Sunday, March 05, 2006

Viva Il Papa!

The highlight of the trip. O M G! The Piazza filled with thousands, singing, clapping. Chants of "Ben-e-detto Ben-e-detto!" ... and then, precisely at noon, he appears to a rousing roar. There follows the little speech (full text here in English) in Italian, then the Angelus itself. Greetings to various groups from different countries ... recognizing various parish and other groups. One Roman parish is particularly loud -- "Son' forti!" he laughs ("they're strong!"). His English sounds like a stereotypical German professor's -- "Now greetingz to ze Inglish-shpeaking pilgrimz ... " Then the closing prayer and the apostolic blessing. More raucous shouting. I put forth a "Viva il Papa!" at the top of my voice. We're all so excited to see him! Oh my word, I love this man!  Posted by Picasa

2 comments:

kairosnow said...

cooooooooooool.

But, the picture is small and low resoultion :(

Why did'nt you upload the picture as is?. I would have downloaded it to get a print! :).

Fr. Gaurav Shroff said...

Oh -- it had to be cropped and enlarged -- that's another reason why. My zoom lens wasn't that good!