The World Athletics Gala, which includes the announcements of the Male and the Female World Athlete of the Year 2008, will be hosted on Sunday 23 November at the Salle des Etoiles of the Sporting Club d’Eté, Monte-Carlo by International Athletic Foundation (IAF) Honorary President HSH Prince Albert II of Monaco and IAF & IAAF President Lamine Diack.

As well as the end of season awards, video highlights of the best action from the athletics year including the Beijing Olympic Games and all 2008 IAAF championships, interviews with star athletes, and sparkling musical entertainment from singer Lalah Hathaway and the Jamaican band the ‘Fabulous Five’, will make this an Athletics night to remember.

Entertaining the audience of over 600 guests, which will include dozens of Olympic and World champions and record holders, who will be present on the night in the Salle des Etoiles, the two musical acts are gold medal performers in their own field.

Soul singer Donny Hathaway's daughter Lalah cut her debut album in 1990, a recording which was highly acclaimed, and in her four albums since then, firstly for Virgin and then Stax records, her rich voice has earned her a reputation for versatility, as she has trod paths of neo-soul, acid jazz, R'nB, and even gospel.

The ‘Fab 5’, formed in 1970, are Jamaica's pre-eminent popular band, whether measured by record sales at home, hits on the charts, frequency of engagements or major awards won over the decades. In their early years, their musicality and showmanship made them the rage on the dance and show circuits, and 19 albums later they are still on the very top of their musical game with a greatest hits album recently released.

The Male and Female World Athlete of the Year 2008 will each receive an award of US$100,000.

The World Athletics Gala, which includes the announcements of the Male and the Female World Athlete of the Year 2008, will be hosted on Sunday 23 November at the Salle des Etoiles of the Sporting Club d’Eté, Monte-Carlo by International Athletic Foundation (IAF) Honorary President HSH Prince Albert II of Monaco and IAF & IAAF President Lamine Diack.

 

 

During the celebrations of the World Athletics Gala hosted by International Athletic Foundation (IAF) Honorary President HSH Prince Albert II of Monaco and IAF & IAAF President Lamine Diack in the Salle des Etoiles of the Sporting Club d’Eté, Monte Carlo, on Sunday 23 November, 22-year-old Jamaican Usain Bolt and Russia’s 26-year-old Yelena Isinbayeva were crowned as the Male and Female World Athletes of the Year 2008.

Bolt, who captivated the attention of the sporting world with his Olympic 100m, 200m and 4x100m gold medals, each with a World record performance, commented:

“I have a motto that anything is possible. But this really is such an honour.”

"Just to be included with every great name in the sport is wonderful. I’ll try to do it year after year."

Undefeated in nine outdoor competitions this year, Isinbayeva raised her own World record on three occasions and defended her Olympic title, also with a World record. Also the World Athlete of the Year for 2004 and 2005, Isinbayeva commented:

“I’m very proud. It feels like the first time after getting over my difficulties of 2006 and 2007. I will make a very special place of honour for this trophy.”

"I knew it was going to be difficult over the past two seasons. I was very confident that I could break through the wall.”

 

Male World Athlete of the Year    
Usain Bolt (JAM)

Female World Athlete of the Year
Yelena Isinbayeva (RUS)    

Male Performance of the Year
Dayron Robles (CUB)**

Female Performance of the Year**
Tirunesh Dibaba (ETH)
Barbora Spotakova (CZE)

Revelation of the year Award
Pamela Jelimo (KEN)

Distinguished Career Award
Kajsa Bergqvist (SWE)
Stefan Holm (SWE)
Jefferson Pérez (ECU)

Inspirational Award
Henry Rono (KEN)

80 Years of Women Athletes at the Olympic Games
Jackie Joyner-Kersee (USA)

Special Olympic Award
Usain Bolt (JAM)
Tirunesh Dibaba (ETH)
Yelena Isinbayeva (RUS)
Françoise Mbango (CMR)
Angelo Taylor (USA)
Andreas Thorkildsen (NOR)

  

The International Association of Athletics Federations announced a series of awards for the year 2008 on Monday during the celebration of the World Athletics Gala in Monte Carlo.

    Following are the list of winners.

