EASTER CELEBRATIONS: With the strains of the midday Muslim call to prayer reverberating throughout the narrow cobblestone streets of Jerusalem's Old City, thousands of Christian pilgrims set off yesterday on their Good Friday procession retracing the path Jesus took to his crucifixion.
Franciscan monks in plain brown robes led the crowds along the Via Dolorosa, or Way of Sorrows, leaving the lay pilgrims and actors to inject some pageantry into the event.
Some donned crowns with large thorns and carried crosses, while others re-enacted the Passion by playing the parts of a bloodied scourged Jesus and his disciples as well as Roman soldiers, one of whom spoiled the Biblical scene by shading his eyes from the noon sun with sunglasses.
The parade took off at a sprightly pace from the first Station of the Cross in what is now the Muslim quarter of the walled city, and is widely believed not to be the actual place where Jesus was sentenced to death by the Roman governor, Pontius Pilate.
However, such historical quibbles bothered not the faithful from around the world who thronged the narrow streets, some jostling to get closer to the front of the procession where a portable speaker broadcast verses recited by priests in Latin and English at each station.
Local souvenir-hawkers who normally hassle tourists with their overweening sales pitches fell unusually silent as they watched thousands of potential customers pass stalls stocked with glow-in-the-dark statues of the Virgin Mary, oversized rosary beads and bootleg copies of Mel Gibson's controversial and timely film, The Passion Of The Christ.
This year Easter Week is marked at the same time by both Orthodox and western Christians, who generally follow different calendars.
This blessed coincidence led to no small amount of congestion, tension and flare-ups once the procession had entered the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.
Built over what is believed to be the true site of the crucifixion, burial and resurrection of Christ, the church is the venue for the final five Stations of the Cross.
Six Christian faiths stake claims to worship at the churches, grottos and shrines that make up this cavernous stone building, and they guard their respective territory ferociously.
The territorial possessiveness played itself out yesterday as groups enacted their Good Friday rituals in what is the most important shrine in Christen- dom.
The Coptic Christian priests, who were dressed in fine purple robes, stamped around in circles beside the tomb where Jesus is believed to have been buried, striking the stone floor with wooden staves.
For the 12th Station of the Cross, the Latin Catholics briefly squatted in the Greek Orthodox chapel, built over the rock of Calvary on which Jesus was crucified.
The building was a feast of glorious religious outfits, from the pointed black hoods of the Armenian priests to the modest white robes of the diminutive nuns from St Teresa of Calcutta's Missionaries of Charity.
Its domed ceilings echoed with prayers in different languages, and tides of worshippers flowed in and out of the main door.
Elderly veiled women clutched small wooden crosses to their breasts, while others hauled in a life-size cross hoisted at shoulder height.
Dozens of pilgrims bent over the Stone of Unction, a slab of pink stone inside the entrance of the church where Jesus was laid when he was taken down from the cross and anointed with myrrh and aloe.
They kissed the stone, rubbed icons and medals on it, and even perfume, which they then soaked back up with cloths.