LIFE

IN THE VATICAN

Vatican Hill: That’s what all this was, way back when, a piece of earth on the west bank of the Tiber River slightly elevated from what was called Vatican Fields. Popes have been at home here—with dramatic interruptions, such as a stint from 1309 to 1377 when, because of civil unrest in Italy, the papacy decamped to Avignon, France—ever since Leo IV in the 9th century. For centuries “the Vatican,” as a religious presence, has been alternately exalted and beset, delivered finally to its current splendor. Everyone, of course, sees pictures of the paintings and of the Sistine Chapel, for good reason. But here are the quieter moments, with regular people working in tucked-away precincts—as well as some places utterly empty, where only the pope might enter.

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THE HOLY DOOR of St. Peter’s Basilica is pushed open by Pope Francis on Tuesday, December 8, 2015, launching a 12-month Jubilee year that the pontiff hopes will emphasize what has become the leitmotif of his papacy: a merciful, welcoming Church. Through the centuries, Jubilees were decreed at regular intervals or in times of “need.” In his Bull of Indiction announcing the Holy Year, Francis said this call to Rome would commemorate the feast of the Immaculate Conception and also the 50th anniversary of the closing of John XXIII’s Second Vatican Council, which he felt asked Catholics to show mercy to everyone.

The Holy Door remains firmly sealed between Jubilees but is thrown open during a Holy Year to allow pilgrims to pass through. For centuries, it was literally a wall that had to be smashed open with heavy hammers to begin a Jubilee. In 1975, the wall was replaced by a bronze door and so Pope Francis presided over an altogether easier, but no less meaningful, affair.

LABORS OF LOVE

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CALMLY INDUSTRIOUS is a phrase that would apply to those who work in service to their Church and their pope. Above: A man moves chairs inside St. Peter’s Basilica during preparations for the election of the new pope at the Vatican on March 11, 2013, where the cardinals are set to begin their conclave inside the Sistine Chapel, a meeting that will lead to the elevation of Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio of Argentina as pope. Below: In the spring of 2005, just prior to the papal election of Benedict XVI, Francis’s predecessor, Cardinal Eduardo Martínez Somalo is presiding in the Vatican’s Apostolic Palace at what might be considered a solemn ceremony, as lay people and religious who will work as car drivers, housekeepers and others sign an oath of secrecy, promising never to reveal details of the infighting they might learn of during that year’s upcoming conclave. Bottom: After Francis has concluded Mass at St. Peter’s, a nun is part of the cleanup brigade.

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DAVE YODER/L’OSSERVATORE ROMANO/NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC CREATIVE

The Vatican’s work force consists mainly of priests and others who are assigned to spiritual duties, and also perhaps 3,000 manual laborers who commute from beyond the Vatican walls (the Association of Vatican Lay Workers trade union has 1,800 members), security forces (famously, the Swiss Guard), nuns who do everything from cook and clean to mend tapestry and finery, and then elevated clergy—archbishops, cardinals and such. These men do as they please, or as the pope pleases.

ON HIS HOLINESS’S NOT-SO-SECRET SERVICE

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SOME THOUSAND ROOMS make up the labyrinth of the Vatican Palace. The glorious space at above is the Pope Paul VI Hall.

Of the 1,000 rooms, perhaps a fifth of them house the pope (usually house the pope, Francis’s off-site choices not excepted), along with his secretary of state, high court officials, other officials in close attendance to the pope, administrative officials, some gendarmes and members of the Swiss Guard. So then: Several of the Swiss Guardsmen seen here in the Pope Paul VI Hall didn’t need to travel far for the ceremony at hand, nor risk their armor in the rain.

What is this ceremony at hand? It’s a celebration of the Sack of Rome. The Catholic Church, should it choose, could celebrate a sack of this country or that one, this city or that one, just about any day of the year; it could nearly fill its calendar with Crusades commemorations alone. Here we see a new generation of military men, including some inducted on this day, giving a huzzah for the stand of the Swiss Guard that defended Rome during a major historic sacking of the city on May 6, 1527. On that day, the pope’s intrepid Swiss stymied forces loyal to the Habsburgs and allowed Pope Clement VII to escape. (The Vatican was aligned with those who opposed the Habsburg dynasty at the time, which is certainly interesting but doesn’t really concern us here.)

Below: Guards relax in the superb Canteen of Hosts. Down through the years, various popes have been known to visit here and share a meal with the men.

