VOTF in Rome

The VOTF Survey

Rome, the night of April 22 passing into the dawn of April 23

The Night Watch

I missed the last regular bus from downtown Rome last night and couldn't find the night bus - the black line as they refer to it here - to the place where I'm staying in Rome. Because of maintenance work, the Metro had stopped running at 9 pm. The regular buses run until 11:30 pm.

So what to do? The next regular service began at both the Metro and the bus stops at 5:30 am. I could have taken a cab but I was pulled to St. Peter's Square.

For those of you who may be inclined to worry at this point - thank you - but I haven't gone over the deep end. I knew St. Peter's Square was one of the safest places to be; there is always a police presence.

Leaving the Trevi Fountain and the lively crowds of tourists and Romans, I traveled to the Piazza Venezia and made the decision to go to the the former lodging of Pope Benedict XVI. From what I been able to glean about him personally, the apartment has an extensive library of over 1,000 volumes, which are now being transported to the Vatican, plus a piano, and maybe a cat.

It's a regular looking multi-tiered apartment building in Rome and I decided to begin my short pilgrimage to St. Peter's Square beginning from this spot. The night was cool with some wind, the streets got less crowded, and as I walked I prayed that the route with its shops and sense of life would remain with this new pope as he enters the Apostolic Palace and becomes removed from both the joys and trials of a simple walk to work.

The lit dome of St. Peter's was my guide. Looming over all the other architecture it led me to the place where pilgrims, saints, sinners and popes have come over the centuries.

The front facade of St. Peter's was lighted with a soft glow across the windows of the Hall of Benediction making it look as if a luminous band-aid had been placed on the forehead of the largest Church in Christendom. Huge lanterns hang within the columns of the Bernini colonnade

St. Peter's Square is never totally empty but on this night it came close. The strolling couples, slowing cars taking in Michelangelo and Bernini's magnificence in stone, the patrolling police, and the odd camera man guarding both his prime spot and tools of the trade in the vast media stand across from the Square, totaled about 15 to 20 people an hour. In the vastness of St. Peter's Square, we were all able to be alone with our thoughts.

Mine became a mosaic of the centuries with the different hues and pieces of Voice of the Faithful – in particular, the faces of the survivors of sexual abuse by clergy that have made themselves known to the VOTF Dayton Affiliate. Into the frame came David Clohessy and Barbara Blaine of SNAP, and Sue Archibald of the Linkup - Catholic children all, souls seared, innocence gone, consciousness raised, action propelled.

As I hope for them and Voice of the Faithful - a true Renaissance of the light of the Holy Spirit in my Church - my thoughts go to the time so named in the Middle Ages. I can see Julius II coming home from the wars in full armor on a white steed, entering the center of the Square where the half steps in the stones made especially for the horses’ hooves are still visible. I picture him in full stride moving quickly as cardinals, bishops and robed monks kneel to kiss his ring. Brushing past their bowed heads, he turns at the top steps of the whale of space in the atrium and accepts the applause of a medieval crowd of minstrels, marketers, and minions. His boots and sword slap hard against the stone of the Vatican as he heads to the Sistine Chapel to check on Michelangelo's progress. Hands on hips, war grime on his boots, he shouts up the scaffolding, “When will you be finished?”

It's what I want to shout to the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith about the defrocking cases (the case to remove a man from priesthood against whom there are credible allegations of sexual abuse of children and minors) that have been sent from the US. The volume of these cases flows like a river, but once inside the Office a dam has been built, it seems, whose gates allow a very narrow stream of resolved cases to trickle through.

Again from our own age, David Clohessy's longing for the community of his Church and his heart-of-the-matter quotes, Barbara Blaine's Joan of Arc determination and elegant calm, and Sue Archibald's gentle but unflagging persistence, are superimposed in my mind's eye in the place where tapestries of saints are hung.

I hear the voice of the survivor in my own affiliate say that when all hope was lost in the local bishop and archdiocese to do the right thing, she clung to a faith that in the end the Vatican would do what was right. The faith grows slimmer but it is still there. Tears run down my face.

I can see Pope Leo XIII sitting in the library of the Apostolic Palace, candle wax clumping at the base of a silver stick. He hears the same bells as I do tonight. Head bowed but pushed forward by justice, he finishes Rerum Novarum. In one of our best moments as a Church, he proclaims a fair day's work for a fair day's pay - long before Teamsters, picket signs, or contracts.

