Day 4 began with our plans to attend Mass at St. Anne's Parish. This is the Church where Fr. Nathan said his first Mass, and the parish church for everyone that lives in Vatican City. We allowed plenty of time to get there, but unfortunately, the metro ran a lot less trips on Sunday, so after waiting 7 minutes, one showed up, with everyone squished in more than we'd ever seen before. SARDINE TIME! We ended up being about 7 minutes late, which we hate.
This church is pretty small, and there were no seats when we got there. No biggie, we can stand. However, several people stood up and insisted the girls and I sit. So we did. Very difficult, as Beka started asking for milk. I put one girl on each side of me, and maneuvered the Tula to nurse her while wearing her. She nursed and fell asleep, score! Makes the best Mass, especially in a place where we have the only children, and are surrounded by tons of old ladies. The girls decided though they didn't want to sit and they wanted to stand with daddy. I told them no, that nice people had given their seats up for us, and we were going to accept their gratitude. In typical 4yo fashion, Abby started to cry nice and loud, everyone staring at us now. ::Sigh:: Pick my battles, let her go stand with daddy. So now 6yo decides well, it worked for her, so she started crying, and got to stand with him as well.
Afterwards, we headed out of the church and waited for Fr. Nathan to meet us. Then we headed for the Plaza of St. Peter's to get ready to see Pope Francis. We found one small shady spot in the shade of a fountain, and sat there, and had a picnic snack. During this time, they had huge screens showing what was going on in St. Peter's. It was very evident that Mass was going on with Pope Francis and some other man from another nationality. Fr. Nathan, knowing a bit of Italian, said "My Italian's not great, but I THINK he just said something about a Doctor of the Church and Armenian genocide." We later discovered that yes, Gregory of Narek was declared a Doctor of the Church by Pope Francis. This happened in February, but I guess this was the Mass that made it official. Very cool info to learn, and to know we were there for it without exactly realizing it. The man at the Mass must have been the Armenian leader of the Armenian Rite.
A little while later, with the plaza packed, Papa Francesco came out of the little window and gave his address in Italian. Fr. Nathan translated it to Jon, but I wasn't able to listen. They said something about how he said respect our elders in a nutshell. Then he did the Regina Coeli. Typically he'd do the Angelus, but since it was Easter, he did the Regina Coeli and gave his Papal Blessing. So cool!
Then we left the crazy and packed plaza and went to look for somewhere to eat. During this time, we ran in to John, a guy my husband knew when we was at seminary. They talked for a minute or two, then we moved on. We happened to go down a small road that no one was on, and found a nice little pizza place, so went inside for coolness (it was so hot on the plaza!) and lunch. Pizza, sodas, cappuccinos, and veggies. Very good, but in the end, a bit expensive. But since this was the only full meal we ate out, we were ok with this.
Afterwards, we headed toward the Castle San Angelo. We walked around the outside of the castle, then went inside. Unfortunately, as we were going in, my blood sugar was dropping quickly, so we got to handle me drinking tons of liquids while trying to climb the stairs. We took our time, to hopefully avoid dropping my sugar more, and enjoyed the views.
We had promised the kids we would get gelato this day, so we headed back to St. Peter's and went to the Old Bridge Ice Cream place. Can't recommend it enough. Jon splurged and got everyone a waffle cone. They were huge, and after we were all covered in sticky ice cream, we headed back to the apartment to wash up, rest, and get a good night's sleep.
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