Pope Prays at Madras Shrine of an Apostle

Midway through his 10-day pilgrimage to India, Pope John Paul II met Wednesday with multitudes of Indian Christians and prayed at the shrine of Thomas the Apostle.

The leader of the world’s 800-million Roman Catholics, dressed in heavy ceremonial vestments despite temperatures in the 90s, appeared at times to be tiring under his demanding schedule.

His first prayer in Madras was at the shrine to the martyrdom of the disciple Thomas, known as Doubting Thomas because, according to St. John’s Gospel, he insisted on placing his hands on the wounds of Jesus Christ before he would believe that Christ had been raised from death after the Crucifixion.

The steep hill called St. Thomas’ Mount, where the apostle is believed to have been run through by a vindictive Hindu spearman, looked much like an anthill Wednesday as hundreds of thousands of Indians--authorities estimated as many as one million--scrambled for a vantage point to see the Pope.

Crowd Almost 500,000

Later, almost 500,000 people, more than at any other stop on the trip so far, gathered for Mass on Madras’ Marina Beach.

Catholics in southern India believe that St. Thomas lived here from AD 52 to 72 and that he established one of the world’s earliest Christian communities. Church records, however, do not authenticate Christianity here before the 4th Century.

Vatican spokesman Joaquin Navarro Valls said the Pope sides with those who believe that Christianity was established here before the end of the 1st Century.

He said the Pope had asked him to tell journalists “how very happy I am about how the trip is going” as it reached the midway point.

The pontiff has said that he came to India for two reasons, for purely pastoral activity and to encourage the Catholic Church of India “to open itself even more to the dialogue with the big religions of this country.”