Hello, Mario. It's great to see you.

Hello, Robert. Always an honor and a pleasure seeing you as well.

Mario. I know that you have something you want to share with us. I just wanted to say that yesterday is a famous important feast day for me, which is the two British Saints, Saint John Fisher and Saint Thomas Moore. They were both executed by King Henry the eighth in 1535. And uh it always reminds me that you can try to avoid crossing the secular powers of your time. But if you're not careful, they will arrest you and execute you.

Yeah, you're totally right. And it's kind of funny that if I may use the word funny that feast day comes the day after my birthday because my birthday was on the 21st Don La Festa di San Luigi Gonzaga, right first day of summer and was always uh uh a reminder that the next day would have been the double s this day, right?

Ok. Well, that's wonderful. Happy birthday to you. Thank you. Thank you. I guess, I guess you're about 50 now. Well, le le

let's say that I've been celebrating my 50th anniversary several years. That's what I keep saying. Everybody. Yeah. Yeah, I keep celebrating. That's a trick that my mom will say. How old are you? Well, I'm celebrating my 50th anniversary and she kept doing that for almost 30 years.

Well, I suppose we should just introduce you once again for the new people. You are a former Swiss Guard. You were born and raised in Italy, actually, you grew up in Soto Monte where John the 23rd was from very tiny town in northern Italy. But you did military service in Switzerland and went into the Swiss Guard and were serving under John Paul the second. You've been retired from the Guard for some time, but you have many stories of your experience and uh we can benefit from your understanding of how the Vatican functions and that's why we're talking about what you went through and how you see things and we're very much appreciating your presence. Thank you.

Thank you very much Robert. And uh I really enjoyed our conversation last week. As a matter of fact, I was really deeply moved that uh a lady from Poland, she connected with me on uh via email. She went on the, the website I served the saint, you know, of the book and she mailed me and she wanted a copy of the book because she realized that through Amazon, she was able to receive it in Poland. And uh I told her I'll gladly send you the letter and uh sorry, the letter, the book, I'll mail you the book and she wrote me back. Thank you very much. I was deeply touched by your definition of jump of the second being the pope of simplicity. And so if you allow me, Bob, I'm gonna start today before we embark in a conversation to share a little anecdote to emphasize and to explain a little bit better why I call Saint Pope John for the second the pope of simplicity. So growing up my I never met my maternal grandmother because she passed away a few years before I was born. And then my mom was raised by her grandmother, older sister. So her aunt, OK, La Zia. And so for me growing up my aunt, we will call her Zia Pina. Her name was Pina Joseph Pina was kind of my maternal figure, right? Grandmother, even though she wasn't my grandmother and every like every Berga master Rob, she loved to knit. OK. So I'm in the Vatican. We are getting close to Christmas. I am on the phone with my mom and my mom says, oh, Mario, by the way, Zia Pina, she needed a wall sweater that she wants you to give to his holiness. And I laughed at my mom. I said, ok, sure, mail it to me. OK. I'll see what I can do, right? And so a couple of weeks later in the barracks, you know where I had my mailbox, I find the package that my mom had sent. I open it and it was a beautiful wool sweater, white, ok, with white button long, you know, it will go below the belt, you know, a little long, right and beautiful braid here in the front. And I thought, wow, if I were the Pope, I will for sure wear this. And so I put it back into the bag that she gave me and was an envelope and uh, I took it with me in the Apostolic palace for several days trying to see for an occasion if I was gonna see Zoline or at least Monsignor JVI. And sure enough, one day, Monsignor JIC passed by and I courageously went to him and I said, Monsignor, my hunt made this present for his holiness is a sweater. Here it is Merry Christmas. You know, um, please forgive me, forgive my aunt, but she really wanted me to give it to you and I'm just making her wish come true. Oh, Grazia, thank you. And about uh three days later I received a thank you note signed by the Sos Tuto at that time was Monsignor Rep Giovanni Battista re you know, so, you know, officially thank you for Doctor Regalo to the Santo Padre. No, and I still have that letter. Well, Christmas goes by December 31st, Bob. I was in front of the crash in Saint Peter's Square with the band. Remember I was the conductor of the Swiss Guard band. And we were playing, you know, I was conducting Christmas carols and Saint Pope John Paul the second. If you remember, we go to Quiza del J on the 31st to celebrate mass, you know, and then he will come back and stop at the crash to see the crash. There will be the Worker de la Fora there and we will be playing right. And sure enough, here he comes and we are conducting, I'm conducting their plane and then he stops, he comes next to me, we stops playing and he starts talking to me. Thank you. And I noticed Bob that under his red cape, he was wearing my hunt sweater, right? I almost, you know, chuckled. Right. And then when he left Monsignor Stanislao that saw me noticing the sweater, you know, came to me and he said he really liked it and it keeps him warm. Say thank you to your great hand. And you can imagine the next day January 1st when I called my mom and my great a happened to be there telling her that the Pope was wearing her sweater and she I made at that time 80 I would she was probably 8586. Extremely joyful because of the simplicity of Saint Paul, John Paul the second.

