Pope Remains 'Very Serious'

Vatican Says Pontiff Responds To Aides But Has A High Fever

(CBS/AP) 
Several cardinals from the United States and Latin America said they were heading to Rome. After the official mourning period following the death of a pope, cardinals hold a secret vote in the Sistine Chapel to choose a successor.

The Il Secolo XIX newspaper of Genoa reported that the pope, with the help of his private secretary Archbishop Stanislaw Dziwisz, wrote a note to his aides urging them not to weep for him.

"I am happy, and you should be as well," the note reportedly said. "Let us pray together with joy."

However, Navarro-Valls said he couldn't confirm the report, even after speaking to the pope's secretary.

As word of his deteriorating condition spread across the globe, special Masses celebrated the pope for transforming the Roman Catholic Church during his 26-year papacy and for his example in fearlessly confronting death.

Hospitalized twice last month after breathing crises, and fitted with a breathing tube and a feeding tube, John Paul has become a picture of suffering.

His papacy has been marked by its call to value the aged and to respect the sick, subjects the pope has turned to as he battles Parkinson's disease and crippling knee and hip ailments. The pope also survived a 1981 assassination attempt, when a Turkish gunman shot him in the abdomen.

Cardinal Marcio Francesco Pompedda, a high-ranking Vatican administrator, visited the pope Friday morning and said he opened his eyes and smiled.

"I understood he recognized me. It was a wonderful smile — I'll remember it forever. It was a benevolent smile — a father-like smile," Pompedda told RAI television. He told the Milan daily Il Giornale the pope was lying in bed propped up by pillows, and twice tried but failed to say something.

"There were various tubes, and an intravenous drip, but I confess that I didn't dwell on these details," said Pompedda, adding that the pope appeared to be "suffering but serene."

John Paul's health declined sharply Thursday when he developed a high fever brought on by the infection. The pope suffered septic shock and heart problems during treatment for the infection, the Vatican said.

Septic shock involves both bacteria in the blood and a consequent over-relaxing of the blood vessels. The vessels, which are normally narrow and taut, get floppy in reaction to the bacteria and can't sustain any pressure. That loss of blood pressure is catastrophic, making the heart work hard to compensate for the collapse.

CBS News Medical Correspondent Elizabeth Kaledin reports the pope's rapid decline is fairly common in elderly people. It's a domino effect of organ failure, which in the Pope's case started with the urinary tract infection that leads to low blood pressure, difficulty breathing and eventual heart, lung and kidney failure. It's all part of septic shock.

The good news, reports Kaledin, is that dying of septic shock is a fairly peaceful way to die.

"I've often used the word sauntering into death. Life just sort of saunters out of the body with no dramatic events,'' said Dr. Wes Ely, of Vanderbilt University Medical Center.