COURTESY OF THE SMOOT FAMILY Cristina Smoot, 9 months, suffered from hydrocephalus but was cured by Pope John Paul II, her family says. At right is Smoot as a Sacred Hearts Academy senior in 1998.

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Pope’s blessing
credited for curing
isle family’s baby

Conchita Smoot's baby suffered from a fatal brain-swelling disease when Pope John Paul II blessed her in 1981 in the Philippines. Within a few days the swelling went down. Baby Cristina was cured, Smoot said.

It was a miracle, Smoot said. "It was almost like God took over. ... That's it. That's all she needed," she added.

In Hawaii Kai, Smoot described the blessing from the late pontiff yesterday just before his funeral in Rome.

Smoot, a devout Roman Catholic who described herself as a private person, was reluctant to tell her story of how her daughter was blessed by the pope. She first told her story to the media in 1983 when a reporter with a Manila newspaper interviewed her when she traveled to the Philippines to visit her ill parents in a hospital.

But in the wake of the pope's death, Smoot wanted others to know what the pope did for her. "With his passing, people should understand that miracles happen. They honest to God happen," she said.

At 3 months old, Cristina Smoot was diagnosed by doctors at Kapiolani Medical Center for Women & Children with hydrocephalus, an accumulation of fluid in the brain, causing the head to swell. Smoot said children with the condition have abnormally large heads and live only until their early teen years.

The circumference of Cristina's head continued to grow at a rapid rate. She became lethargic and her forehead started to protrude. A neurosurgeon recommended that she undergo surgery to drain the fluid from her head.

When Cristina was 9 months old, Smoot and her family traveled to the Philippines for three weeks in January 1981 to have her father, pediatrician Dr. Federico Gimenez, examine her daughter. Her trip was also made to coincide with the pope's scheduled visit in hopes of having Cristina blessed by him.

During their last week in the Philippines, the pope arrived.

The Smoot family was among hundreds of people who swarmed the roadways for a chance encounter with the pope, Smoot said. Her husband, Fred, stood on a 4-foot-tall median in the roadway and held his daughter above his head while they all yelled to the pope. But he looked in the opposite direction. "That didn't work. We were all so distraught," Conchita Smoot said.

The next morning, her brother, who lives near the home of the papal nuncio of the Philippines, said the pope was seen by those in the neighborhood, Smoot said.

About 4 a.m. the following day, she and her daughter headed to the papal nuncio's home, but people crowded the streets, prompting security guards to surround the residence, Smoot said.

Smoot pleaded with two guards. "I tried to explain that my daughter was handicapped," she said, "(but) they saw a healthy, robust baby."

They refused until she was about to hand her daughter to one of the guards and said: "You take her. I'll take your place. You have to get a blessing for my daughter," she said.

The guards relented and let her through.

As tears welled in her eyes, Smoot described how she was near the pope and how she screamed in English, "Holy Father, bless my daughter."

When the pope was heading toward his vehicle, she started yelling in Spanish to bless her daughter, and the pope turned around. Smoot said the pope stretched out his arms, inviting her to come closer. The crowd parted to make a pathway for Smoot leading to the pope. "There was a presence that was not of this world," she said.

The pope kissed Cristina twice before he blessed her on her forehead.

A few days later, before the Smoots returned to Hawaii, Conchita Smoot's father checked Cristina's head and noticed a dramatic change. From that point, Cristina did not need surgery, her lethargy dissipated and her head grew at a normal rate.

Cristina is healthy, she said. In 1998 she graduated from Sacred Hearts Academy and later obtained her bachelor's degree in aquatic biology from the University of California-Santa Barbara. She now lives in San Diego and turns 25 tomorrow.

Cristina credits her mother's strong will for her encounter with the pope. "I'm just so happy she is the way she is. ... Who knows where I would be?" she said in a phone interview.

"It's amazing how strong her faith is, and her determination. ... She only had a few days (in the Philippines). That, to me, is really inspiring, too," Cristina said.

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ASSOCIATED PRESS Pallbearers carried the coffin of Pope John Paul II during today's funeral in St. Peter's Square at the Vatican.

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Throngs of dignitaries
and faithful jam
St. Peter’s Square
for the funeral

The presiding cardinal asks God
to reward the pope for faithful service

VATICAN CITY » Presidents, prime ministers and kings joined millions of pilgrims, prelates and other religious leaders crowding St. Peter's Square and Rome in paying a final farewell today to Pope John Paul II in one of the largest religious gatherings in the West in modern times.

Applause rang out in the square as John Paul's simple wooden coffin, adorned with a cross and the "M" for Mary, was brought out from the basilica and placed on the ground in front of the altar. The book of the Gospel was placed on the coffin and the wind lifted the pages.

