Tens of thousands view Pope Benedict XVI lying in state at Vatican

By mid-morning the queue to enter the basilica snaked around St Peter’s Square

Mourners view the body of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI as it lies in state inside St. Peter's Basilica at The Vatican where thousands went to pay their homage Monday, Jan. 2, 2023. Picture: AP Photo/Ben Curtis

Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI’s body is lying in state in St Peter’s Basilica as thousands of people file by to pay tribute to the pontiff who shocked the world by retiring a decade ago.

As daylight broke, 10 white-gloved Papal Gentlemen — lay assistants to pontiffs and papal households — carried the body on a cloth-covered wooden stretcher up the centre aisle of the basilica to its resting place in front of the main altar under Bernini’s towering bronze canopy.