LAHORE, Pakistan (AP) — Mourners gathered Wednesday in Pakistan’s eastern city of Lahore to bury 14 schoolchildren who were killed when the roof of a tutoring center collapsed on Tuesday.
Police are investigating whether negligence during ongoing construction work caused the collapse that left another eight children injured and hospitalized in stable condition.
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Books, shoes and other stuff of victim children are seen at the site of Tuesday's roof collapse at a tutoring center roof, on the outskirts of Lahore, Pakistan, Wednesday, July 1, 2026. (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)
People carry the bodies of children, who were killed in the roof collapse at a tutoring center that was under construction after a funeral prayer, on the outskirts of Lahore, Pakistan, Wednesday, July 1, 2026. (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)
Women mourn around the bodies of their children, who were killed in the roof collapse at a tutoring center that was under construction on the outskirts of Lahore, Pakistan, Wednesday, July 1, 2026. (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)
People carry the bodies of children, who were killed in a roof collapse at a tutoring center on the outskirts of Lahore, Pakistan after a funeral prayer Wednesday, July 1, 2026. (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)
EDS NOTE: GRAPHIC CONTENT - Women mourn around the bodies of their children, who were killed in the roof collapse at a tutoring center that was under construction on the outskirts of Lahore, Pakistan, Wednesday, July 1, 2026. (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)
Residents and preliminary police findings indicate the tutoring center was operating in an aging building. Investigators believe the unfinished roof of the second floor may have collapsed because of poor construction.
At least two people, including the building owner, were arrested as investigators tried to determine who was responsible, senior police official Kamran Faisal said, adding that negligence by the owner and construction workers appear to have caused the collapse.
“We are still investigating to determine exactly whose negligence resulted in this tragic incident,” Faisal said.
Funeral prayers for the children, who were up to 14 years old, began before dawn and continued through Wednesday morning. Most of the victims were buried in a local graveyard, while some families planned to take the bodies to their native towns for burial.
Ambulances transported the victims’ bodies overnight to their homes in Kahna, a neighborhood on the outskirts of Lahore. As the bodies were returned to their families, cries echoed through the neighborhood. Mothers and female relatives sat beside the bodies throughout the night while classmates and friends of the victims stood nearby in tears.
The funeral mourners Wednesday morning included Mohammad Ashfaq, a laborer whose 7-year-old son and nephew were killed in the collapse.
“I cannot express my pain and grief in words,” Ashfaq said through tears as relatives tried to comfort him.
Nearby, Muhammad Farooq mourned the loss of his young daughter.
“Yesterday she went to her tuition class at around 4 p.m.,” Farooq said. “Around 4:45 p.m., my family called me and said the roof of the tuition center had collapsed. They told me many children were trapped under the debris. Fourteen children were killed, and the injured were taken to the hospital.”
Local resident Mohammad Tahir said neighbors were the first to respond after the roof gave way.
“Rescuers arrived quickly, but before they reached us, neighbors rushed in with shovels and even dug through the debris with their bare hands,” Tahir said. “We also pulled children from the rubble, but many could not be saved.”
Building collapses are common in Pakistan, where construction standards are often poorly enforced. Structures are frequently built with substandard materials and safety regulations are sometimes ignored to reduce costs.
Grief has turned to anger for some people. Residents blamed the owner of the tutoring center for holding classes in what they described as an old and unsafe building despite ongoing construction and demanded strict punishment for those responsible.
“We don’t know whose funeral to attend first or whose home to visit first to offer condolences,” Tahir said.
Books, shoes and other stuff of victim children are seen at the site of Tuesday's roof collapse at a tutoring center roof, on the outskirts of Lahore, Pakistan, Wednesday, July 1, 2026. (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)
People carry the bodies of children, who were killed in the roof collapse at a tutoring center that was under construction after a funeral prayer, on the outskirts of Lahore, Pakistan, Wednesday, July 1, 2026. (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)
Women mourn around the bodies of their children, who were killed in the roof collapse at a tutoring center that was under construction on the outskirts of Lahore, Pakistan, Wednesday, July 1, 2026. (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)
People carry the bodies of children, who were killed in a roof collapse at a tutoring center on the outskirts of Lahore, Pakistan after a funeral prayer Wednesday, July 1, 2026. (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)
EDS NOTE: GRAPHIC CONTENT - Women mourn around the bodies of their children, who were killed in the roof collapse at a tutoring center that was under construction on the outskirts of Lahore, Pakistan, Wednesday, July 1, 2026. (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)
ECONE, Switzerland (AP) — A breakaway group of traditionalist Catholics on Wednesday directly defied Pope Leo XIV by celebrating an ancient Latin Mass to consecrate four bishops without his consent, dismissing the threat of schism and excommunication and justifying their actions as a “sacred duty” to defend the Catholic faith.
Bells tolled through the mountain valley of Econe, Switzerland, as the Society of St. Pius X began the solemn ceremony at its seminary. Thousands of people, faithful Catholics who prefer the traditional Latin Mass over modern liturgies, filled the field under cloudy skies as the incense-led procession of hundreds of priests approached the altar under a tent.
The orderly, solemn ceremony, accompanied by organ music and livestreamed on the society's YouTube channel, went ahead despite a last-ditch appeal by Leo to call it off. In a letter published Tuesday, the American pope warned that consecrating bishops without his approval amounts to a “sin of extreme gravity” that will actually harm their faithful.