A choir sang the Gregorian chant "Grant him Eternal rest o Lord," and the service got under way.

Cardinals wearing white miters walked onto the square, the wind whipping their red vestments.

Presiding at the funeral was Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, dean of the College of Cardinals, a close confidant of John Paul and mentioned as a possible successor.

"Oh God, father and pastor of humanity, look at your family gathered here in prayer and grant your servant and our pope, John Paul II, who in the love of Christ led your church, to share with the flock entrusted to him the reward promised to the faithful ministers of the Gospel," Ratzinger prayed at the start of the Mass. He also delivered the homily.

After the 2 1/2-hour Mass, the body was carried deep under the basilica, where it joins the remains of popes from throughout the ages near the traditional tomb of the apostle Peter, the first pope.

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ASSOCIATED PRESS Bishops looked on as cardinals arrived at St. Peter's Basilica for the service.

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John Paul requested in his last will and testament to be buried "in the bare earth," and his body was laid to rest under the floor of the grotto below the basilica. His tomb will be covered with a flat stone bearing his name and the dates of his birth and death. Pilgrims will eventually be able to visit.

Earlier, groggy pilgrims who had camped out on the cobblestones awoke in their sleeping bags to hordes of the faithful stepping over them as they tried to secure a good spot to view the Mass. The square and the boulevard leading to it were a sea of red and white flags waved by pilgrims from John Paul's beloved Poland, many in traditional dress shouting "Polska! Polska!"

"We just wanted to say goodbye to our father for the last time," said Joanna Zmijewsla, 24, who traveled for 30 hours with her brother from a town near Kielce, Poland.

American Archbishop James Harvey, head of papal protocol, greeted dignitaries and religious leaders as they emerged from St. Peter's Basilica onto the steps. Many of the officials shook Harvey's hand and offered condolences before mingling and taking their appointed seats.

Turbans, fezzes, yarmulkes, black lace veils, or mantillas, joined the "zucchettos," or skull caps, of Catholic prelates in an extraordinary mix of religious and government leaders from around the world.

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ASSOCIATED PRESS Faithful rested yesterday along the street leading to St. Peter's Basilica at the Vatican. Police reopened the line to the Basilica to give pilgrims a final chance to pay respects to Pope John Paul II, who died Saturday at age 84.

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"I'm here because I'm a believer but also to live a moment in history," said Stephan Aubert, wearing a French flag draped over his shoulders.

Bells tolled as the leaders took their places on red-cushioned wooden seats. Ten minutes before the scheduled start of the funeral, the U.S. delegation arrived, headed by President Bush and his wife, and including his father, former President George H.W. Bush, and former President Bill Clinton.

Vatican ushers dressed in white tie and tails seated dignitaries who were given a chance to view John Paul's body before it was carried out of St. Peter's Basilica -- where it has lain in state since Monday -- and into the square.

Rome itself came to a standstill. Just after midnight yesterday, a ban took effect on vehicular traffic in the city center. Airspace was closed, and anti-aircraft batteries outside the city were on alert. Naval ships patrolled both the Mediterranean coast and the Tiber River near Vatican City, the tiny sovereign city-state encompassed by the Italian capital.

Italian authorities took extraordinary precautions to protect the royalty and heads of state or government attending the funeral. Jewish and Muslim leaders were among the dignitaries from more than 80 countries, including the presidents of Syria and Iran.

The pope's death on Saturday at age 84 has elicited a remarkable outpouring of affection around the world and brought an estimated 4 million people to Rome. Most of the pilgrims, however, could only hope to see the ceremony on giant TV screens that were erected around the Vatican and in piazzas around Rome.

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ASSOCIATED PRESS Crowds packed St. Peter's Square at the Vatican today at the start of the pope's funeral. Royalty, political power brokers and multitudes of faithful paid their last respects in one of the largest Western religious gatherings of modern times.

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In Krakow, Poland, where John Paul studied for the priesthood, about 300,000 people watched the funeral on three TV screens set up in a field. Many had spent the night around bonfires after a Thursday night Mass drew a million people.

The Vatican released John Paul's last will and testament on the eve of the funeral. Penned in Polish over 22 years, beginning five months after his election in October 1978, he instructed his private secretary to burn his personal notes upon his death.

He also suggested he considered resigning in 2000, when his infirmities were already apparent. Revising his will just three days before a historic pilgrimage to the Holy Land, John Paul prayed that God would "help me to recognize up to what point I must continue this service."

Yesterday, the huge bronze doors of St. Peter's, where the pope had lain in state since Monday, were closed to the public in preparation for the Mass. In four days, some estimates say nearly 2 million pilgrims passed by his bier to pay their last respects.

Rome groaned under the weight of visitors. Side streets were clogged in a permanent pedestrian rush hour.