Bergamo, Italy, Jun 28, 2017 / 23:02 pm
The Diocese of Bergamo announced yesterday that next year the body of St. John XXIII will return to the city, his native diocese, for a visit expected to last about two weeks.
In a June 27 statement the diocese announced that Pope Francis had approved the request of Bishop Francesco Beschi of Bergamo for the body of St. John XXIII to "return to Bergamo."
Currently exposed for veneration inside St. Peter's Basilica, the saint's body will likely return to his home diocese around June 3, 2018, to mark the 55th anniversary of his 1963 death.
St. John XXIII was born Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli in Sotto il Monte, a village of Italy's Bergamo province, Nov. 25, 1881, as the fourth of 13 children. He was ordained a priest of the Bergamo diocese in 1904, at the age of 22, serving there until he was selected for the Vatican's diplomatic corps and consecrated a bishop in 1925.