And yet at the start of the Mass, a priest read aloud a statement justifying the consecrations as a necessary defense of the faith and criticizing how the Catholic Church today had deviated from tradition.
“Therefore before God we consider it a sacred duty towards Holy Church and towards souls to proceed with the consecration of bishops who are entirely faithful to her holy tradition and to her constant magisterium,” the priest said. “We consider every punishment and censure brought to bear against this step will have no validity.”
According to church law, the mere act of consecrating a bishop without a papal mandate incurs the harshest penalty in the Catholic Church: automatic excommunication for the four new bishops and the bishop administering the rite. It also amounts to a schismatic act, or an intentional rupture of the unity of the Catholic Church.
And yet everything about Wednesday’s ceremony had the air of a joyous celebration. The website for its consecration has had a countdown clock running for days. Video clips show seminarians joyfully unloading boxes. Participants received a baseball cap with the “Econe2026” seal on it.
The field, located under giant power lines, was awash in smiling nuns, priests posing for photos, girl scouts handing out water bottles, black-clad security guards with earpieces and orange-vested volunteer escorts keeping journalists on a short leash. Morning mist coated the nearby Rhone River that snakes through the Alpine valley as worshippers flocked in.
And in perhaps the most obvious sign of a celebration, registered participants were able to purchase a souvenir set of wine to commemorate the “historic” event. The 75 Swiss franc ($92.50) “Cuvee des Sacres” gift box features pinot noir, Syrah, Petit Arvine and Fendant, each bottle with a bishop-themed label: an image of a bishop’s pointed miter hat, his ring, cross or crozier staff.
For the society, known by its acronym SSPX, neither the threat of a declared schism nor an excommunication matters. The SSPX believes it alone is upholding church tradition and the Catholic faith.
“We don’t fear it. It pains us immensely, but we believe that the good we seek is greater than the pain that will be inflicted upon us,” said Marc-André Mabillard, media manager for the society.
In a late response to Leo's letter, the SSPX superior, the Rev. Davide Pagliarani, urged Leo to wait before declaring any penalty.
The ceremony took place 38 years to the day after the Vatican declared the last consecrations of SSPX bishops a “schismatic act” that incurred automatic excommunication for the bishops.
The French Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre had founded the ultratraditionalist SSPX in opposition to the modernizing reforms of the Second Vatican Council. Among other things, the 1960s church meetings revolutionized the Catholic Church’s relations with other Christians, Jews and people of other faiths, and allowed Mass to be celebrated in the vernacular rather than Latin.
Today, the SSPX celebrates the ancient Latin Mass and has accused the modern church of being rife with heresies and errors, including modernism, liberalism and ecumenism. The society insists that only the SSPX is upholding the true faith of Christ and has justified the consecrations, citing a “state of necessity” to minister to its faithful.
But many Catholics, including conservative and traditional ones, are opposed to the consecrations, viewing them as an act of severe disobedience to the pope that hurts the church.
“You can’t serve tradition while disobeying the church and her authority,” said the Rev. Robert Gahl, an ethics expert at the Catholic University of America.
The St. John Paul II biographer, George Weigel, has written that the SSPX-Vatican divide is about far more than just whether Mass is celebrated in Latin or English.
It’s about “a rejection of the Second Vatican Council’s teaching on the church, salvation, religious freedom, church–state relations, and the church’s relationship to other religions,” Weigel wrote recently in First Things magazine.
Weigel recalled that Lefebvre was a supporter of the “collaborationist" Vichy regime in France during World War II. One of its original SSPX bishops denied the Holocaust.
The SSPX has justified the consecrations by invoking a “state of necessity.” The group says that with only two of the original four bishops surviving, it simply needs more bishops to tend to the needs of a faith community that counts 800 places of worship in 77 countries.
The group denies that the consecration is a rejection of Leo’s authority or a challenge to his power. Rather, it says the creation of four new bishops is solely to be able to ordain new priests and preside over confirmation ceremonies according to the ancient rite.
The SSPX has identified the new bishops as Pascal Schreiber of Switzerland, Michael Goldade of the United States, Michel Poinsinet de Sivry of France and Marc Hanappier, also of France.
In response to the pope’s letter, Mabillard, media manager for the society, expressed “great sadness to not be understood by our leader,” and added: “We are changing absolutely nothing in our plans.”
Winfield contributed from Rome.
Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.
Faithful wait for the start of a consecration ceremony for four new bishops, outside a tent set up outside the Society of St. Pius X seminary, in Econe, Switzerland, Wednesday, July 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Baz Ratner)
Priests prepare miters and pastoral staffs before the start of a consecration ceremony for four new bishops, in a tent set up outside the Society of St. Pius X seminary, in Econe, Switzerland, Wednesday, July 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Baz Ratner)
Pope Leo XIV leaves after a Mass where he conferred the pallium on newly appointed metropolitan archbishops, in St. Peter's Basilica, at the Vatican, Monday, June 29, 2026. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)
Pope Leo XIV waves during the Angelus noon prayer from the window of his studio overlooking St.Peter's Square, at the Vatican, Monday, June 29, 2026. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)
Pope Leo XIV leaves after a Mass where he conferred the pallium on newly appointed metropolitan archbishops, in St. Peter's Basilica, at the Vatican, Monday, June 29, 2026. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)
