The Archdiocese of Washington, D.C., is sorting through tens of thousands of tickets for Pope Benedict XVI‘s Mass at Nationals Park.
Officials on Friday were divvying up the 47,000 tickets, putting them in envelopes and organizing them intopiles so they can be distributed to almost 150 parishes and missions in Archdiocese of Washington and more than 120 dioceses nationwide, said spokeswoman Georgina Stark. The tickets, which are free, will be sent out next week.
The tickets, designed by the archdiocese, look similar to those for sporting events. The passes have a white background and at the top is a red rectangle with the logo of the 2008 papal visit to Washington – the pope with open arms, and the “Christ Our Hope” message underneath.
Earlier this month, parish priests held a raffle to determine where their congregations will be seated for the April 17 mass. Organizers color-coded a map of the stadium, and priests drew matching colored construction paper from baskets. The parishes won’t know where their seats are until they get the packages next week.
The archdiocese received more than 100,000 requests for tickets, twice the amount available for the April 17 mass. Organizers are asking ticket-holders to not scalp the tickets.
“We hope that people who get them will be people who want them and value then and won’t sell to other people,” said archdiocese spokeswoman Georgina Stark.
Dioceses in D.C., Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia and Delaware will get about 10,000 tickets. The Diocese of Arlington received 6,000, and the Archdiocese of Baltimore was given about 2,500.
Metro has produced a commemorative $9, one-day pass with logo of the papal visit that people can buy on the day of the Mass. The pass can be used to go anywhere on Metro that day.
