Muslim family carves chair for Pope Francis' visit to Bosnia

A Bosnian Muslim did not sleep for a week after he was assigned the job of carving a special chair that Pope Francis will be sitting in during his visit to Bosnia.

Hajdarovac, 61, and his 33-year-old son Edin started working on the chair on Monday in their little workshop in the central Bosnian town of Zavidovici.

 

PHOTO: NEWSINFO

All other orders were put on hold in order to produce the chair by June 6, when the pointiff will be holding a Mass in Sarajevo aimed at boosting efforts toward brotherhood in the country which was ravaged by war two decades ago.

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Hajdarovac's family-run workshop has been in the carving business for years, and has been carving souvenirs for visitors of the Catholic Medjugorje shrine as well as decorations for churches and mosques. The chair for the Pope, however, marked the highlight of their careers.

PHOTO: FOCUS NEWS

"It makes me extremely happy because to make the chair for such a person is a huge and important thing," Edin Hajdarovac told The Associated Press.

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Keeping the design of the chair a secret, the father-son pair only revealed that the wood they would be using would be from a walnut tree and it would depict various religious symbols, including the Pope's coat of arms and emblems of three Bosnian cathedrals.

 

PHOTO: HUFFINGTON POST

The local priest, Miro Beslic, convinced his flock to finance the purchase of the material but the Hajdarovacs will be carving the chair free of charge.

"The whole country is in financial crisis, but once people understood that this is about the Pope... then people accepted the idea," Beslic said.

PHOTO: REUTERS

Francis is viewed by many Muslims, Catholics and Christian Serb Orthodox in Bosnia as a worthy Pope.

This Associated Press article originally appeared on Yahoo News.