Pope baptises 32 babies in Sistine Chapel

VATICAN CITY (AP):

With wails resounding amid the splendour of the Sistine Chapel, Pope Francis yesterday baptised 32 infants, and at one point in the ceremony told mothers to feel free to feed their crying babies.

Formally welcoming the children as members of the Catholic church, Francis poured water from a shell-shaped dish over the heads of the babies held in their mothers' arms.

Francis pronounced the babies' names one by one, as beaming parents held their children, dressed in white satin, or silk gowns and other finery, in the chapel whose ceiling was frescoed by Michelangelo.

In keeping with his down-to-earth style and his drive to make the church more relevant in the everyday lives of the faithful, the Pope has done away with much of the pomp and stiffness often characterising papal appearances.

He noted that some babies were crying. "If they are hungry, mothers, feel free to feed them," Francis said during his homily.

The Sistine Chapel choir sang during the ceremony, but Francis said that "today the most beautiful chorus is that of the babies".