Pope John Paul, looking tired and speaking with difficulty, put five Catholics on the road to sainthood yesterday, including the 19th century German mystic nun who inspired Mel Gibson?s film on Christ?s passion. At the same ceremony in St Peter?s Square, he beatified Austria?s last emperor, Karl I.

As has become customary, the pope, who suffers from Parkinson?s disease, did not read all the mass and what he did read was hard to understand. A cardinal celebrated part of the mass while the pope sat on a throne on the sidelines. The most controversial of the five new beatified was Anne Catherine Emmerick, a sickly German mystic nun who lived from 1774 to 1824 and has been called ?Mel?s Muse?.

Gibson used her book, The Dolorous Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ, for inspiration in some of the most grisly details of the hit film to complement the gospel accounts. Emmerick, who is said to have had the bleeding wounds of Christ and to have survived long periods without eating, became a nun and her visions of Christ?s passion and death were written down by poet Clemens Brentano and used in Gibson?s film.

The episode where Mary mops up her son?s blood after his sadistic scourging came from Emmerick as did the hooded devil inciting Jews as they demanded Christ?s crucifixion or following him as he carried his cross. Some Jewish leaders condemned Gibson?s film, saying it would spur new forms of visceral anti-Semitism. They now fear that moving Emmerick closer to the glories of the altars, as sainthood is known, will make matters worse. The Vatican has rejected the charges.

In the part of his homily read for him in German, the pope did not mention Emmerick?s book, which has found a new readership among today?s traditionalist Catholics. But he praised her pious character and concern for the poor.

The pope has now beatified some 1 340 people.

Philip Pullella