Walking saint goes marching in

Belgrade, Serbia - "The walking saint" has walked away and hundreds of thousands gathered to say goodbye with a somber funeral procession in Belgrade, Serbia. Patriarch Pavle, the leader of the Serbian Orthodox Church through its post-Communist revival and the Balkans' bloody ethnic conflicts in the 1990s has died at the age of 95 after an extended hospitalization for heart and lung problems. Since 1970, he has been leader of the 7-million member church. 

Funeral prayers were held at Belgrade's Church of St. Michael the Archangel, or Saborna Crkva in Serbian, where Pavle's body lay in an open casket. Estimates of up to a half-million Orthodox believers, many from neighboring Bosnia and Montenegro, were made by state television as to the number attending the funeral procession. 

Crowds joined Serbian leaders and clergy in a solemn procession to the St. Sava Temple, the biggest Orthodox Christian church in the Balkans, where a public mass was held to honor Pavle. The Serbian saint was finally placed to rest during a private ceremony at a monastery located in Belgrade's suburbs.