People worldwide gathered in churches and in front of TVs as Pope John Paul II's funeral was celebrated in Rome.

From predominantly Buddhist Myanmar to predominantly Catholic Latin American countries, in chapels, cathedrals and outside mosques, Catholics and non-Catholics remembered the Polish pontiff.

In the Middle East, the funeral was broadcast on Arab television networks, including Christian, Muslim and secular stations. Many Arabic stations aired live coverage from the Vatican as well as studio discussions between Catholic and Islamic leaders.

Maronite Father Joseph Mouannes, general secretary of the Lebanese bishops' communications commission, said when he left a TV studio April 8, throughout Beirut church "bells were ringing and the muezzin were echoing their Islamic prayers. I was shocked. I was asking myself, 'What is happening in Beirut now?' and then I remembered, 'It's the funeral of the pope now.' You can't imagine, all the city, with all the bells ringing, and the muezzin praying. It was something unbelievable."

In Bethlehem, West Bank, nearly 200 faculty members and students from Bethlehem University crowded into the small university chapel for a Mass; some students had to be turned away because there was no room.

At one point in the Mass, three female students held aloft a placard with the words "Santo Subito" and "Immediately Saint" that intersected in a cross; the slogan was written again in Arabic atop the cross.

---In their homes, many Israelis and Palestinians followed the funeral on their televisions. "I watched the pope on television when he was here five years ago, and he had such charisma and projected such warmth and love then that I realized that, even I, a secular Jew, also had warm feelings for him," said Mali Sorek, 53, who spent the morning viewing the pope's funeral Mass in her Jerusalem living room. "He was a very special man."

---In Pakistan, the national flag flew at half-staff April 8 as a mark of respect for Pope John Paul. More than 40 police officers stood guard and mounted roadblocks outside Our Lady of Fatima Church in the capital, Islamabad, during a memorial Mass attended by diplomats and leaders of other faiths. The Mass was concelebrated by Archbishop Alessandro D'Errico, the Vatican's nuncio to Pakistan, and Bishop Andrew Francis of Multan.

---In Mexico City, mourners stayed up all night at the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe to watch the funeral, which was broadcast live on large screens and on television nationwide. Pope John Paul visited Mexico five times, and Mexicans left a sea of candles before a bronze statue of the pontiff in front of the basilica. President Vicente Fox, who attended the funeral, declared April 8 a national day of mourning and ordered flags flown at half-staff across the country.

---In Haiti, some citizens recalled the first words the pope spoke as he stepped onto the tarmac at the Port-au-Prince airport in March 1983: "Things must change here." "He was the first person to speak about change here," said Luc Mesadieu, presidential candidate for the Christian Movement for a New Haiti, a Protestant evangelical party, recalling the period three years before the fall of dictator Jean-Claude Duvalier. "At the time, no one dared to speak about change."

In Casales, a community of descendants of the Polish army that fought with Napoleon against Haitian slave independence fighters, Pope John Paul was remembered with a special Mass. "We are proud to be descendants of the same ancestors as those of Karol Wojtyla," Massgoers told local media.

---In Toronto, a city Pope John Paul visited in 1984 and again for World Youth Day in 2002, Polish-Canadians transformed the area around St. Casimir Church into an impromptu shrine to the pope. On April 8, the major thoroughfare on which the church is located was closed to allow Toronto's Polish community and others to attend a memorial Mass. That evening, the Toronto Archdiocese's Office of Catholic Youth organized a memorial Mass at St. Basil Church in recognition of the pope's special love for young people.

--- In Moscow, some 1,000 people packed into the city's Catholic cathedral to watch the funeral Mass televised live. The same day in neighboring Ukraine, Ukrainian Orthodox Patriarch Filaret of Kiev celebrated a memorial service at St. Volodomyr Orthodox Cathedral. "Prayers for Pope John Paul II today were the manifestation of Christian love, which is inherent in every Christian," said Patriarch Filaret, who met the pope during his 2001 visit to Ukraine.

---In Myanmar, Catholics throughout the country began to pray in their perpetual adoration chapels for Pope John Paul, reported UCA News, an Asian church news agency based in Thailand. On April 8, some 3,000 Catholics joined 140 priests and religious as well as leaders of other faiths at a special Mass in St. Mary's Cathedral in Yangon.

---In Britain, political campaigning for May 5 national elections was suspended for the day of the pope's funeral as a mark of respect. Screens were erected in London's Trafalgar Square, and some 200 mourners gathered in the rain to watch the ceremony. Most Masses throughout Britain April 8 were suspended so Catholics could watch the funeral on television. The exception was Westminster Cathedral in London, which rang its bells to mark the start of a Mass for the pope at the time his funeral began at the Vatican.

---In Wadowice, Poland, the pope's home town, a giant television screen was erected to allow residents to watch the pope's funeral.

---At the end of a two-and-a-half-hour Mass in the west Indian state of Goa, more than 4,000 people listened to a replay of a six-minute speech Pope John Paul delivered in the local Konkani language during a 1986 visit. After the service, most of the congregation remained to watch a live telecast of the papal funeral.

---A memorial Mass for Pope John Paul II in Pyongyang, the North Korean capital, drew about 100 mourners, according to international news reports. Slightly more than a minute of video footage that aired in South Korea April 10 showed people praying for the pope and receiving Communion, according to UCA News, an Asian church news agency based in Thailand. The celebrant was reportedly a Korean priest who had been ordained in the United States, but he was not identified. News reports described a choir singing to a pianist's accompaniment and women wearing white head coverings. North Korea's state-run media announced Pope John Paul's death April 5, three days after it occurred.

In the week following Pope John Paul II's death, more than 3 million pilgrims descended on Rome to honor the late pontiff, a Vatican statement said April 12.

According to final figures from the Italian government, record crowds headed to St. Peter's Basilica, where Pope John Paul's body lay in front of the main altar April 4-7, with 21,000 people entering the church every hour, or 350 per minute. Visitors waited an average of 13 hours to pay their respects; the longest wait was 24 hours, and the longest line was more than three miles.

---On April 8, the day of the pope's funeral Mass, 500,000 packed St. Peter's Square and the street leading up to it, with another 600,000 watching the Mass on giant television screens set up near the Vatican and at sites on the outskirts of Rome. Volunteers distributed more than 3 million free bottles of water over seven days.

---The number of riders on Rome's already crowded public transportation system increased by 40 percent. Buses and trams carried an additional 1.1 million people per day, and the city's subway system carried an additional 300,000, with a total of more than 15 million trips above and below ground April 2-8.

---More than 6,000 accreditations have been issued since April 2. While the Vatican statement said it was impossible to count exactly the number of radio and television stations that broadcast the April 8 funeral, 80 channels transmitted from European Broadcasting Union positions, and 137 television stations from 81 countries informed the Pontifical Council for Social Communications that they carried the Mass.

---Vatican Radio broadcast live in seven languages. The Vatican Web site's live video stream offered an alternative to television for 1.3 million people.

---At the funeral, 157 cardinals concelebrated the Mass, and an additional 700 bishops and 3,000 prelates were present. Some 300 priests were on hand to distribute Communion, with a ratio of 1 priest to 1,700 faithful.

---Among the 169 foreign delegations were 10 royal sovereigns, 59 heads of state, 17 heads of government, and dozens of ministers and ambassadors. Twenty-three Orthodox and eight Protestant delegations attended, as well as Jewish, Muslim and other non-Christian communities.

---CNS