VATICAN, October 19 (RIA Novosti) - Pope Paul VI was beatified on Sunday by the Catholic Church in a ceremony carried out by reigning Pope Francis.
At the request of Pope Francis, the beatification of Paul VI took place at the end of an Extraordinary General Assembly of the Synod on family issues, which has been taking place in the Vatican for the past two weeks.
The Synod of Bishops was established by Pope Paul IV in 1965 as a permanent advisory body to the papacy.
To the applause of tens of thousands of believers, a major image of Pope Paul VI was unveiled at the St. Peter's Basilica during the beatification mass, and a relic with a bloodstained shirt he was wearing during an assassination attempt in 1970 was carried out to the altar.
Paul VI, born Giovanni Battista Enrico Antonio Maria Montini, reigned from June 21, 1963 to his death in 1978. He was the first pontiff to travel five continents, becoming the most traveled pope in history at that time. His condemnation of artificial birth control, among other issues, has made him one of the Catholic Church’s most controversial pontiffs.
