TICKETS DISTRIBUTED FOR POPE'S VISIT

Some 900 of the Springfield-Cape Girardeau Diocese's 57,439 parishioners will receive tickets to attend the papal Mass on Jan. 27 in St. Louis.

For parishioners in the Archdiocese of St. Louis, the ticket situation is much better.

The papal Mass will be attended by 468 members of Perryville's St. Vincent de Paul Church, which is in the St. Louis Archdiocese.

Tickets in the Springfield-Cape Girardeau Diocese will be distributed by the parish pastors based on the number of members in each parish, said Marilyn Vydra, director of communications for the diocese's office in Springfield.

The number of tickets allocated for each church ranges from as many as 62 to as few as two, Vydra said.

"We are trying to be fair," she said.

It will be up to the parish pastors to decide how to distribute the tickets to members of their congregations. The only stipulation is that they can't be sold or raffled.

"They can't be used for fund raising or anything like that," Vydra said.

The diocese has asked the priests to report the names of ticketholders to the Springfield office by Dec. 15.

Vydra said diocese officials want to make sure all 900 tickets will be used.

Pope John Paul II will celebrate Mass at the Trans World Dome on Jan. 27, starting at 9:30 a.m.

About 100,000 people are expected to attend the Mass, Vydra said. About 66,000 will actually observe the Mass inside the Dome.

The other 34,000, including the 900 from the Springfield-Cape Girardeau Diocese, will watch it on closed-circuit television from the adjoining Cervantes Convention Center.

Vydra said the pope is slated to make a brief appearance before the crowd at the convention center in the popemobile before entering the Dome to celebrate Mass.

The Springfield-Cape Girardeau Diocese is among 21 dioceses in nine states that have been allocated tickets for the papal Mass.

The archdiocese of St. Louis has allocated tickets to its parishioners for the Mass and three other papal events.

Steve Mamanella, a spokesman for the archdiocese, said the number of tickets allocated for each of the outlying dioceses ranged from as few as 200 to as many as 1,200.

Tickets were allocated based on size of the diocese and its proximity to St. Louis, Mamanella said.

The pope's two-day visit to St. Louis includes four public events: the arrival ceremony at the National Guard hangar at Lambert-St. Louis International Airport and a youth rally at Kiel Center on Jan. 26, and a morning Mass at the Trans World Dome and a prayer service at Cathedral Basilica of St. Louis on Jan. 27.

About 20,000 tickets have been allocated for the Kiel Center event. About 2,000 tickets have been allocated for the airport ceremony and the same amount for the Cathedral Basilica prayer service.

In all, about 75,000 tickets for the four events combined are being distributed to parishioners in St. Louis and the 10 counties in the archdiocese. The tickets are being distributed by lottery.

The archdiocese has 227 parish churches and eight missions, including six churches and two missions in Perry County.

Mamanella said hundreds of tickets were allocated for some of the Catholic churches in the archdiocese.

The Rev. Kevin Fausz, pastor of St. Vincent de Paul Parish, said that his parish received tickets for all four events.

The parish has about 2,000 families or about 6,000 parishioners, he said.

Fausz said the 468 parishioners with tickets to the Mass will witness it from inside the Trans World Dome instead of on closed-circuit television in the adjoining convention center.

Eight parishioners will be on hand for the pope's arrival at the airport and another eight will be on hand for the prayer service at the Catholic cathedral.

Fausz said 210 students, including all of the students at St. Vincent High School in Perryville, and 14 chaperons will attend the youth rally at the Kiel Center.

"For students in the high school, it is going to be a real memorable event," said Fausz.

The rally at the Kiel Center is for youth from high school to age 23.

None of the youth from the 21 outlying dioceses will be allocated tickets for the Kiel Center rally.

But youth can join in the "Walk in the Light" massive youth walk from the Gateway Arch grounds to the Kiel Center. Vydra said heated tents with video screens will be set up outside the Kiel Center for youth who don't have tickets to the rally.

Some southern Missouri Catholics likely will make the trip to St. Louis even without tickets for a chance to view the pope along the motorcade routes.

Three papal motorcades are scheduled. Mamanella said the routes will be announced within a few weeks.