Christmas Eve Around The World

VATICAN CITY: Pope Benedict XVI’s Christmas Eve Mass at St. Peter’s Basilica got off to a tumultuous start Thursday after an apparently deranged woman jumped the barriers and knocked him down on his way to the altar.

In his homily, delivered after the incident, Benedict urged the world to “wake up” from selfishness and petty affairs, and find time for God and spiritual matters.

The 82-year-old pope was unhurt in the fall, said a Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Ciro Benedettini. The pontiff did appear somewhat shaken and leaned heavily on aides and an armrest as he sat down in his chair.

Footage from the Vatican aired on Italy’s state TV showed a woman dressed in a red, hooded sweat shirt vaulting over the wooden barriers and rushing toward the pope before being swarmed by bodyguards.

Video shot by a witness showed the woman grabbing the pope’s vestments as she was taken down, with Benedict seemingly falling on top of her.

The commotion happened as the pope’s procession headed toward the main altar and shocked gasps rang out through the public that packed the basilica. The procession halted and security rushed to the trouble spot.

Benedettini said the woman who pushed the pope appeared to be mentally unstable and had been arrested by Vatican police. He said she also knocked down Cardinal Roger Etchegaray, who was taken to a hospital for a checkup.

It was the second year in a row there was a security breach at the service. At the end of last year’s Mass a woman jumped the barriers, got close to the pope but was quickly blocked by security.

That woman, too, wore a red sweat shirt, but Benedettini said it was not known if the same person was behind Thursday’s incident.

During the Mass, the pope appeared tired at times but celebrated the ritual without further incident.

For the first time in recent memory, however, Christmas Eve Mass began at 10 p.m. instead of midnight, in what a Vatican spokesman said was an effort to help Benedict preserve his strength for his schedule over the Christmas season.

In the West Bank town of Bethlehem, meanwhile, residents hemmed in by an Israeli security barrier and still recovering from years of violence celebrated their town’s annual day in the spotlight along with pilgrims and tourists. Visitors milled around Manger Square, mingling with clergymen, camera crews and locals hawking food and trinkets.

The region’s top Roman Catholic cleric, Latin Patriarch Fouad Twal, reminded listeners in a holiday address that peace remains out of reach. “The wish that we most want, we most hope for, is not coming. We want peace,” Twal said after he passed into Bethlehem in a traditional holiday procession from nearby Jerusalem.

Hours later, an Israeli man was shot and killed in the West Bank in an attack by Palestinian gunmen. Such attacks have become rare in recent years as the West Bank has regained a semblance of normalcy.

The Israeli military identified the man as a resident of a nearby settlement, and a little-known Palestinian faction took responsibility in an e-mail sent to journalists.

Some Christians in other far-flung parts of the world also saw gloom edge out the holiday cheer.

On Thursday, explosions killed at least 26 people across Iraq, most of them Shiite pilgrims. The blasts raised fears of further sectarian attacks at the approach of Ashoura, when Shiites mark a period of mourning and self-flagellation for the Prophet Muhammad’s grandson.

In Baghdad, a marble palace once occupied by Saddam Hussein housed an impromptu Christmas celebration for U.S. soldiers and others far from home.

“I have mixed emotions,” said Lt. Col Timothy Bedsole, 52, an Army chaplain from Alabama who was marking his second Christmas in Iraq. “It’s a very happy time for us as Christians and a very sad time to be away from our families.”