    Male World Athlete of the Year: Usain Bolt, Jamaica

   Female World Athlete of the Year: Yelena Isinbayeva, Russia

   Performance of the Year: Dayron Robles, Cuba

    Note: Liu Xiang will collect his Performance of the Year Trophyfor 2006 when he was unable to attend the World Athletics Gala

  　Female Performance of the Year: Tirunesh Dibaba, Ethiopia, Barbora Spotakova, Czech Republic

    Revelation of the year Award: Pamela Jelimo, Kenya

    Distinguished Career Award: Kajsa Bergqvist, Sweden, Stefan Holm, Sweden, Jefferson Prez, Ecuador

    Inspirational Award: Henry Rono, Kenya

    80 Years of Women Athletes at the Olympic Games: Jackie Joyner-Kersee, United States

    Special Olympic Award: Usain Bolt, Jamaica, Tirunesh Dibaba, Ethiopia, Yelena Isinbayeva, Russia, Francoise Mbango, Cameroon, Angelo Taylor, United States, Andreas Thorkildsen, Norway.

 

On Wednesday, October 15, 2008, the Princess Grace Foundation–USA hosted the Princess Grace Awards Galaat Cipriani 42nd Street in New York City and presented 21 Awards to emerging artists in theater, dance and film, as well as two Princess Grace Statue awards to artists who haatve previously won Awards and have shown achievement and growth in their respective fields.  Every year, the Princess Grace Foundation-USA (PGF-USA) proudly awards these grants at its annual gala to support its mission of providing crucial support to emerging artists in America.  PGF-USA was proud to present award winning actress Glenn Closewith the Prince Rainier III Award in recognition of her outstanding career and contribution to the arts.  This award was presented to her by award winning actor Ted Danson, her Damages co-star.  Tony® Award winning actor and Glenn Close co-star in Barnum, Jim Dale served as the evening’s emcee.  The Gala took place in the presence of HSH Prince Albert II of Monaco.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Co-chairs for the Gala (and Platinum Sponsors) were Noelle Wolf and Dick Wolf, Emmy® Award winning writer/producer of the Law & Order drama series and Dolly Lenz, Vice Chairman of Prudential Douglas Elliman.  Presenting Sponsor for this year’s Princess Grace Awards Gala was Hermès.  Crown Sponsors this year were American Airlines, Ana Tzarev Gallery and Mrs. Edmond J. Safra. Corporate Chair for the Princess Grace Awards Gala is Gérard Cohen, of HSBC Private Bank (Monaco) S.A.  Entertainment for the evening included a performance by Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings followed by dancing to DJ Tom Finn.  The Gala was produced by Scott Mauro of Scott Mauro Entertainment, Inc. for the fourth consecutive year.

 

International celebrity Jesse Metcalfe and former Destiny’s Child member MichelleWilliams hosted the 20th Annual World Music Awards in Monte Carlo on Sunday, November 9th 2008. The music special will air in 160 countries around the world reaching a billion viewers.

Beyonce kicked off the show with a stunning performance singing a medley of her two new singles- “If I were a Boy” and “Single Ladies”. What followed was an amazing evening with special performances by Alicia Keys, Solange, Kid Rock, Estelle, The Script, Madcon, DJ Laurent Wolf, Nancy Ajram, Kate Ryan, Philipp Kirkorov with Akon and Tuface accepting their awards.

 

 

 

 

Ringo Starr accepted the Diamond Award on behalf of The Beatles, for selling more records than any other band in the history of the music industry. The Beatles are the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed band in the history of popular music, with music sales estimated by EMI Records at over a billion records worldwide.

The U.S. broadcast is on December 2rd, 2008 at 8pm on MyNetwork TV. Channel 4 UK will air a whole World Music Awards weekend on C4, T4 and 4Music with a first airing on Friday November 21st, 2008.

 

 

 

 

The World Music Awards were created back in 1989 with the aim of providing an alternative for jury-based awards, an unbiased award ceremony. The World Music Awards could be called the fairest and the most objective awards ceremony as the awards are given to artists according to record sales.

 

The WMAs adheres to numbers and not to personal opinions as other jury-based awards do. To certify the record sales, the WMAs cooperate with the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry. It also contributes to the fight against piracy. It encourages fans all over the world to buy legal CDs of their favorite singers, which ultimately helps to determine the winners of the World Music Awards.

 

The World Music Awards is a charity event benefiting the Monaco Aide & Presence Foundation, under the honorary presidency H.S.H. Prince Albert of Monaco, run by the government of Monaco. Since its inception, The World Music Awards has constructed, through the Monaco Aide & Presence Foundation, several schools, hospitals and orphanages around the world. To date, there are 19 active World Music Awards centers in Africa, Asia, and South America. These include a day hospital and school on the Ivory Coast; a health center in Orissa, India with a 24 hour ambulance service; a school and orphanage in Madras India; a home for abandoned children in Brazil; a home for handicapped girls in Katukuranda, Sri Lanka; a hospital, school and a village for the homeless in Madagascar; a hospital in Mokatam, Egypt; a hospital and school in Niger; a shelter, hospital and orphanage in Cameroon; a hospital in Cambodia, a hospital and school in Mali, a clinic in Rwanda and a hospital which will open soon in Darfur.

