OLEAN -- When Pope John Paul II died last Saturday his passing triggered quarter-century flashbacks I had not expected.
As reporters for Gannett News Service, my colleague Carlton Sherwood and I in 1979 were working on a complicated global investigative report that later won the Pulitzer Prize, 25 years ago this month, in fact.
It involved apparent fiscal chicanery by a band of European monks -- some real, some not -- who were working out of Pennsylvania and, whether by design or astounding mismanagement, were fleecing elderly, faithful Catholics all over the United States.
The Vatican already knew of the problem and had named a "visitator" -- sort of a fiscal exorcist who himself has great investigative powers flowing directly from the papacy -- to prepare an in-depth report on the millions of dollars missing. When the recently elevated Pope John Paul II announced he would visit the United States for a couple of weeks, I drew a privileged assignment -- not only to cover his historic trip from a religion angle, but to attempt wedging in a question to His Holiness on the monastic fund-raising scandal.
The former proved easier than the latter. John Paul II's famous whirlwind energy was immediately apparent, and as he flew from city to city to address and minister to his thrilled flock, it became clear communicants and worshipers would get much closer to the pope than would trailing reporters.
On the press plane -- credentialed to write a piece for "Rolling Stone" magazine -- was Ohio native Don Novello, a comedy writer and comedian on "Saturday Night Live" whose most popular character was the hilarious Father Guido Sarducci, a fake priest who portrayed himself as rock critic and gossip columnist for the real Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano.
Novello was always in character, and wore the convincing raiments of a Vatican monsignor -- big floppy black hat, white Roman collar and a red-trimmed flowing black coat with shoulder cape that he bought for $7.50 in a St. Vincent de Paul thrift shop. He topped the staid garb off with pink-tinted sunglasses, a big black brushy mustache and a constantly lit cigarette in his right hand.
Sarducci was famous for his gentle, yet cutting humor that included a "Find-a the Pope in the Pizza" contest on "Saturday Night Live" in which viewers were supposed to identify a slice of pepperoni that resembled John Paul II. He previously had gained brief fame by pretending to be an arch-conservative named Lazlo Toth who in the mid-1970s penned a bunch of put-on letters to various right-wing politicians and to Richard Nixon in the White House -- all of which suggested insane, fascistic solutions to various social problems. The conservative pols, including the about-to-be disgraced Nixon, answered warmly and with congratulations.
Religion reporters -- and even the political reporters assigned to the papal trip -- seemed to be a culturally clueless bunch, so many of them accepted Sarducci as a real Vatican priest, even though he was well-known to late-night weekend TV viewers in America. He never set them straight, but when I promised not to blow his cover, he chatted amiably about comedy and Catholicism and growing up in Dayton and papal politics and growing up Italian and anything at hand. He liked to run by religious comedy bits on willing listeners.
One involved the "missing commandments" that Moses, whom Sarducci described as old and crotchety, allegedly lost when the holy tablets broke on the way down from the mount. Moses, maintained Sarducci, only remembered the negative proscriptions -- don't do this and that. The positive ones, like "Whistle while you work," were lost forever.
Because Sarducci looked and carried himself like a real priest, I figured the pope himself might notice Sarducci in the gaggle of pressies at some stop or other, and Novello could feed him my question about the monastic financing scandal. Sure enough, at Andrews Air Force Base outside of Washington, D.C., John Paul II decided to stride down the barricade separating the reporters from His Holiness and bestow up-close and personal blessings on the scribes. When he got to Sarducci down the line, the pope seemed to stop and converse briefly. I was excited. I thought maybe Novello might carry my reportorial wood and water. No such luck. My memory is that Sarducci couldn't resist asking the pope some unanswered put-on question about why wouldn't John Paul II let nuns smoke marijuana to relieve the tension of a cloistered life.
(Father Sarducci, two years later, got in trouble in Vatican City when he wore his monsignor's attire for some publicity shots. Church officials were not amused. Novello was arrested for impersonating a priest. The charges eventually were dropped.)
My last real shot at asking His Holiness the big question, I surmised, would occur at the posh Washington residence of Archbishop Jean Jadot, the pope's apostolic delegate to our capital and federal government. The veteran papal diplomat, often called the Vatican ambassador to Washington, was a smooth Belgian who was respected by religion reporters and sometimes answered tough questions about Rome. Indeed, Jadot convinced John Paul II to speak briefly to reporters from his beautiful garden veranda, and said His Holiness had time for three questions.
We all started waving our arms madly. The first questioner the pope called upon was a large lady in a big, showy hat. She gushed: "Oh, Your Holiness, when are you going to grace us with a return visit?" John Paul II politely answered, sometime (which he did about two decades later).
The second lucky reporter was some bespectacled guy who ate up precious time by droning on and on about an intricate point of church doctrine none of us understood, and ended up asking no real question at all. (This sometimes happens at presidential news conferences, too.)
The last chance engendered hope. His Holiness looked right at me, then chose a friend to my right from a New York paper -- who blurted out "Hey, Your Holiness, give us a lead!" -- meaning say something newsworthy we can use in the first paragraph of our story. This seemed to baffle John Paul II, and the news conference was over.
Jadot later answered a few questions, and Sherwood, in Italy, eventually got his hands on the visitator's report. So we were able to complete the series. Everything I wrote about John Paul II's first trip to the United States, however, had a religion angle to it, not a financial one.
Some things you may not have read or heard in the avalanche of coverage following his death:
A prediction: The 117 voting members of the College of Cardinals will choose a successor who is even more conservative, and he won't be from Poland, France, Africa, Latin America, or the United States. The Italians have been out of St. Peter's for more than 26 years, and they want it back.
| Niagara Falls Reporter | www.niagarafallsreporter.com | April 5 2005 |