Well, Mario, thank you for that story. It makes me immediately believe that we don't understand sufficiently that the Vatican is like a family in some way, it's like a household. Yes. And in fact, they call it that the Pontifical household. And, uh, the Swiss guards are the guardians. And then there's the policemen who have another role, uh, with relation to the Italian state. All the monsignors are the secretaries or the assistants or the advisor, all the Vatican offices. And then the relatives like your aunt who decides to make a sweater to knit a sweater for the for the Pope and then you are able to carry it, give it to his secretary, see the pope wearing it it ju it it's an image of the Vatican as a familial place, not like a global institution with all sorts of rules and regulations, but a place where people are living together, talking and planning the best uh way to celebrate Christmas and New Year. Yes,

you are spot on Bob because especially, you know, you know, inside the Vatican still today, I would say uh there are about 23 2400 people that work and that they come in even though you remember the famous joke of John the 23rd when they asked him, Santita, how many people work here? And he said about us that did not change, I can guarantee you, right? But you're spot on because you know the guards, the guards and then the people, household and the Cardinale that live inside. They are basically like a family, right? The police that. They are called the Gar Maria. They don't live inside, right. They come, they do their hours, their shift and then they are out. Ok, La Guardia. They are always there. You are on duty. When you're not on duty, you still live inside. And if you want to go for a walk, you go up, um, to the, to the giardini. I used to play tennis. Fun enough with the current president of the US CCB conference. Archbishop Timoti Broglio. At that time, he was working as Secretario de Cardinal Sodano in the Secretary of State. He was an amazing tennis player and we will play tennis,

right? I have one question, Mario. Yeah. Who won the tennis?

He, he always did. He was man, he was an athlete and an amazing once. I will never forget you. I'm saying names that they probably don't mean much to the listener, but they mean to you. So once was me and Cardinal Cassidy. Do you remember Cardinal Cassidy? Australian Cassidy. Cassidy. Yes. So it was me and Cassidy at that time, it was not Cardinal, it was still Archie Bishop because for a short amount of time, it was the Substi Tuto before or re just for six months if you remember, right? And so it was me and Cassidy against uh at that time, you know, Donin Father team Monsignor Broo and uh Monsignor Lozano that he was the chief of the Spanish language. Then he became an archbishop and an Nunzio. And uh it was quite a match. And at the end of the match, Bob here is the cherry on the pie. We all ended up in Archbishop Martin's apartment on the gover Torao for steak on the grill. And obviously there were a few other people there and I had asked few other guards to go, but this is the family that you are talking about and we didn't talk about, you know, theology or diplomacy. We were just guys and enjoy a beer and a steak and talking about the beauty of seeing the cupola right there, talking about sports monsignors, Archie Bishop. They needed downtime, I would say simple time and we needed to feel part of the family and the sports or enjoying a steak or a burger on the terrace of Archbishop Marino's apartment gave us that feeling.

Well, Mario, there's so many thoughts now that uh passed through my mind. I did know I met many times Archbishop Marcinkus. I wrote articles about him. He became a very controversial figure. He was already controversial. They called him God's banker. But they, they also said that he had somehow covered up financial irregularities that had been involved with two people. Michele Sindona who was from Sicily and he died in prison, I think uh with some poison coffee. If I recall, I think maybe was smuggled into him. And so he didn't ever speak the the full story. And then Roberto Calvi

that they found him on the bridge in London Blackfriars

Bridge in London in June of 1982. That's before your time and before my time. But these, these uh financial relations, I don't know if this is anything you want to talk about. But I, I enjoyed and was appreciative of Archbishop Marcinkus later, he was said to be someone who had led the, the Vatican's finances in the wrong way. But he always said to me that he was chosen, even though he didn't have experience as a banker, he was intended to be a priest in Cicero, Illinois and he came to Rome. And I think back in 1970 if I'm not mistaken, Marcinkus, who was a very tall man, about 6 ft six powerful man, probably 240

pounds. Always a pipe in his mouth. He always had the pipe. Yeah. Yeah.

And he went to the Philippines with Paul the sixth. I believe it was 1970. And someone came forward with a knife from the crowd and was approaching Paul the sixth. Maybe he was running and Marchenko came, stopped this and because, ok, we'll read this in just a moment. We have a, a note from one of the viewers, but he stopped this attack on the Pope. And Paul the sixth felt so grateful that he finally was someone who could really protect him and be very quick and uh strong and he slowly gave him more and more authority in the 19 seventies and finally made him the president of the Vatican Bank, but he had around him a series of other people who were much longer in that office and much more training in that office. And I think he trusted them and that in some cases, they probably didn't give him the best advice.

