Srilanka, April 27 -- Today marks the final day of the Exposition of the Sacred Tooth Relic of the Buddha at the Sri Dalada Maligawa, drawing to a close a historic event with extraordinary acts of piety, endurance, and interfaith compassion.

The Sacred Relic was placed on public display for the ninth consecutive day yesterday, opening at 11 a.m. to an overwhelming tide of Buddhist devotees, among them hundreds of foreigners. By midday, over 200,000 people - including families with young children - had gathered in Kandy, queuing for hours in the sweltering heat to pay homage. Among the large number of Buddhist devotees, an unexpected sight stood out: priests and nuns from the Catholic Church, distributing food parcels and bottles of wate...