We have laryngitis in our moral voice now. How can we preach moral certitude while our own house and our own children remain bereft of justice? As the clock of St. Peter's strikes 3 am, the dead middle of the night, I pray that this laryngitis will not become permanent.

As the moon and Bernini's columns play a game of hide and seek, I see in the shadows of the Square, a small brown robed monk, three white knots falling from the cincture of the thread-bare garment. With a determined gait, eyes straight forward, certitude of purpose in mind, goal set – I hear, “Speak to the Pope, tell him and he will understand.” It is Francis of Assisi on the mission to repair the Lord's Church. Minus the robe, it could be the co-founder of my affiliate.

Once the knowledge of what had transpired in victims' lives came into Mike Knellinger's life, he has been on the same mission as Francis - and encountered the same scoffing, the same misunderstandings, but also the attraction of a small band of followers, and on the best of days - a letter that gets through to the Pope, or at least to the papal nuncio - that has some impact. The clock strikes half-past three, accompanied by my “Deo Gratis” for him, for all of the Dayton Affiliate, and all of Voice of the Faithful.

At the crossover point between the Apostolic Palace and the Basilica, into my mind's eye comes the round figure of Pope John XXIII, a red cape as a weapon against illness and the winter's chill. He moves through the gardens to the Tower of the Winds where, in a structure that looks like the castle on a chess board, technology allows him to watch the sessions of the Second Vatican Council from a television hookup. The Belgian Cardinal Leo Suenens stands to speak of the Church and the Modern World. The Basilica is lit with the light of the Holy Spirit. “Yes!” two birds seem to say as they passed in low formation over me. I raise a more mundane “Deo Gratias” that they are not pigeons and have made no nocturnal deposit in my space.

The clock chimes 4 am and my thoughts lead me inside the Basilica to my first encounter in the heart of Rome with Pope John Paul II. He held a crowd as enthralled by his physical presence as they were by the glory of the Basilica itself. His domination of the place for more than a quarter of a century is felt from the simple grotto where he is laid, to the main aisle he commanded on foot and in motorized cart, to the altar where kings were crowned, heresies proclaimed, interdictions rang out, incense billowed, and through it all - we believe - in the Eucharist where the Lord remains ever present.

At 4:30 am I begin to sing. It is spontaneous - the Benedictus of the Morning Prayer. From ancient days, we have hoped in the Lord's promise to us that He will guide our steps. It seems extremely urgent to me now.

Whether simple compassion or the singing prompt a male and female police officer to bring me a warm cup of sweet tea, I do not know, but I am both surprised and grateful. It is an example of the Italian way - love expressed through food. “Mange! Mange!” (Eat! Eat!) I know it in the home and heart of my dearest friend. From a corner of the Square, comes a man intent on bringing me a small cake as well. Short, bearded, with a slight limp, he looks for all the world, like Toulouse Lautrec. Only a beret and palette are missing.

At 5 am, the first splitting of darkness, like the parting of the Red Sea, begins over the lit dome of Castle Sant' Angelo. Popes ducked into the passageways to escape enemies on both ends. The black of night morphs into the most amazing deep sapphire blue. It takes a half hour for the cleft of light to spread up the Via della Concilizione to kiss the face of St. Peter's and bid it happy morning.

Now in the full light of day it is time to think of Pope Benedict XVI. In these first days, the Throne of Peter seems too large for his slight frame. I think back to my first encounter with him. We crossed paths nearly right in front of the main altar of St. Peter's at the corner of the balustrade of the stairs to St. Peter's Tomb. I recognized him immediately. It was the eyes. They are dark but draw you in. His demeanor was gracious, nearly shy.

The vendors begin to open their stands. The buses are running again. I stand for one lingering, peaceful, close look at the Basilica.

Will Benedict XVI make it a fortress of denial or a place of true refuge for the precious lives of those from whom innocence was ripped by the alter Christus (the other Christ)? Will he speak bluntly for the good of the Church the words of fraternal correction to his brother bishops who stood by and left the vulnerable suffer? Can the laryngitis be cured?

Will we know him as our brother Joseph?