 

 

Barack Hussein Obama was elected the 44th president of the United States on Tuesday, sweeping away the last racial barrier in American politics with ease as the country chose him as its first black chief executive. The election of Mr. Obama amounted to a national catharsis — a repudiation of a historically unpopular Republican president and his economic and foreign policies, and an embrace of Mr. Obama’s call for a change in the direction and the tone of the country.

But it was just as much a strikingly symbolic moment in the evolution of the nation’s fraught racial history, a breakthrough that would have seemed unthinkable just two years ago.

Mr. Obama, 47, a first-term senator from Illinois, defeated Senator John McCain of Arizona, 72, a former prisoner of war who was making his second bid for the presidency.

To the very end, Mr. McCain’s campaign was eclipsed by an opponent who was nothing short of a phenomenon, drawing huge crowds epitomized by the tens of thousands of people who turned out to hear Mr. Obama’s victory speech in Grant Park in Chicago.

Mr. McCain also fought the headwinds of a relentlessly hostile political environment, weighted down with the baggage left to him by President Bush and an economic collapse that took place in the middle of the general election campaign.

“If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible, who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time, who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer,” said Mr. Obama, standing before a huge wooden lectern with a row of American flags at his back, casting his eyes to a crowd that stretched far into the Chicago night.

“It’s been a long time coming,” the president-elect added, “but tonight, because of what we did on this date in this election at this defining moment, change has come to America.”

Mr. McCain delivered his concession speech under clear skies on the lush lawn of the Arizona Biltmore, in Phoenix, where he and his wife had held their wedding reception. The crowd reacted with scattered boos as he offered his congratulations to Mr. Obama and saluted the historical significance of the moment.

“This is a historic election, and I recognize the significance it has for African-Americans and for the special pride that must be theirs tonight,” Mr. McCain said, adding, “We both realize that we have come a long way from the injustices that once stained our nation’s reputation.”

Not only did Mr. Obama capture the presidency, but he led his party to sharp gains in Congress. This puts Democrats in control of the House, the Senate and the White House for the first time since 1995, when Bill Clinton was in office.

The day shimmered with history as voters began lining up before dawn, hours before polls opened, to take part in the culmination of a campaign that over the course of two years commanded an extraordinary amount of attention from the American public.

As the returns became known, and Mr. Obama passed milestone after milestone —Ohio, Florida, Virginia, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Iowa and New Mexico — people rolled spontaneously into the streets to celebrate what many described, with perhaps overstated if understandable exhilaration, a new era in a country where just 143 years ago, Mr. Obama, as a black man, could have been owned as a slave.

For Republicans, especially the conservatives who have dominated the party for nearly three decades, the night represented a bitter setback and left them contemplating where they now stand in American politics.                                                                                                                                                             

Mr. Obama and his expanded Democratic majority on Capitol Hill now face the task of governing the country through a difficult period: the likelihood of a deep and prolonged recession, and two wars. He took note of those circumstances in a speech that was notable for its sobriety and its absence of the triumphalism that he might understandably have displayed on a night when he won an Electoral College landslide.

“The road ahead will be long, our climb will be steep,” said Mr. Obama, his audience hushed and attentive, with some, including the Rev. Jesse Jackson, wiping tears from their eyes. “We may not get there in one year or even one term, but America, I have never been more hopeful than I am tonight that we will get there. I promise you, we as a people will get there.” The roster of defeated Republicans included some notable party moderates, like Senator John E. Sununu of New Hampshire and Representative Christopher Shays of Connecticut, and signaled that the Republican conference convening early next year in Washington will be not only smaller but more conservative.

Mr. Obama will come into office after an election in which he laid out a number of clear promises: to cut taxes for most Americans, to get the United States out of Iraq in a fast and orderly fashion, and to expand health care.

In a recognition of the difficult transition he faces, given the economic crisis, Mr. Obama is expected to begin filling White House jobs as early as this week.

Mr. Obama defeated Mr. McCain in Ohio, a central battleground in American politics, despite a huge effort that brought Mr. McCain and his running mate, Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska, back there repeatedly. Mr. Obama had lost the state decisively to Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York in the Democratic primary.

