The Vatican: The Vatican has published a graphically descriptive, behind-the-scenes account of Pope John Paul's final days, hours and minutes.
According to a new Vatican volume that chronicles the last two months of his life, the pope's last comprehensible words were "Let me go to the house of the Father."
He uttered the phrase in Polish in a barely audible voice to aides about 3½ hours before he slipped into a coma and six hours before he died on the evening of April 2nd.
It is the first time the Vatican has published such a detailed, insider's account of any pope's final days.
In the past, there had been much mystery surrounding the deaths of some pontiffs. In 1978, there was much speculation about the death of John Paul's predecessor, John Paul I, who died suddenly after only 33 days in office. The Vatican's handling of information of that death in 1978 was confusing at best, with contradictory official statements about who discovered the body.
This time, the information is so detailed that parts of it read almost like a patient's clinical chart or an aide's private diary.
The volume of more than 200 pages is a detailed chronicle and is to be published as a supplement to Acta Apostolicae Sedis, a kind of official gazette of events in the Vatican. - (Reuters)