For tickets To ask for tickets to the Washington or New York City Masses, write to Patricia Tossey, administrative assistant to the bishop, 1184 Bishop Street, Honolulu, HI 96813, or e-mail her at patt@rcchawaii.org. She will do her best to accommodate your request. Deadline for requesting tickets is March 1, 2008.

Want to attend one of Pope Benedict XVI’s stadium Masses when he comes to the United States in April? Bishop Larry Silva’s office may have your ticket.

The Holy Father will celebrate two public Masses during his first pastoral visit to the United States, one on April 17 in the Nationals’ Stadium in Washington, D.C., and the second on April 20 at Yankee Stadium in New York

The Archdioceses of Washington and New York, which are hosting the Masses, are making a limited number of tickets available to Hawaii Catholics who wish to attend. How many tickets is not yet known, said Patricia Tossey, administrative assistant to the bishop, who is handling local requests. More details are expected in January.

According to Catholic News Service, priority in allocating the Mass tickets will be given to people in the archdioceses of Washington and New York.

The tickets will be free. However, applicants will have to provide name, address and other information and must show an ID to be admitted to the stadium, according to the New York archdiocese’s Web site. And the tickets will be nontransferable, it notes, warning that any tickets for sale through brokers or Web sites are fraudulent.

The Washington Nationals’ new baseball stadium has a capacity of about 45,000; Yankee Stadium has a capacity of perhaps 65,000.

Bishop Silva will be attending both Masses.

Most of the U.S. papal events are by invitation only. Here are the events to which the public is not invited:

•    April 16 diplomatic reception at the White House: Participants from the diplomatic community are to be invited through the White House.
•    April 16 meeting with the U.S. bishops at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington: Event is limited to U.S. bishops.
•    April 17 meeting with Catholic educators at The Catholic University of America in Washington: Open to presidents of Catholic colleges and universities and superintendents of diocesan school systems.
•    April 17 interreligious gathering at the Pope John Paul II Cultural Center in Washington: Invitations are being handled by the USCCB Committee for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs.
•    April 18 speech to the U.N. General Assembly in New York: Access to the U.N. building and grounds will be controlled by the United Nations.
•    April 18 ecumenical event at an as-yet-unidentified New York parish church in Manhattan: Invitations to Christian religious leaders will be extended by the Archdiocese of New York.
•    April 19 Mass for priests, deacons and religious at St. Patrick’s Cathedral, New York: Invitations will first go to New York Archdiocese-based priests, deacons and religious, then to those of neighboring dioceses.
•    April 19 meeting with children with disabilities at St. Joseph’s Seminary Chapel in New York: Event probably will accommodate no more than dozens of children, by invitation only.
•    April 19 youths and seminarians rally at St. Joseph’s Seminary: All U.S. seminarians will be invited. Youths will receive tickets through their Catholic schools, religious education programs and youth groups.
•    April 20 visit to ground zero, site where New York’s World Trade Center stood: A simple ceremony is planned for police, fire and emergency workers and family members of victims of the 9/11 attack.