Mr. McCain failed to take from Mr. Obama the two Democratic states that were at the top of his target list: New Hampshire and Pennsylvania. Mr. Obama also held on to Minnesota, the state that played host to the convention that nominated Mr. McCain; Wisconsin; and Michigan, a state Mr. McCain once had in his sights.

The apparent breadth of Mr. Obama’s sweep left Republicans sobered, and his showing in states like Ohio and Pennsylvania stood out because officials in both parties had said that his struggles there in the primary campaign reflected the resistance of blue-collar voters to supporting a black candidate.

“I always thought there was a potential prejudice factor in the state,” Senator Bob Casey, a Democrat of Pennsylvania who was an early Obama supporter, told reporters in Chicago. “I hope this means we washed that away.”

Mr. McCain called Mr. Obama at 10 p.m., Central time, to offer his congratulations. In the call, Mr. Obama said he was eager to sit down and talk; in his concession speech, Mr. McCain said he was ready to help Mr. Obama work through difficult times.

“I need your help,” Mr. Obama told his rival, according to an Obama adviser, Robert Gibbs. “You’re a leader on so many important issues.”

Mr. Bush called Mr. Obama shortly after 10 p.m. to congratulate him on his victory.

“I promise to make this a smooth transition,” the president said to Mr. Obama, according to a transcript provided by the White House .“You are about to go on one of the great journeys of life. Congratulations, and go enjoy yourself.”                                                                                                               

For most Americans, the news of Mr. Obama’s election came at 11 p.m., Eastern time, when the networks, waiting for the close of polls in California, declared him the victor. A roar sounded from the 125,000 people gathered in Hutchison Field in Grant Park at the moment that they learned Mr. Obama had been projected the winner.

The scene in Phoenix was decidedly more sour. At several points, Mr. McCain, unsmiling, had to motion his crowd to quiet down — he held out both hands, palms down — when they responded to his words of tribute to Mr. Obama with boos.

Mr. Obama, who watched Mr. McCain’s speech from his hotel room in Chicago, offered a hand to voters who had not supported him in this election, when he took the stage 15 minutes later. “To those Americans whose support I have yet to earn,” he said, “I may not have won your vote, but I hear your voices, I need your help, and I will be your president, too.”

Initial signs were that Mr. Obama benefited from a huge turnout of voters, but particularly among blacks. That group made up 13 percent of the electorate, according to surveys of people leaving the polls, compared with 11 percent in 2006.

In North Carolina, Republicans said that the huge surge of African-Americans was one of the big factors that led to Senator Elizabeth Dole, a Republican, losing her re-election bid.

Mr. Obama also did strikingly well among Hispanic voters; Mr. McCain did worse among those voters than Mr. Bush did in 2004. That suggests the damage the Republican Party has suffered among those voters over four years in which Republicans have been at the forefront on the effort to crack down on illegal immigrants.

The election ended what by any definition was one of the most remarkable contests in American political history, drawing what was by every appearance unparalleled public interest.

Throughout the day, people lined up at the polls for hours — some showing up before dawn — to cast their votes. Aides to both campaigns said that anecdotal evidence suggested record-high voter turnout.

Reflecting the intensity of the two candidates, Mr. McCain and Mr. Obama took a page from what Mr. Bush did in 2004 and continued to campaign after the polls opened.

Mr. McCain left his home in Arizona after voting early Tuesday to fly to Colorado and New Mexico, two states where Mr. Bush won four years ago but where Mr. Obama waged a spirited battle.

These were symbolically appropriate final campaign stops for Mr. McCain, reflecting the imperative he felt of trying to defend Republican states against a challenge from Mr. Obama.

“Get out there and vote,” Mr. McCain said in Grand Junction, Colo. “I need your help. Volunteer, knock on doors, get your neighbors to the polls, drag them there if you need to.”

By contrast, Mr. Obama flew from his home in Chicago to Indiana, a state that in many ways came to epitomize the audacity of his effort this year. Indiana has not voted for a Democrat since President Lyndon B. Johnson’s landslide victory in 1964, and Mr. Obama made an intense bid for support there. He later returned home to Chicago play basketball, his election-day ritual.

 

 

The exhibition "Grace Kelly Years, Princess of Monaco » continues to live a successful international roaming. After the Principality and its 135 000 visitors in the summer of 2007, after the City Hall of Paris and its 75 000 visitors in Summer 2008, now Moscow hosts this tribute exhibition, conceived by the Grimaldi Forum Monaco with the full support of the Prince’s Palace. It relates all moments and all facets of the Hollywood star Grace Kelly who became the Princess of Monaco and conquered the world.

