BY DELISA THWALA
MBABANE- A numbers of emaSwati and Catholics have joined the thousands of people paying their respect, to the late Pope Benedict.
Thousands of people have lined up to pay their respects to Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI at St Peter’s Basilica where he will lie in state for three days before a ‘simple’ funeral at the Vatican on Thursday.
Roman Catholic churches in the country, during the first service of the year, made mention of the great loss suffered by the whole Roman Catholic community.
In a morning service at Cathedral Manzini, Father Ntshangase mentioned that they were greatly pained by the loss of their leader and further urged Catholics to pray for Pope’s soul.
Meanwhile the doors of the Basilica were swung open just after 9am yesterday so the public, some of whom had waited for hours, could pay their respects to the late pontiff.
The 95-year-old passed on at 9.34am on December 31, 2022 in the Vatican monastery, where he had lived since his shock retirement in 2013. He was the first pope to retire from the papacy in 600 years.
His body, dressed in a mitre, the headgear of a bishop and a red cloak like vestment in preparation, was placed on a simple dais, with two Swiss guards standing on either side as the faithful walked by.
