WORLD BRIEFING / ITALY
Pope Benedict XVI, visiting the scene of one of the bloodiest battles of World War II, prayed for an end to all violent conflict. The pope celebrated Mass for thousands of people at the foot of the Benedictine Abbey at Monte Cassino, which was destroyed in 1944 by Allied bombs and later rebuilt.
The abbey was founded by St. Benedict, whose name the former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger took when he was elected pope in 2005.
The battle of Monte Cassino, also known as the Battle for Rome, was one of the most complex and bloody of World War II. It lasted nearly four months, and tens of thousands of soldiers were killed.
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