Thursday 9^th October, in the beautiful premises of the Ekaterina Cultural Foundation, in the heart of Moscow, HSH Princess Stephanie, accompanied by Mr. and Mrs. Semenikhin responsible for the Foundation and producers of the event in Russia, officially inaugurated the exhibition attended by a thousand guests.

Together with the Curator, Frederic Mitterrand, Paul Masseron, Government Counsellor for the Interior, Hervé Irien, Director for the Collections of the Palace, Sylvie Biancheri, General Director for the Grimaldi Forum and Catherine Alestchenkoff, Director for cultural events, the official cortege (re) discovered in a scenography still designed by Nathalie Mane but resized to this space of 850 m2 in two levels, the different moments of the Princess’ life, through unparalleled and rich attestations .

From the first weekend, the exhibition has been attended by 3 300 visitors! By 5^th December, the closing date, all Moscow should succumb to the myth of eternal Grace Kelly ...

 

 

CAPTION: Frederic Mitterrand and Mrs. M.et Semenikhin surrounding HSH Princess Stephanie at the opening

Five Peace Band in concert at the Grimaldi Forum, on 22nd October 2008 Remember the early seventies ... The guitarist John McLaughlin and pianist Chick Corea successful blended rock and jazz and drove the two most explosive groups like: "Return to Forever" and "The Mahavishnu Orchestra”. Their success is unparalleled in the world of instrumental groups.
Their music is out the ordinary, both source of energy, spirituality, emotion, improvisation and hard rock in addition! Both groups have inspired a new generation in search of new musical frontiers.
For the first time since their sacred union around the legendary Miles Davis group 40 years ago, the two musicians gather their forces, accompanied by three of the most famous contemporary musicians: Kenny Garrett (Alto Sax), Christian McBride (Bass) and Vinnie Colaiuta (drums). Their new group, FIVE PEACE BAND, will again put the music world in turmoil ... To start their world tour, "Five Peace Band" decided to make a first performance in Monaco on 22nd October . It will be on the stage of Grimaldi Forum. The takings will be given to charity in favour of humanitarian association "Caap Afrika". John McLaughlin, jazz “master degree guitar "... Professional since the age of sixteen, a member of the famous "The greatest artists gallery” in the Guitar Player Magazine, John McLaughlin has been in close contact with almost all musical legends of the second half of the twentieth century: Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page, Jimi Hendrix, John Surman, Carlos Santana and many others. Influenced by Wes Montgomery, Django Reinhardt or Ravi Shankar, he was one of the pioneers of jazz rock, with his friend Miles Davis. Fascinated by Eastern philosophies and music, he created several groups during his career: "Mahavishnu Orchestra" and "Shakti" in the 70s, refounded in 1997 and named "Remember Shakti. He successfully mixes without any hangups, jazz, acoustic guitar and Indian sacred music, and he is always acclaimed by audience and critics. At the same time he regularly records Western music too, like the famous "Friday Night in San Francisco" with Paco de Lucia and Al Di Meola.
John McLaughlin is one of the most comprehensive guitarists in the world. He can play any kind of guitar and any music style without problem (jazz, blues, be-bop, free jazz, Indian music, flamenco). He is a flagship for young generations as well as a great artist always inclined to put himself at stake.

 

The ballet first performed on 28 June 1841 at the opera house on Rue Le Peletier (then the Académie Royale de Musique) was so successful that Giselle travelled to London then Saint Petersburg where Jules Perrot established it.

Marius Petipa, then the Imperial Ballet's ballet master, conserved it carefully, embellishing and renovating it so that it became a leading ballet in the Russian repertoire.

Long after the Ballet de l’Opéra de Paris had last performed Giselle (1868), the young peasant girl reappeared, in 1910, when Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes were invited to perform at Palais Garnier.

Having returned home, Giselle, well served by Serge Lifar and his dancers (Olga Spessivtseva, Lycette Darsonval, Yvette Chauviré), became a permanent fixture. There have been notable versions by Alicia Alonso (1972) and Mary Speaking (1985) plus in 1991 a new production by Patrice Bart and Eugène Polyakov with Loïc Le Groumellec's sets inspired by Brittany.

 

  

The storyline of Giselle perfectly suited that era's taste for the fantastic, other-worldliness and strong emotions, a characteristic of post-Revolution society.

