Prayers for our Holy Father...

It is 2:00 am in New Mexico on April 2nd, 2005 and I find it difficult to sleep. In Rome it is 11:00 am and the square at St. Peter's Basilica is again filling up with thousands of people who along with many others around the world are praying for our Holy Father. Although his body is slowly shutting down - the normal end of life process - he has chosen not to go to the hospital where he would have had access to more intense, extraordinary medical care - preferring instead to be in his home and if it is God's will, dying with dignity and peace, surrounded by people who have loved and cared for him over the years.
A Vatican news brief is due shortly. What it will tell us is unknown, but it is most likely to be sad news. On the other hand, how can we be sad when we know this Holy man who has served God and His Church so well over the last 26 years will be going to his eternal rest, free of pain and suffering?

Update (11:30 am - Rome): According to the Vatican, the Holy Father's condition has not changed that much and he is not in a coma although he is in and out of consciousness. When told of all the young people who had come to pray in the square last night he said ( Dr. Navarro-Valls said this was reconstructed from what the Holy Father said several times during the evening): "I have looked for you; now you have come to me and I thank you." Mass was celebrated at 7:30 am in the presence of the Pope although he did not concelebrate. Unless there is a significant change there will not be another update on the Holy Father's condition until around 5:30 pm in Rome.

"The more sand that has escaped from the hourglass of our life,
the clearer we should see through it." Pope John Paul II