Sediari Pope John Paul II disbanded the chair-bearers in 1978. However papal ushers (Italian "Gentiluomo di sua santità") carried him on his death in 2005. Sediari The Sediari pontifici () were chair-bearers of the pope on the sedia gestatoria. Originally servants of the papal household they later became a lay confraternity. The origins of the chair-bearers lie in medieval times, earlier even than the Swiss Guards. The earlier red-dressed papal grooms or palafrenieri were a different group of papal servants, originally liverymen for the papal carriage, then an influential Confraternity, then finally merged with the sediari. The sediari and parafrenieri constituted
Religion in Taiwan broader "Chinese religion". It is hard to make such distinction because various Taoist deities are worshipped alongside deities which originated in Buddhism, for instance Guanyin, in many temples across the country. Prior to the 17th century the island of Taiwan was inhabited by the Taiwanese aborigines of Austronesian stock, and there were small settlements of Chinese and Japanese maritime traders and pirates. Taiwanese aborigines traditionally practised an animistic ethnic religion. When the island fell under Dutch rule in 1624, Protestantism was spread to the Taiwanese aborigines. Two years later, with the transition to Spanish rule, the Catholic Church was introduced