Un'udienza con Papa Benedetto XVI - The Vatican

"An audience with Pope Benedict XVI"

On Sunday February 2nd some of my friends and I went to check out St. Peter's Square and the Vatican City. Also on Sundays the Museum is not open and neither is the Sistine Chapel or the view from the top of the Basilica inside St. Peter's church (These activities will be saved for a later date!).  

The Nativity Scene inside of St. Peter's curch

The Basilica at night

There was some sort of service going on, so we went to take part in it

My friend Christina got us an audience with Pope Benedict XVI on Wednesday February 6th. It was so amazing and enlightening. The church were the pope gave his sermon seated at least 500 people. The service was at 10:30 in the morning but to get any sort of decent seat we arrived around 9 am, which on a Wednesday I am not even up until at least 9:30! But this was well worth it! Just to see the amount of love all of the people had for the Pope was incredible, there were people from all over the world at this service, either by themselves or with church groups. There was a group from a French Catholic Elementary behind us and they would sing a hymn/chant for him, while a group of either Spanish or Italian catholic Elementary kids had multi-colored bandannas and would routinely wave them above their heads saying something to the effect of "We love our Pope" in their own language.

Once the Pope came out the entire room went absolutely crazy with singing and chanting for him. Then the cardinals proceeded to welcome all of the visitors from each country/region in their individual languages. Finally the pope gave a sermon in Italian first then he himself (The Pope) summarized what he had just said in this order of languages... Italian, French, English, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Arabic (I think), Czech, Polish, and Latin. He spoke over 10 languages and knew them all perfectly, he was a little hard to understand because he spoke so softly but nonetheless I was at least able to understand his English and German! It was such an enlightening experience and it made me feel very small, which was definitely a good thing!

The Swiss Guard (they guard the Vatican), he obviously did not  want his picture taken!

THE POPE!!!

There was a lot of love inside 

The Ceiling was even impressive

The Altar inside mass with the Pope

Inside the church

Another view with the stained glass

The altar with the wooden Jesus

The Pope again

The next set of pictures are of St. Peter's church, and underneath the giant canopy-like structure is a way into the tomb of the 1st pope Peter.

Pieta By Michelangelo (Mary and Jesus after he was on the cross)

We can't wear shorts or show our shoulders inside the Vatican

View of the square looking out from the entrance

The nativity scene outside in the square