Viva El Papa!

My Dad and my sister got the incredible blessing to attend the Holy Father's Mass! (jealousy is an understatement) My sister sent these pictures.

The Popemobile!

Look at this beautiful procession!

Viva el Papa!

Which brings me to a funny story. I was blessed to be able to go to Rome at Christmastime when I was a senior in college. We were able to go to several of Pope John Paul II's Masses and speeches. On Christmas day we went to St. Peter's and as the Holy Father comes out all holler "Viva el Papa"... except me... not knowing any Italian at all at the time (and about 5 words now) I stood there hollering at the top of my lungs ***"Viva la papa!" (Long live the potato!)

***My dear friend Cecilia in Italy has corrected my in-fluent Italian:

VIVA LA PAPPA means "long live the food" (family world, child vocabulary for "meal/food" is PAPPA in Italian),,,,,;) potato is "patata" .:)

Love
Cecilia

*snicker* I'm gradually improving my Italian! :)