Christians in the Holy Land are marking Good Friday amid signs the coronavirus crisis is winding down, with religious sites open to limited numbers of faithful but none of the mass pilgrimages usually seen in the Holy Week leading up to Easter.
The virus is still raging in the Philippines, France, Brazil and other predominantly Christian countries, where worshippers are marking a second annual Holy Week under various movement restrictions amid outbreaks fanned by more contagious strains.
Last year, Jerusalem was under a strict lockdown, with sacred rites observed by small groups of priests, often behind closed doors. It was a stark departure from past years, when tens of thousands of pilgrims would descend on the city's holy sites.
This year, Franciscan friars led hundreds of worshippers down the Via Dolorosa, retracing what tradition holds were Jesus' final steps, while reciting prayers through loudspeakers at the Stations of the Cross. Another group carried a wooden cross along the route through the Old City, singing hymns and pausing to offer prayers.
The Church of the Holy Sepulchre, built on the site where Christians believe Jesus was crucified, died and rose from the dead, is open to visitors with masks and social distancing.
Christian worshippers carry a wooden cross along the Via Dolorosa in Jerusalem's Old City during the Good Friday procession on 2 April, 2021. Source: AFP
"Things are open, but cautiously and gradually," said Wadie Abunassar, an adviser to church leaders in the Holy Land.
"In regular years we urge people to come out. Last year we told people to stay at home... This year we are somehow silent."
Pope Francis began Good Friday with a visit to the Vatican's COVID-19 vaccination centre, where volunteers have spent the past week administering about 1,200 doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine to poor and disadvantaged people in Rome.
Later on Friday, Francis was to preside over the Way of the Cross procession in a nearly empty St Peter's Square, instead of the popular torchlit ritual he usually celebrates at the Colosseum.
In France, a nationwide 7pm curfew is forcing parishes to move Good Friday ceremonies forward in the day. Nineteen departments in France are on localised lockdowns, where parishioners can attend daytime Mass with a signed "travel certificate".
A woman sits in front of the closed Holy Sepulchre of the Church of the Holy Spirit in Munich on Good Friday. Source: DPA via AAP
Although a third lockdown is being imposed on Saturday, French President Emmanuel Macron has wavered on a travel ban for Easter weekend, allowing the French to drive between regions to meet family on Friday.
Fire-ravaged Notre Dame will not hold a Good Friday Mass, but the cathedral's "Crown of Thorns" will be venerated by the cathedral's clergy at its new temporary liturgical hub in the nearby church of Saint-Germain-l'Auxerrois.
People wear face masks and stand spaced far apart as they attend a Good Friday religious service at the Protestant Berlin Cathedral on 2 April, 2021. Source: Getty Images Europe
In the Philippines, streets were eerily quiet and religious gatherings were prohibited in the capital, Manila, and four outlying provinces.
The government placed the bustling region of more than 25 million people back under lockdown this week amid a surge in COVID-19 cases.
