Finally got to visit Benny...

I've always thought it's been pretty cool to wake up on Palm Sunday and Easter and see all the photos and videos from the services at St. Peter's square. It's always amazed me how many people would crowd into the square, and I remember saying so many times: "As cool as it would be to be there on Easter, I would hate to be there...way too crowded."

Well, guess where I found myself on Sunday?


Yep. :) I decided that since I'll only be in Rome for Easter once I wasn't going to miss this for the world. Since we live so close to the Vatican (and it was an absolutely gorgeous day!) we decided to just walk down to St. Peter's...we were actually able to get a lot closer than we thought we'd be able to. Believe it or not (as Amanda pointed out), we waited in a longer line to get into the Colosseum with a tour group than we did to get into Palm Sunday Mass!

The funny thing is, as packed as the square was, we still had quite a bit of room around us, so it almost didn't feel as crowded as it looked. Of course, that's until they did communion...for how many thousands of people? It was absolutely nutty! We finally just found a spot somewhat out of the way and stood our ground. It's intense...


I'm so glad it was a nice day on Sunday...Mass was almost 3 hours long! It was pretty tempting to leave early, but even at the most boring moments (think 3 hours of not knowing what's being said...yeah) we refused to miss out on even a second of the service. It was actually kind of neat because there were moments when I felt so lost as to what was going on, and then I realized that I was actually understanding several words within a the same sentence...not always enough to understand what they were saying, but I could at least get some context. Definitely very encouraging! :)

The (apparently) Swiss guards...we're not quite sure why they're called that. Hmm...maybe I should have paid more attention in religion class...

Yep. That's the pope. I have to say, it was weird to see him on the giant screen right near us - it felt like I was watching it on TV back home - and then I just turned my head to the left and could see the pope right there! Totally crazy...

As hectic as it looks on TV (and trust me, it is hectic) it's totally worth the craziness to be there in person!!!

Ciao for now!