Details on getting papal Mass tickets likely not ready for weeks

Published: 2007-11-29

WASHINGTON (CNS) -- To answer the question that is increasingly being asked of officials with the archdioceses of Washington and New York -- and pretty much anyone else who works for the Catholic Church in the region -- you can't yet get tickets to any events during Pope Benedict XVI's visit to those cities in April. The two archdioceses don't expect to have information about how to get tickets for the few public events of the April 15-20 visit until after the first of the year. And what tickets are available will likely be distributed according to formulas that will give priority to people from Washington and New York and neighboring dioceses. The Vatican announced Nov. 12 that the pope will arrive in Washington April 15, spend the next two days there, move on to New York April 18 and depart for Rome the evening of April 20. He will address the United Nations; participate in events with interreligious and ecumenical religious leaders; visit the White House and ground zero, the site where the World Trade Center stood; meet with U.S. bishops and representatives of Catholic education institutions; join a rally for youths and seminarians; and celebrate Mass for priests, deacons and religious of New York. However, most of those activities will be invitation-only. Unlike previous papal visits, when Masses were held at the National Mall and Central Park -- wide-open venues with space for hundreds of thousands of people -- opportunities to see Pope Benedict will be more limited. Pretty much the only chances the general public will have will be at Masses at the Washington Nationals' new baseball stadium, with a capacity of about 45,000, and Yankee Stadium in New York, which has a capacity of perhaps 65,000.

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