Hundreds of thousands gather for pope family mass

Hundreds of thousands of flag-waving pilgrims gathered in Bresso airport near Milan on Sunday to attend a mass led by Pope Benedict XVI on the last day of the 7th World Meeting of Families. Italy's Premier Mario Monti was among those expected to attend the celebration which will round up a visit in which the pope has spoken of the importance of traditional family values in a period of fierce economic crisis. Addressing 350,000 pilgrims on Saturday evening, Benedict said how aware he was of the struggle many families face due to the crisis, and chided politicians who promise much but fail to live up to their responsibilities. "Political parties must have a greater sense of responsibility, they must not promise things they cannot carry out. They must stop looking out for themselves and feel responsible for the common good," he said. He also called for greater acts of charity from ordinary citizens, suggesting to the enthusiastic crowd at the Bresso park that families from rich countries could sponsor families from poorer ones. Once Sunday's mass is over, the pope will return to a Vatican embroiled in a scandal, with rumours of bids within the Church to undermine its hierarchy. The "Vatileaks" scandal, in which hundreds of secret papal documents were leaked to the media, culminated last week in the arrest of the pope's personal butler. The relaxed and festive Church-sponsored World Meeting of Families has been a welcome distraction from the turmoil at the Holy See, which has taken its toll on the 85-year-old leader of the Catholic Church. With the pope in Milan, some of the Swiss Guards who usually protect the Vatican when he is in residence have spent the weekend helping out in Italy's northeast, which was hit hard by two earthquakes over the past weeks. Twenty young guards swapped their colourful traditional Renaissance costumes for civilian clothes and headed to the quake-struck zone to help thousands who have been sleeping in tent camps since the disasters, which killed 23 people.