James Patterson - Woman of God

The air was crisp and the temperature fair when we arrived at the Apostolic Palace, where Pope Gregory spent his days.

This was it.

Gilly and I were going to meet the head of the Catholic Church, the man who represented Christ on earth to more than a billion Catholics.

I was ready.

FATHER RAPHAEL met us at the car and took us into the Apostolic Palace through the Portone di Bronzo. It was a true palace of enormous scale and breathtaking grandeur. I knew that it had a thousand rooms-fish ponds, conservatories, museums and chapels, including the glorious Sistine Chapel, and other rooms that were not open to the public.

But the priest didn’t give us a guided tour. Rather, he led us without comment through frescoed rooms and long, gilded corridors hung with ancient religious paintings and, from there, up three tall stories of marble staircase, the most direct route to the pope’s office.

As we climbed, I became aware of a tingling sensation across my cheeks, as if water were drying on my skin. A slight breeze ruffled my hair.

I held tight to Gilly’s hand as Father Raphael showed us into the office where Pope Gregory worked. The walls were ecru patterned with gold. Gold damask hung at the windows, and the pope, wearing white vestments, sat at his desk facing the door.

Pope Gregory looked in real life as he did on screen. He was white haired and a bit stooped, with genial features and an exceptionally warm smile.

When we entered the room, he rose to his feet, stepped out from behind his desk, and came toward us, extending his hand. I dropped a practiced curtsy and kissed his ring. Gilly stared up at Pope Gregory and said, “You’re so-radiant.”

He smiled widely and said, “Thank you, Gillian. You’re also very radiant, and so pretty.”

Father Raphael stepped forward and asked Gilly if she would help him feed the fish.

“We have big fish that you can feed by hand, signorina, and conservatories where very tall trees grow under glass.”

“May I go, Mom? Please?”

When Gilly had skipped off with Father Raphael, the pontiff directed me to a seating area across the room from his desk. After he took a seat in an ornate white upholstered armchair, I dropped into a similar but simpler chair across from him, with a low, wooden table between us.

He said, “I’ve been told that you speak Italian.”

“Yes.”

That sparkling sensation on my cheeks and forehead seemed to intensify. It reminded me of the dusting of snow on my face when James and I sat with Bishop Reedy in his horse-drawn carriage on our way to our wedding reception.

God. Are You here?

I accepted coffee and tried to be just normal Brigid while sitting opposite the Supreme Pontiff. He made small talk, and as he asked about the flight and accommodations, the tingling on my face extended to my folded hands and my crossed ankles, and I felt that special warmth inside my chest. The breeze circled the white furnishings, riffling the skirts on the pontiff’s chair.

Could the pope feel the breeze? I couldn’t tell.

He was saying in Italian, “I wanted to meet you, Brigid, because so many people are drawn to your church. Tell me, please, about what I think you call your ‘communications’ with our heavenly Father.”

When he said “il nostro Padre celeste,” present reality cleaved in the same way it had for me before, during enormous stress and in the presence of God.

I was looking directly at Pope Gregory and also looking down on the two of us from overhead. I saw the particles that I had only felt before. They were like flecks of gold floating away from me, swirling within a vortex around the pope and me like the fallen autumn leaves eddying around the feet of Bishop Reedy’s dappled horses.

God, are You here?

The resonance, almost like a voice, came to me.

Be with Gregory.

I was with the pope, seeing myself through his eyes. I saw my long, curling hair, my hazel eyes, and my mother’s heart-shaped face. I saw the details of my dress: the darts, the tucks, the stitches in the hem, the cutouts in the lace of my scarf.

My view swiped to the left and flowed past the centuries-old gold-framed painting of Jesus’s resurrection on the wall behind the pontiff. And then my view locked in.

I was back in my own body, looking at the pope in minute detail. But the most striking thing was, I saw that Pope Gregory was seeing me. He saw what I looked like, but also, I felt that he was reading my heart.

He asked, “Sei in presenza di Dio in questo momento?” Are you in God’s presence now?

I said, “Yes. I feel Him here.”

“Please describe this feeling.”

I had to tell him. At least, I had to try. I started out haltingly, but as I spoke, the words came out simply and truthfully.

“It is a feeling that I must call exalted, Your Holiness. I feel that God is with me and I am being directed by Him. I remain in place, and, simultaneously, I leave my body and can see things that don’t exist in stationary reality. I have an expanded awareness of myself, and of the moment, and of other people who are with me. Sometimes I am powerfully aware of people who have died, and I feel that they are aware of me-as if they were living.

“Right now, Your Holiness, I have an expanded awareness of you.”

“Do you feel a slight breeze?”

He waggled the fingers of his ring hand beside his face.

I swallowed hard and said, “Yes.”

He placed his hand over his heart. “Do you feel warm inside?”

“Yes, I do.”

The pope nodded and said, “I too. I see a very soft light around you. And I hear an intonation in here.” He touched his temple. “Be with Brigid.”

I gasped. I had never told anyone about the directives: Be with Colin. Be with James. Be with Gilly. I had told no one at all. And now Pope Gregory had said, “Be with Brigid.”

He was also with God, both of us were, together. I felt almost consumed with love for him.

I said, “Be with Gregory.”

His face crumpled with emotion. He crossed himself and kissed the plain cross he wore on a heavy chain around his neck. As I struggled to stay with Gregory, His Holiness said, “Will you pray with me?”

We prayed, the pope in his ornate armchair and flowing vestments, I in the more austere seat and black clothing, across from him. I folded my hands and kept my feet flat on the ground as the pope asked God for peace and unity in the world. A breath of air whispered through my clothes and hair and whirled around my ankles.

We said “amen” in unison, and just then, Gilly ran into the room, her shoes clattering on the polished floor, her face flushed with excitement.

The pope stood and reached out to her, and Gilly went directly to him and threw her arms around his waist. He gave her a hug she would never forget for the rest of her life.

She said, “Thank you for letting me see your wonderful home.”

The pope looked down at her fondly and said, “I love having you and your mother as my guests. God’s blessings on you both.”

Father Raphael took photos, and then the pope kissed the top of Gilly’s head and put his hand on my arm.

“Please keep me in your prayers,” he said. “Go safely with God.”

THE CHURCH of the Sacred Heart was at the juncture of two narrow, winding cobblestoned streets. The street was choked by protesters and some who supported JMJ.

I was torn. I didn’t want to bring Gilly into this chaos, but, at the same time, it was Maundy Thursday. I felt compelled to go to this church that had received an unspecified but still credible threat.