Pope Francis took a spin around St Peter's Square
this morning and to the delight of the gahtered faithful stepped out of
his vehicle to bless a disabled man in a wheelchair in the crowd.Blue and white flags from his native Argentina fluttered above the Vatican City crowd which Italian media estimate could reach a million.
Civil protection crews closed the main streets leading to the square to traffic and set up barricades for nearly a mile (2km) along the route to try to control the masses.
For nearly half an hour, Francis toured the square in an open-topped car, waving and occasionally kissing babies handed up to him as if he had been doing it for years.
At one point, as he neared a group of people in wheelchairs, he signalled for the vehicle to stop, got off and went to bless a man held up to the barricade by an aide.
The installation Mass is a simpler affair than the 2005 ceremony which launched Pope Benedict XVI's papacy, in keeping with Francis's sober style, but still grand enough to draw 132 official delegations and religious leaders from around the world.
Among the VIPs was the spiritual leader of the world's Orthodox Christians, Bartholomew I, who will become the first patriarch from the Istanbul-based church to attend a papal investiture since the two branches of Christianity split nearly 1,000 years ago. His presence underscores the broad hopes for ecumenical and interfaith dialogue in this new papacy.
But it is Francis's history of living with the poor and working for them while Archbishop of Buenos Aires which seems to have resonated with ordinary Catholics who say they are hopeful that he can inspire a new generation of faithful who have fallen away from the Church.
"I think he'll revive the sentiments of Catholics who received the sacraments but don't go to Mass anymore, and awaken the sentiments of people who don't believe anymore in the Church, for good reason," said Judith Teloni, an Argentine tourist guide who lives in Rome and was attending the Mass with a friend.
Francis
has made headlines with his simple style since the moment he appeared
to the world on the balcony of St Peter's Basilica, eschewing the
ermine-lined red velvet cape his predecessor wore in favour of the
simple papal white cassock, then paying his own bill at the hotel where
he stayed prior to the conclave that elected him pope.
During
today's Mass, Francis received the woollen pallium, or stole,
symbolising his role as shepherd of his flock, and also the simple
gold-plated silver fisherman's ring which is a symbol of the papacy.
A
wax cast of the ring was first presented to Pope Paul VI, who presided
over the second half of the Second Vatican Council, the 1962-65 meetings
that revolutionised the church. Paul never wore it but the cast was
subsequently made into the ring that Francis chose among several other
more ornate ones.
Francis will receive each of the
government delegations in St Peter's Basilica after the Mass, and then
hold an audience with the visiting Christian delegations tomorrow.
He
will have a break on Thursday; a gracious nod perhaps to the fact that
the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Rev Justin Welby, is being
installed that day in London.
As a result, Mr Welby will
not be representing the Anglican Communion at today's installation Mass
for Francis, sending instead a lower-level delegation. All told, six
sovereign rulers, 31 heads of state, three princes and 11 heads of
government will be attending, the Vatican said.
More than
half a dozen Latin American presidents are attending, a sign of the
significance of the election for the region.
Francis, named after the
13th century friar known for his care of the most disadvantaged, has
made clear he wants his pontificate to be focused on the poor, a message
that has resonance in a poverty-stricken region that counts 40% of the
world's Catholics.
For Jews, Orthodox and other religious
leaders, the new pope's choice of Francis as his name is also important
for its reference to the Italian town of Assisi, where Pope John Paul
II began conferences encouraging interfaith dialogue and closer bonds
among Christians.