Vatican issues postage 'Sede Vacante' stamps

Philatelists all over the world now have a new object of desire: the Vatican's special Sede Vacante stamp.

The stamps, released on Monday, mark the interregnum between the death of Pope Francis and the election of his successor, a period known as 'Sede Vacante', Latin for Vacant Seat.

They can be bought in the Vatican City and also in the area surrounding St. Peter's Basilica, where Francesco Santarossa and his 88-year-old father, Ermenegildo, manage a numismatics and stamps shop.

The elder Santarossa has managed the shop since he left the papal gendarmerie in 1971.

But his service to the Vatican didn’t finish with retirement - 10 years later, he caught the attacker of John Paul II.

The pontiff was shot and seriously wounded in St. Peter’s Square on May, 13, 1981, by Turkish assailant Mehmet Ali Agca.

Santarossa recounts how he heard two shots and 'immediately understood they shot the pope".

He ran towards John Paul II's mobile to help and on the way cut off the attacker.

“When he was a meter away from me, he launched at me with the gun... I took him and I tried to bring him inside the Bronze Door (famous Vatican entry).”

The former gendarme's passion for stamps dates back to his days in Fontanafredda, his hometown in northern Italy.

There, he helped people who could not read with mail to and from their families abroad, and he was enamoured by the beautiful stamps placed on the envelopes.

He passed the torch to his son Francesco, who is now in charge of their shop.