Pope Benedict XVI will be the first pontiff in history to read a chapter of the Bible on television after agreeing to take part in a continuous reading of the Holy Scriptures for Italian state broadcaster RAI.
The pope will kick off the six-day marathon by reading the first chapter of Genesis in Italian on October 5, the head of RAI's Vatican department, Giuseppe De Carli, said on Thursday.
Benedict's reading, which will take around an hour, will be broadcast on RAI's first channel, RAI Uno, although organisers have not yet decided whether the papal performance will be live or prerecorded.
The pope himself is said to have expressed a preference to read live from St Peter's Basilica.
''I think the fundamental element that convinced Benedict XVI to take part in the television programme was the fact that he will not be commenting but simply giving a pure reading of the text, a pure announcement of the Word,'' said Monsignor Gianfranco Ravasi, president of the Pontifical Council for Culture.
The pope's participation will also be ''an appeal to the Catholic Church to go back to studying and deepening its knowledge of the Holy Scriptures, to find again that base element and point of departure'', Ravasi added.
Once the pope has finished his chapter, the marathon Bible reading will continue from a pulpit in the basilica of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme Church in Rome and will move across to RAI's education satellite channel, RAI Edu, according to De Carli.
READERS TO INCLUDE PEOPLE FROM ALL WALKS OF LIFE.
A total of 1,200 people from across the social divides will take part in the project - from cardinals, rabbis, politicians and academics to policemen, sportsmen, students, soldiers and factory workers.
The reading is expected to take six days and six nights to complete, with passages lasting between four and eight minutes and brief pauses for ''musical reflection'' every hour and a half.
It will close on October 10 with the Vatican Secretary of State, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, reading the 22nd chapter of the Book of Revelation on first channel RAI Uno.
De Carli stressed that both Catholics and Jews will be involved in the reading, adding that the pope's Italian reading of Genesis would immediately be followed by Rome's Chief Rabbi, Riccardo Di Segni, reading it in Hebrew. The beginning of St John's Gospel will be read in Greek.
De Carli added that the door was also open to Muslims wishing to participate in the project.
''Even though the Bible is not a sacred book for people of the Islamic faith, if they would like to read a passage we have nothing against it,'' he said.