Inspired by the German legends that author Heinrich Heine wrote about in his book About Germany, the scenario adopts the Romantic principle of mixing genres: the pastoral Act I ends tragically while the nocturnal drama of Act II has a fantastical ending.

The contrast between a real, earthly world and an oneiric one peopled with female spirits structures the entire ballet. Here only the women metamorphose. They are mysterious beings, ideal in nature, the illusion of their incorporeality accentuated by tutus with long light skirts, slow flowing movements and point work, a very recent innovation at the time.

From its first performance the ballet was so outstandingly successful its popularity rapidly spread beyond Paris. The following year, 1842, it was staged in London by Jules Perrot and in Saint Petersburg by Antoine Titus. Antonio Cortesi put it on in Milan in 1843 and it even crossed the Atlantic.

The Opéra de Parisperformed Giselle until 1868, after which it might well have been forgotten if it had not been revived and enriched by Marius Petipa in Saint Petersburg in the 1880s.

Thanks to Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes guesting at Palais Garnier, it reappeared on the French stage in 1910.

Since then it has been part of the repertoires of major international ballet companies and has been reinterpreted by the most modern choreographers.

 

  

Brigitte Lefèvre trained at the Opéra de Paris ballet school and at age 16 was engaged in the corps de ballet where she danced in ballets by George Balanchine, Roland Petit, Maurice Béjart (the Chosen One in The Rite of Spring), Michel Descombey and Gene Kelly as well as in repertoire classics. She has studied jazz dance with Gene Robinson and participated in courses run by Alwin Nikolaïs, Merce Cunningham and Paul Taylor.

In 1970 she wrote her first choreography, Mikrocosmos, which was performed at the Avignon Festival, in the main courtyard. She left Opéra de Paris in 1972 to cofound, with Jacques Garnier, one of the first modern-dance repertory companies in France, Théâtre du Silence in La Rochelle (1974 to 1985).

In 1985 she was appointed principal inspector of dance at the ministry for culture then in 1987 was promoted to general inspector and head of the first dance delegation. She became general administrator of Opéra de Paris-Garnier in 1992, then assistant director in charge of ballet in 1994. In 1995 she was appointed director of dance for Opéra National de Paris.

Since her appointment Brigitte Lefèvre has striven to build up a living repertoire that embraces past, present and future, by alternating great classical ballets with new creations.

 

A trip marked above all by faith, and in particular by Lourdes, but also with strong cultural implications. Paris and Lourdes are the stops on Benedict XVI's tenth international voyage, which begins tomorrow and will end next Monday, September 15. The two destinations are connected by the pope's intention to help the Church of France on its difficult journey of confronting the new challenges posed by the development of a lively society full of contradictions, and will give Benedict XVI a chance to emphasize two aspects of the "response" of faith.

The reason for the visit is the conclusion of celebrations for the 150th anniversary of the apparitions in Lourdes, and so they will have a fundamentally Marian character. But the visit will begin in Paris, at 11 o'clock tomorrow morning. Although it is not part of protocol, the pope will be met by the president of the republic, Nicholas Sarkozy. This is significant. But above all, on the afternoon of his arrival he will go to the Collège des Bernardins, where he will meet with intellectuals. More than 700 people have asked to participate.

There will also be representatives of UNESCO and the European Union present. So for the pope, it will be a platform from which he can speak to all of Europe. "The pope prepared his address personally and with great care, in German", says Fr Federico Lombardi, director of the Vatican press office. According to Le Monde, "his decision to add - beyond the obligatory visit to Lourdes - the meeting in Paris on September 12 with 700 intellectuals leaves no doubt about the principal meaning of his trip: to question France about the crisis of faith in secularized culture".

One visible sign of this will be the chemin de lumière, a torchlight procession of young people that will leave the Basilica of Notre-Dame that same evening. The participants will meet the pope at the Esplanade des Invalides, where he will celebrate Mass the following morning. Before this, it will pass the Institut de France, which houses five academies. Then-cardinal Ratzinger was a member of its academy of moral and ethical studies. This will be commemorated with the unveiling of a plaque highlighting the uniqueness of the fact that an academic has become pope.

The visit to Paris will also be the occasion for meetings with the Jewish and Muslim communities, and with representatives of other Christian confessions, in addition of course to priests, religious, and Catholic laypeople.

Benedict XVI will arrive in Lourdes on Saturday afternoon. The pope will make all of the stops along the "jubilee path" in the Marian city, and will also visit the Cachot, the home of Bernadette's family, and the grotto of the apparitions.