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As you might expect, the populist Francis has pulled off a surprise visit to dine with Vatican employees—in July 2014—but it was to the larger, more general cafeteria with working stiffs outfitted in far more mundane threads than those of the Guard. Francis waited in line for his lunch and after taking a tray and cutlery, chose pasta and cod served with grilled vegetables. He asked his tablemates about their work, pronounced the food fine and gave a blessing before leaving.

FEMINISTS NEED NOT APPLY

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MEN ONLY is not a law throughout the Vatican—Pope Francis has elevated women to high administrative posts, even while staying firm on an all-male priesthood—but it is, thanks to tradition and several lingering if obviously hidebound rules, a norm. At top we see porters in the corridors outside the pope’s apartments, and below is Father Antonio Baldoni, who is in charge of the papal sacristy: guardian of the pope’s wardrobe.

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Nearly 600 citizens carry Vatican City passports, and according to a 2013 report, approximately 30 of them are women, the majority Italians. One of these was a nun, said the report, and others either had jobs (the wife of a Swiss Guardsman was officially employed as a translator; there were two teachers; one woman was in the military) or were related to men working at the Vatican. Women—as you may or may not be surprised to learn—cannot vote, but then again: Only cardinals can in Vatican City, as when they elect a new pope. The result of this is that Vatican City is the only country in the world where women have no voting rights at all.

The good news is, things were once harsher for female citizens of the Vatican. It used to be, for instance, that women were unable to open a bank account in Vatican City, but the papal sequence of John Paul II, Benedict XVI and now Francis has caused some of the more absurd strictures to be loosened or lost. In the wider world, the gender issues regarding Catholicism often boil down to a discussion of female clerics, but in Vatican City the issues are several and quotidian.

If as a tourist you have visited St. Peter’s Basilica, you have noticed the guards at the top of the stairs leading into the cathedral—eyeing folks. They aren’t your usual security detail (though of course in this day and age, security is paramount). The guards check for women whose skirts or dresses (black in color, is the request) do not reach the knee, whose sleeves are too short, or whose jewelry is too flashy. This rule of respect, as opposed to some of the prohibitions facing Vatican City’s female residents, is certainly defensible in a house of God.

TUCKED AWAY

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YOU WANT SECRETS, we’ve got secrets. This 2013 photograph (above) shows one of the most secret rooms in the world, the so-called Room of Tears, a small space accessible through a narrow staircase in the back of the Sistine Chapel. The room houses pontifical robes worn by previous popes. The Room of Tears is a new nickname for this place where Francis and other men came to dress after learning of their election. Reportedly, Francis meditated here and cried as he considered his upcoming papacy, which was announced to the world with a stream of white smoke from the Sistine Chapel chimney at 7:06 p.m. (Rome time) on March 13, 2013. (Per tradition, inconclusive votes of the cardinals result in the ballots being burned and black smoke emitted. White smoke tells the crowd on the plaza below that they have a new pope and an announcement of his identity is imminent on the balcony.)

The standard was, a new pope picks a set of pontifical choir robes—a white cassock, rochet and red mozzetta—from three sizes provided by the tailor, who of course would not know in advance the size of the papal successor. The new pontiff then dons a gold-corded pectoral cross and a red and gold embroidered stole. He places the white papal zucchetto (skullcap) on his head.

Pope Francis, signaling who he was and would be, dispensed with the mozzetta, rochet and gold pectoral cross, wearing only the white cassock and zucchetto and his own pectoral. Then he emerged on the central balcony of the basilica.

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At top, in the Vatican gardens, is a replica of the Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes, a faithful copy of the famous setting in France that was given by that country in 1902 to Pope Leo XIII. Above the altar of the cave is a statue of the Blessed Virgin, before which the pope, to close the month of May, greets congregants after a torchlight procession through the gardens.

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A REFUGE, IF NEEDED, is Castel Sant’Angelo, seen here on the night of July 24, 2013. (We viewed St. Peter’s Basilica from a castle window earlier.) Sant’Angelo is today open for only a few months in the summer, and, truth be told, little drama happens there these days. But here’s an irresistible tidbit: An elevated passageway approximately 800 meters long, the Passetto di Borgo, connects the castle to Vatican City. The walkway was added so that the pope could reach his private apartments in the Sant’Angelo without descending to street level, and, more important, so that he might privately escape if Vatican intrigues boiled over and portended imminent danger. As with the Tower of London, executions were once carried out at the castle. A statue atop the building depicting the angel who gives Sant’Angelo its name has long looked down on the doings, sanctified or dastardly, below.