Punch-up delays Sydney pilgrim's progress (Extra)

Jul 19, 2008, 9:04 GMT

Sydney - An Australian pilgrim angered by an anti-pope protest lapsed into violence at Sydney's Catholic youth festival Saturday.

The 19-year-old lunged through a police cordon to wallop a fellow local protesting the church's teachings against homosexuality.

Police arrested the man, who was later released without charge.

It was the first recorded clash at the week-long World Youth Day celebrations presided over by Pope Benedict XVI.

The religious jamboree, held somewhere in the world every three years, has drawn 125,000 foreign pilgrims to Australia's biggest city. Australians attending number 100,000.

The fisticuffs came as pilgrims on their way to a racecourse where the pontiff will conduct the closing mass Sunday marched past a protest group of around 500.

Biffed protester Stefan Joksic was wearing a T-shirt that read Pope Go Homo.

'He found a break in the police line and just lunged for me. He was pulled back by the cops. He hit me on the side of the neck,' Joksic, 23, told Australia's AAP news agency.

Joksic's group included someone dressed up as the devil and several drag queens. They offered condoms to pilgrims marching 9 kilometres across the city to where they will sleep out overnight.

The Sunday mass closes World Youth Day. The pope leaves Australia Monday.