January 10

We had a more leiurely morning and went to Sunday Mass at St. Peter’s. It was in Latin with Italian readings and homily, so we didn’t understand a lot, but it was amazing to celebrate Mass in the center of Catholicism with people from all over the world.

Afterwards, we went out in the square and Pope Francis said a few words, led the Angelus and gave us the Apostolic Blessing. He is in the window with the thing hanging down in the right hand corner of the picture below.

Inside St. Peter’s. We’ll have more pics later.

There were big screen TVs in case you couldn’t see him that well. Which we couldn’t. But it was still neat.

Lots of people.

and birds

Then we went to a local restaurant and had antipasta which turned out to be a TON of food so we never ordered anything else.

After our reposo, we were ready to go to dinner with our friend Fr. Josh who is finishing up his last year at the Pontifical North American College. He took us to Vito & Dina’s right around the corner from us and it was delicious! We skipped the antipasta that night, but had dessert. It was good to catch up with Fr. Josh too.

Here is a picture of our apartment building. We were on the 4th floor with a tiny lift that held 3 people. Charlie, Mom & I usually rode the lift and everyone else usually walked the stairs. We did not look out over the courtyard and we did not have a balcony, but it was a nice apartment for 10 days. 3 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, a tiny kitchen and not much else!