Il Papa

CHAPTER 28

As if we hadn’t had our fill of the Vatican yet, we had one more little thing to take care of there- just a little meeting with the man in charge, the Pope. Steve, being a devout Catholic, had preemptively arranged for tickets to see the Vicar of Christ in action, which we had to pick up the day before from a beaming Sister of the Church- she might have been the happiest person in Rome. Early the next morning, we made our way back to the Vatican once again, to stand in line with the other pious pilgrims. Not being catholic, I really had no idea what to expect, but I was imagining just a gussied-up version of normal Sunday mass- boy was I wrong…

It was a Pontifical pep-rally! There were huge delegations of believers from all over the world, and the Pope would call their names out and say thanks for coming, and they would go nuts, cheering, singing, weaving banners and flags, jumping up and down on their chairs- it was wild! There were even a few marching bands. All it needed were some cheerleaders- which I guess it had if you counted the Cardinals on stage.

*Note: Photos with a “VS” suffix are credited to Val and Steve

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