Only 100 people will be allowed to attend the funeral mass for Archbishop Desmond Tutu.
According to the New York Times, the Nobel Peace Prize-winning icon’s January 1st funeral was given a 100-person capacity due to pandemic restrictions in South Africa.
“The public viewing will be regulated by social distancing rules, in addition to the limited attendance at the funeral mass, where family members and clerics will take precedence on the small guest list,” the NYT reported.
Tutu’s remains will be cremated and his ashes will be interred at St. George’s Cathedral — Tutu’s former church — on New Year’s day in Cape Town.
On Sunday (December 26), South African President Cyril Ramaphosa announced the 90-year-old’s passing in a statement.
“The passing of Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu is another chapter of bereavement in our nation’s farewell to a generation of outstanding South Africans who have bequeathed us a liberated South Africa,” Ramaphosa said. “A man of extraordinary intellect, integrity and invincibility against the forces of apartheid, [Tutu] was also tender and vulnerable in his compassion for those who had suffered oppression, injustice and violence under apartheid, and oppressed and downtrodden people around the world.”
In 1975, Tutu — who was a primary voice in urging the South African government to end apartheid — became the first Black bishop of Johannesburg, South Africa’s capital, and later the first Black Archbishop of Cape Town.
In 1984, Tutu was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his non-violent opposition to apartheid.
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