II, whose condition worsens by the minute.
It’s clear from a variety of reports that the Pope — who looked positively in agony and tortured in his last public appearance when he couldn’t speak to the crowds below — is now in his final hours/days on earth and death can come at any time. The AP:
VATICAN CITY – Pope John Paul II’s condition has worsened, the Vatican said in a statement Friday afternoon.
Earlier, papal spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls choked up with tears as he told reporters about the pope’s “very grave” condition. He said the 84-year-old pontiff had been “informed of the gravity of his situationâ€? and decided to remain in his apartment overlooking St. Peter’s Square, where thousands of pilgrims gathered to pray for him.
John Paul participated in Mass and received some top aides Friday morning, Navarro-Valls said.
“The pope is still lucid, fully conscious and extraordinarily serene,� Navarro-Valls said. He said the pope had unstable blood pressure and remained in “very grave� condition.
Among the top church officials who gathered at his bedside was Archbishop Paolo Sardi, the Vatican vice chamberlain who runs the Holy See between the death of a pope and the election of a new one.
Another visitor was Cardinal Edmund Szoka, the governor of Vatican City and former archbishop of Detroit, who said the pope was having trouble breathing.
“He was perfectly conscious,� Szoka told WXYZ-TV in Detroit. “He recognized me immediately, and I knelt by his bed and prayed for him. When I was leaving, I gave him a blessing and he tried to bless himself with his hand.�
Reuters reports that the Pope has made it clear he is ready to die:
Pope John Paul signaled he is ready to die by choosing not to return to hospital, his former private secretary said on Friday.
“The fact that he has not gone back to hospital is (shows) that he is serenely carrying the cross and ready to give up and to say ‘It is finished’,” said John Magee, Bishop of Cloyne in Ireland, who worked for the Pope for nine years and was with him during an assassination attempt in 1981.
The 84-year-old Pope appeared close to death on Friday after heart failure and breathing problems although the Vatican said he was still conscious and in a stable but serious condition.
“The only time he told me that he wasn’t going to die was immediately after his being shot in 1981 when he turned to me as he was being put into the ambulance … He said ‘John, this is not the death’,” Magee told Irish state broadcaster RTE.
Also:
–Excerpts are here from Vatican’s comments this morning.
–During the Pope’s illness these men have been in charge.
–But there are still serious questions about control of the Church while he is incapacitated.
–This Pope has often talked about sickeness and illness in his speeches.
–There is a kingmaker in picking a new Pope.
–And there is an election process that will kick in.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.