Interview

“You are going to Assisi!” The voice on the phone is urgent and excited. 

“Huh?” I mumble. It is three in the morning on the Labor Day weekend and I have just been awakened by this phone call.

“You will interview the Pope,” I recognize the voice of my editor and am instantly wide awake, “he will come to Assisi for an inter-religious World Day of Prayer for Peace, organized by the Community of Sant’Egidio.”

“And am I going to ask him about the world peace?” 

“I suppose,” my editor hesitates,  “you get a 20 minute audience plus a blessing.” 

“Blessing?” now I am really getting worried, “I am an apostate and atheist.”

“Even better—make it count!” my editor hangs up. 

The following days pass like a whirlwind, and on September 20, 2016 I find myself huddling with Pope Francis in the dark and smelly room of Cloister of Sixtus IV in Assisi. The setting is positively medieval, and the Pope takes it in stride, while I worry about the live bubonic plague spores that I reckon are still present ten centuries later.

“Your Holiness,” I begin reverentially.

“Call me Francis and let’s get going.” 

I am taken aback by this informality and Francis, as if reading my thoughts explains, “I can be papal if I need to but you will have a better experience if we simplify the procedure.”

My first question is supposed to get him on defensive but suddenly I feel like a plant that has lost a lot of turgor, and I’m having problems getting off the blocks.

“The future starts today, not tomorrow,” Francis says helpfully. “Do you know who said that?”

“Schwarzenegger?” I guess. 

“Pretty good but not even close,” Francis says with faint praise, “John Paul II.  Get moving.”

“Kill them all and let God sort them out,” I quote, finally beginning, “not a good backdrop for the world peace.” 

Francis nods politely. “Innocent III, the gold standard for papal toughness. Surely we have made some progress in the last nine hundred years.” 

I decide to abandon old grievances. “So the prospects for world peace are better today?”

Francis glances at me curiously. “Not at all.”

“What?” I blurt out, “you can’t be serious! Is that your new message to the world?”

Francis is completely unmoved. “We have been saying it loud and clear for quite some time.”

“Loud and clear?” I repeat, dumbfounded.

“Let me see,” Francis starts, “how about “No peace without justice, no justice without forgiveness.””

“John Paul II,” I recognize the quote, “aren’t these marching orders and promises?”

 “Is that how you understand it?” Francis looks puzzled, “doesn’t he say “no peace” right off the bat?”

“Well,” I plod on, “he ties it to justice and forgiveness.”

“You have got to man up,” the Pope says with fatherly concern, “justice is a great deal harder than peace, and forgiveness …” his voice trails off in a manner indicating a complete lack of faith that forgiveness is implementable on any significant scale. 

The words of John Paul II, “the only way to peace is forgiveness,” ring in my head,  and suddenly I see it all in a completely new light. 

Still, this papal aggression needs to be checked.

“Man up?” I repeat incensed, “then you better pope up! Didn’t you say “Peace: the fruit of a culture of solidarity, mercy and compassion”?”

“I did,” Francis confirms and smiles, indicating that he is  pleased with the depth of my research, “and what do you make of it?”

I decide to unleash my logic on him, “You say that peace is the fruit of a plant. And the plant… “ I continue.

“… does not exist,” Francis cuts in. “Culture of solidarity, mercy and compassion? C’mon, you would be lucky to get two out of three within any human culture.”  

Round one is over and we sit in silence as I absorb these revelations. Francis rocks back and forth deep in thought.

“Joe quit because of it,” he mutters absentmindedly. 

I gather that he is speaking about his predecessor Benedict XVI, who retired rather unexpectedly. 

“Because of peace?” I repeat and suddenly I see  everything clearly. “So the rumor that he shot down a British bomber during the war is true?”

Francis glances at me sideways as he tries to figure something out. 

“If Joe did shoot down a plane,” he begins emphasizing the hypothetical, “and nobody was hurt, wouldn’t it be a miracle?” 

I see where this is going. “For canonization one needs two miracles,” I recall.

“The other one is easy,” Francis waves his hand, “We were looking for a 'good shepherd', and instead we got a German shepherd. This is a miracle!”

“If there is no hope for peace then what is a realistic goal to strive for?” I come back to my interview.

“I think that we should fight indifference,” Francis begins. “The first kind of indifference in human society is indifference to God, which then leads to indifference to one’s neighbor and to the environment,” he quotes one of his own lines.

“Indifference?” I probe, “this sounds hard.”

Francis perks up and stares at me with truly papal intensity.

“Do you wash your dishes?” he finally asks.

“Huh?” I am confused again.

“Dove or Palmolive? Which one would you rather use?”

I ponder while he continues, “but choose wisely, for while the true product will bring you the eternal bliss, the false one will  ruin your cutlery.”

I marvel at his familiarity with Indiana Jones movies and see the point. 

“Indifference! Yes, we can slay this beast,” I exclaim. “I am 100% for Palmolive.” 

“So there is no hope for the world peace?” I return to the main topic. 

Francis smiles faintly, “the best idea towards peace is to refocus on the essence of what we really want.”

“Refocus?”

“Peace is not the absence of conflict, it is the ability to handle conflict by peaceful means,” he quotes.

“John Paul II?” 

Francis laughs softly. “Ronald Reagan.” 

He glances at his watch. “It is time for the peace prayer.”

“Prayer?” I lose my cool. “What a waste of time.”

“Prayer is good,” Francis mutters to himself, not even trying to sound convincing.

“Prayer for peace and what else?” I sneer.

“Does it matter?”

“Exactly,” I exploit his blunder, “prayer is not going to bring world peace!”

“Let me invoke John Paul II,” Francis says, with a hint of annoyance. “Stupidity is also a gift of God, but one mustn't misuse it.”

Now I am really hurt. “You are worse than Donald Trump!” I complain.

“Oh, c’mon,” he smiles apologetically, “it is just that your atheism denies you some basic human comfort, and prayer is one of those things.”

“Seriously?” I sulk. 

“The only thing that prayer can bring is peace of mind,” he explains, “but once you have it, the rest is so much easier.”

“Just peace of mind?” I exclaim, “what about miracles, out of body experiences and fingernail sensitivity?”

Francis winks at me, “you can get lucky, but I would not count on it.” 

“It is time to wrap it up,” Francis gets up, “I will give you my blessing.”

Somehow I am attracted to the idea but I am not sure if I am eligible.

“I am not a Christian,” I confess.

“No problem,” Francis waives my concern, “the bar is lower since I allowed dogs to go to heaven.”

“Ok then, what do I have to do?”

“Just sit still.”

Francis touches my temples with his fingertips and leans over to kiss the top of my head. 
“Neutrogena or Nexxus?” are the last words I hear before my mind is enveloped in darkness.

When I wake up the sun is up. My cat sits on my chest and my wife stands over the bed.

“Did you sleep well?” she asks with obvious concern. 

I am a bit dazed but otherwise I feel great.

“What day is it?” 

“September 5, 2016. Labor Day.”

Fourteen days back. 

 “It is a Groundhog Fortnight. A miracle after all,” I whisper to myself and start planning for the rest of my life.