A special purification rite was performed at the main altar of St. Peter’s Basilica on Saturday after the site was desecrated by a man who stripped naked to protest the war in Ukraine.
The prayer service, known as the penitential rite and required by canon law, was conducted by the archpriest of the basilica, Cardinal Mauro Gambetti.
On Thursday (1st), a Pole took off his clothes and climbed the altar shortly before the closing of the basilica. It had an inscription painted on the back: “Save the children of Ukraine”.
Vatican guards handed him over to the Italian police, who detained him and ordered him expelled from Italy.
At the prayer service, where the altar used by Pope Francis was blessed with holy water, Gambetti said the man made a sinful and “inappropriate, truly regrettable” gesture to draw attention to war victims.
A Vatican source said on the day of the incident that the man also had self-inflicted cuts on his body with his fingernails. He was not identified, but from photos taken by tourists and posted on social media, he appeared to be in his 20s and 30s.
Source: CNN Brasil
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