Vatican City - Cardinals meeting daily in Rome to discuss the main issues facing the Roman Catholic Church ahead of a conclave next week to elect a pope have signed a petition asking a future pope to "accelerate" the beatification of John Paul II, a report said.
The petition was signed by "many" but not all of the 134 cardinals present at Monday's meeting, according to the Italian daily Corriere della Sera.
The prelates have clearly caught the popular mood following the funeral mass for the late pope on Friday, when some in the massive crowd began chanting "santo, santo", demanding that the Polish-born pontiff be declared a saint.
The letter had been left on a table for cardinals to sign and at the end of the meeting was handed to the Dean of the College of Cardinals, Germany's Joseph Ratzinger, who will have the task of delivering it to the next pope, the newspaper said.
Cardinals held their eighth general congregation since the death of the pope on Tuesday, the arrival of 89-year-old Mauritian Cardinal Jean Margeot swelling the number to 137 in the Vatican's New Synod Hall.
Vatican spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls said they had begun "an exchange of ideas on the general situation of the Church in the world and on the Holy See," without giving details.
They also heard from the Cardinal Camerlengo, Eduardo Martinez Somalo, that the pope's apartments had now been completely sealed. Only his study and bedroom were sealed immediately after his death.
Navarro-Valls said that Italian Cardinal Sergio Sebastiani led a discussion about Holy See finances, and the expenses incurred during the period since the pope's death.
They also discussed such mundane matters as how to transport the 115 cardinal electors from their Santa Marta residence to the Sistine Chapel and back, a distance of less than a kilometre.
Archbishop Edward Nowak, the secretary of the Vatican office in charge of declaring saints, was quoted as saying on Monday that the Church could put John Paul II on the fast-track to sainthood from as early as October as the next pope could by-pass the usual lengthy procedure.
"The synod of bishops is meeting in Rome in October and it could be an appropriate opportunity to make such a decision," said Nowak.
Ordinarily, Church rules decree that five years must pass after death before the question of sainthood is tackled, to allow for cooler assessment of the subject's life, although at least one cardinal is believed to have revived talk of an ancient custom of allowing canonisation by acclamation.
The rush to sainthood gathered pace within days of John Paul II's death on April 2, with a stream of reports of purported miracles carried out during his lifetime reaching Rome. However, only those occurring after his death would count toward his sainthood.
"But one is enough for the beatification and another for the canonisation, and if the 'signs' (of miracles) are as many as we are to understand, it will not be too difficult to have new ones," Nowak was quoted as saying.
Only three popes have been canonised in recent history -- Celestine V in the 13th century, Pius V in the 16th and one of John Paul II's close predecessors, Pius X in the early 20th century.
Large queues are expected when the crypt under St Peter's Basilica where John Paul II was buried reopens to the public early Wednesday.
Meanwhile, the Vatican said more than three million pilgrims flocked to Rome between April 2-8, 21,000 people entering St Peter's Basilica every hour to see the body of John Paul II, at the rate of 350 a minute. Many waited an average of 13 hours in long queues, with the wait stretching to a maximum of 24 hours.
The Vatican said the longest line reached five kilometres, or three miles. On the day of the funeral, 500,000 people attended the open-air requiem mass, while another 600,000 watched on large screens installed at various points around the city.