Monday February 1st as well as Tuesday February 2nd were each to be the “day of all days” as the religious attending the “Consecrated Life in Communion” event in Rome were to meet with Pope Francis, both in a private audience( all 4,000 of us!) and at the Papal Mass closing the Year of Consecrated Life.
Thus excitement ran high.
We Visitandines left our Sisters of Charity residence earlier than usual to arrive at Paul the 6th Hall at 8AM, which would mean over a 3 hour wait for our Holy Father to greet us.
The time was well spent; in opening prayer, certainly, expressed again in several languages; in music and in private conversations as we got to know the religious in the seats around us.
The Federation Presidents of our Order were blessed to get second row seats in some cases which gave us great hopes of being close up to the Holy Father.
As time drew near, and rumors that Pope Francis was approaching were whispered the sedate religious began to exhibit decorum of a more spontaneous kind. As the Holy Father was running late, the anticipation kept building and finally the doors opened and the religious roared with joy!
He walked down the aisle to the stage greeting all those in his path. As he stepped to the podium Pope Francis gently handed over his prepared speech and spoke spontaneously, with much dynamism, humor and integrity.
You may read his talk here: https://yearofconsecratedlifedublin.wordpress.com/2016/02/11/address-to-participants-in-the-jubilee-for-consecrated-life-rome-2016/
Three key messages he gave were prophecy, proximity and hope.
View the video of the Holy Father‘s audience here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwMkWVxxyIQ
At the conclusion of his address, the Holy Father greeted the Cardinals, Bishops and other clergy, and music ministers on stage then came down to bless and greet the religious personally, especially those in the front rows, and those who scrambled to get there!
We Visitandines were very blessed to have at least three of our Sisters shake the hand and speak with Holy Father and kiss his ring, and possibly more. The three favored ones pictured here are Mother Rosemarie of Mobile, Mother Emmanuel of Rockville and Sister Jane Margaret of Waldron.
After this extraordinary morning we lunched again at Urbano College, had free time and then Mass at Urbano at 330PM.
The evening was set aside for a concert.
Not all of we Americans were feeling up to this event.