A dying Pope John Paul II scribbled down a final message last night to his close friends, begging them not to cry.
“I am happy and you should be as well,” the note read. “Let us pray together with joy.”
The bedridden pontiff was able to write the message with the help of his private secretary, Archbishop Stanislaw Dziwisz, Italian daily Il Secolo XIX reported.
The leader of the world’s 1.1 billion Catholics, a passionate advocate for life, clung to life himself, with smiles for visitors to his bedside – his mood “extraordinarily serene.”
Outside his window, more than 70,000 well-wishers filled chilly St. Peter’s Square for word of the fate of the 84-year-old pontiff.
“Stay with us. Don’t leave us,” they chanted, many weeping as they stared up at the papal apartments.
The Vatican offered grim bulletins that his breathing had become labored, his kidneys were failing and his condition was “very grave.”
In its latest bulletin, the Vatican said John Paul’s heart and kidneys were failing, his breathing was shallow, and his blood pressure had dropped dangerously low.
The emotional strain of the pope’s latest health crisis was evident on his closest associates.
His confidant and official spokesman, Joaquin Navarro-Valls, openly wept as he told reporters that John Paul managed to celebrate Mass at dawn from his bed on the third floor.
Some thought the pope had died earlier in the day, after the Bronze Door, a massive portal beneath a portico under St. Peter’s Square, was partially closed.
The door is traditionally shut when a pope dies and is kept closed until a new pontiff is elected.
Earlier in the day, Camillo Cardinal Ruini told those attending a Mass at the Basilica of St. John Lateran in Rome that the pope “already sees and touches the Lord. He is already united with our sole savior.”
Ruini comforted the Mass celebrants by saying John Paul “is living with . . . incredible serenity.
“He has abandoned himself to the hands of Christ, with whom he has always lived, worked, suffered and had joy.”
Marcio Cardinal Francesco Pompedda, a high-ranking Vatican administrator, said the pope opened his eyes and smiled when he came into the room.
“I understood he recognized me. It was a wonderful smile – I’ll remember it forever. It was a benevolent smile – a father-like smile,” he said. “I also noticed that he wanted to tell me something, but he could not.
“But what impressed me very much was his expression of serenity.”
Many in the crowd in St. Peter’s Square were wrapped in blankets and stood silently as they looked up at the pope’s windows, the only ones illuminated in the Apostolic Palace.
John Paul was tended throughout the night by his closest aides and a medical team, which included the pontiff’s personal doctor, a cardiologist, two intensive-care specialists, an ear, nose and throat specialist and two nurses.
Around the world, Catholics and non-Catholics awaited word about the pope, who had set records for travel and building of good will in a remarkable 26-year papacy.
The White House said that President Bush and his wife, Laura, were praying for the pope and that the world’s concern was “a testimony to his greatness.”
“He is in our thoughts and prayers during this time,” a presidential spokesman said.
At St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Edward Cardinal Egan called the pope “an extraordinary hero for our time.”
Countrymen of the first Polish pope had prayed together throughout the day.
“I took time off from work to come and pray,” Krystian Zajac, a 47-year-old plumber, said tearfully at the Wadowice church where the pope prayed as a boy.
“This is the will of God; we just have to pray. Everything is in the hands of God.”
Polish President Aleksander Kwasniewski – a former Communist – attended a Mass in Warsaw and canceled meetings.
Elsewhere, 20,000 Brazilians gathered in Sao Paolo for a Mass, and Nigerians filled a church in Lagos to pray for the pope’s recovery.
The 118 cardinals who will choose a successor prepared to go to Rome. Some had already arrived, according to Italian newspaper reports.
“The successor of Peter, the fisherman, is dying,” Chicago’s Francis Cardinal George said, holding back tears.
Rome’s chief rabbi, Riccardo Di Segni, went to St. Peter’s Square to pray “as a sign of sharing in the grief of our brothers for their concerns and as a sign of warmth for this pope and for all that he has done.”
Muslims in France were praying for the “man of peace,” said Dalil Boubakeur, president of the French Council of the Muslim Faith.
Signs that the end was near were evident during the day as church officials came and went after visiting the pope’s private quarters.
Among them was Archbishop Paolo Sardi, the Vatican vice chamberlain.
The chamberlain’s office is responsible for officially confirming the death of a pope, preparing the nine days of funeral rites, and organizing the conclave to choose a new pope.
Edmund Cardinal Szoka, the former archbishop of Detroit who now serves as governor of Vatican City, said he visited the pope yesterday while he was being given oxygen.
“As soon as he saw me, he recognized me,” Szoka told CBS’s “Early Show.” “I blessed him and, as I did, he tried to make the sign of the cross. So he was perfectly lucid, perfectly conscious, but was having a great deal of trouble breathing.”
Navarro-Valls said that during the day, John Paul asked aides to read him three psalms from the Old Testament and the liturgy of the Third Hour, a biblical passage describing the final stage of the Way of the Cross and the path that Jesus took to his crucifixion.
In that stage, according to the Bible, Christ’s body was taken down from the cross, wrapped in a shroud and placed in a tomb.
Navarro-Valls said the pope followed attentively and made the sign of the cross. “This is surely an image I have never seen in these 26 years,” Navarro-Valls said, as he choked back tears.
Navarro-Valls also said the pontiff chose not to go to the specially reserved room for him at the nearby Gemelli Polyclinic, as he had done during his previous health crises.
“The fact he has not gone back [shows] he is serenely carrying the cross and ready to give up and to say, ‘It is finished,’ ” said his former private secretary, Irish Bishop John Magee.
The pope suffered from a long list of illnesses, including Parkinson’s disease and hip and knee ailments.
The final blow came unexpectedly after a feeding tube had to be inserted through his nose on Wednesday. That led to a series of complications Thursday evening, including septic shock, an infection that poisons the blood and that led to heart failure.
The pope had begun Thursday in frail but stable health – then suddenly turned pale and developed a high fever.
He rallied after taking antibiotics, but then suffered a setback and developed blood poisoning.
John Paul was given the Holy Viaticum – Communion reserved for those close to death – and the last rites. With Post Wire Services