April 12, 2005

With papal conclave pending, tourists, media look for news

VATICAN CITY
Baltimore Sun

By Robert Little
Sun Foreign Staff
Originally published April 12, 2005
VATICAN CITY - The man from Minnesota stood off to the side of St. Peter's Square and scrolled through the pictures on his digital camera with pride. He'd captured the dome of the basilica, the papal apartments, maybe the chimney of the Sistine Chapel - all the gems that a Vatican-watching tourist requires.

Then he arrived at a true prize.

"Here's the swarm," he said, swinging the camera around to reveal an image that seemed to show three dozen journalists all but stabbing a red-haired woman with cameras and microphones. "Tell me again," he asked, "who was that woman?"

The woman was Barbara Blaine, an American who says she was abused by a Catholic priest in Toledo, when she was a child. Cardinal Bernard Law, accused of covering up sexual abuse when he was the archbishop of Boston, was celebrating Mass in St. Peter's Basilica yesterday, and she had come to protest.

Posted by kshaw at April 12, 2005 07:45 AM