Pope John Paul is recovering and is expected to leave hospital before Holy Week events leading up to Easter but he has yet to decide what role he will play in them, the Vatican said today.
"We expect him to be back in the Vatican before the start of Holy Week," chief spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls said in the latest health briefing on the 84-year-old Pontiff, who has been in hospital for 11 days after suffering breathing difficulties.
Holy Week starts on Palm Sunday, March 20 this year, and ends on Easter Sunday, March 27. Easter is the most important feast in the Christian liturgical calendar and Holy Week is one of the most intense periods for the Pope.
The Pontiff normally presides at eight long ceremonies that week, two of them late at night. His failure to take part would send a worrying signal to the world's 1.1 billion Roman Catholics.
The spokesman said the Pope, who was rushed to hospital on February 24 and had a tracheotomy to ease severe breathing problems, had made no decision. "When he is back in the Vatican, he will decide how to participate in the Holy Week ceremonies," he said.
Vatican sources have said they expect his participation in the events to be at best severely limited, particularly those which traditionally take place outdoors such as the Via Crucis (Way of the Cross) event at the Colosseum on Good Friday.
Aides were studying the possibility of keeping the Pope in the Vatican and broadcasting live pictures to the faithful at some of the services at least, the sources said.