In a three-hour ceremony rich in colour and pomp, and attended by more than 300,000 people crammed into St Peter’s Square and surrounds, ailing Pope John Paul II yesterday presided over the beatificat

In a three-hour ceremony rich in colour and pomp, and attended by more than 300,000 people crammed into St Peter’s Square and surrounds, ailing Pope John Paul II yesterday presided over the beatification of one of the Catholic Church’s best-loved daughters, Mother Teresa of Calcutta. As first Gregorian chant and then Indian Aratil music soared out across St Peter’s Square, and the massed ranks of more than 150 cardinals gathered round the Pope, one could only wonder what the little Albanian nun, the so-called “Saint of the Gutters”, would have made of it all.