Well, as you can imagine, when I had the chances to spend time in the presence of Martinus as an amble soldier, I never talked about his work or anything, right? So for me and you are correct, he was on his way out as the dean of the bank when I arrived and he was replaced by Monsignor Donato de Boni. I don't know if you remember him, right? Napoletano, right? But uh so to me, my relationship with these individuals were always on a human level, right? So the perception of their person was never based on their office was, was always based on the human level. So yes, growing up leaving, studying, entering into the banking industry, I took a deep dive on the Lio jelly and the Mile Sindona and Calvi and Marcinkus and the relationship with the opening up in Poland and the collapse of the German Wall. But again, during my time, I was just an humble servant, I was a soldier. They were very respectful to me and allowed me to benefit of their presence, participated to many masses with them, right? And today, you know, uh you know that after I left academia, I created my consulting firm that's called Borromeo project. And that's what I do. I consult a lot of clergy trying to explain how they can seek for help within the laity, especially into the finance or managerial or strategical uh conundrum where pastors do not receive any kind of formations, right? And uh and, and, and, and again, Martinus, you are right tall, powerful, big, I would say maybe 280 OK, pounds. But to me, and to me, you know, very kind and I knew that he was from Cicero, never been to Cicero but made me laugh because obviously, uh starting growing up, I would translate, you know, the, the Bello Gallico and the devel sti from Cicero, right? And I did not know that, you know, in, in Illinois, there was the name Chicharron. Anyway. So that, that is all I wanted to say. Yeah,

Mario, I just, just for a scruple, the Belo Gallico I think was the war was, was Caesar?

Caesar not Caesar? You're right. You're right. Yeah, I think you're right. I think you're totally right. Yes. That the Bell Gli,

yes, but Cicero certainly was the greatest orator of Rome and uh was trying to hold the Republic together as it's disintegrated into civil war. And uh but yeah, so all the Italians, they don't study Latin in the way they used to though.

Not anymore. No,

our lifetime sort of stretches over the period when Italy has changed from premo to postmodern more or less these last 50 or 60 years. And also that's the period of the post second Vatican Council. It's also the period when the church became global in a real way. In past centuries, the cardinals from around Rome would elect the Popes, maybe eight or 12 cardinals were from Central Italy would elect the Popes. And for centuries, they were always Italian. And that's why even when they elected John Paul the second, it was the first non Italian pope in 455 years, he was from Poland. So what we can do is try to say, what is the state of the church now as it has become global and what is, what is its relation with its ancient faith, its ancient roots in Italy, with its wonderful traditions. And what is it risking? What are its strengths and weaknesses right now? And what type of things should the present pope and the next pope do to be successful in continuing this process of preparing the global 2000 year old Roman Catholic church for this global world of supercomputers, artificial intelligence, new moral uh challenges, new financial challenges. I'd like to have your advice on some of these questions. What's your vision?

Well, I wish I had a very simple answer, but let me just maybe start from this point. You know, being a pope is definitely not an easy job, 70 years ago or today. As a matter of fact, is not actually technically a job because you don't choose to do it. You are called to do it. That's why it's a vocation and I will never forget uh little parentheses when I was uh playing tennis with at that time, Monsignor Pietro Parolin. I asked him, why does a cardinal when becomes Pope changes his name and not a bishop? You know, why doesn't a priest when he becomes bishop changes his name? But instead, when a cardinal becomes the pope changes his name and he said that he went back to the the, to the, to the fact that their previous life is over, right? And so that's why in my opinion, to become the successor of Peter is not an easy task because everybody judges as you and criticizes you according to their perspective and agenda, right? In Italy right now. Uh you know, I was recently there for meetings in the Vatican when I saw you coming back, oh, the churches are empty. The churches are empty.

Yeah, just to say we were both in Italy around Easter time and I was leaving Italy to go back to America. I'm in Rome right now. But you stopped me at the

desk at the airport

and you said to me, I know who you are and I said, who is, who is this? And I said, uh you, you said, uh I, I know you're writing, I read your letters. I was, I was so struck. I said, so who is this? And you said, let's talk at the gate because we were in a rush and then we talked and you told me about being a Swiss guard and all that and all that you've done since. And that's why I really wanted to talk to you at greater length. Um So the Vatican, it's a great 2000 year old institution, but you just said the churches in Italy are empty, the

churches are empty. OK? There is this stage of confusion, Bob, right? There is this Hedonistic culture, right? Of a of, of a lot of people I have my own relationship with God, I have my own God. I don't need the sacramental element, right? And uh I blame the constant lax season of the laity. OK. That are in a certain way realizing that being a faithful Catholic Bob is actually difficult because we have rules for everything. We have a target that we are trying to aim, but it's not easy. OK? And so why should I do all of these things if on top of that right now, I hear, oh, you don't have to worry about that. You don't have to worry about this. So, you know, there is this stage of confusion, especially in Italy, right? And uh when I was there and I went, you know, to a couple of churches in the morning because I like, rather than going to Saint Peter, I like to go around. I've seen, you know, at 7:30 a.m. or 8 a.m. it's always Bob the elderly right old ladies that are there. And then on Sunday, if you go to a ss the majority of the people there are touristy and the Italians are not there. So where I'm going with this is in Italy. Right now. There is this stage of confusion. They don't understand where to go, they don't understand. Am I supposed to go this way? Am I supposed to, to go that way? There is a certain um how can I say a certain lax is also in the clergy that uh are focusing too much on going outside of the church trying to get people into the pews and they are forgetting that that's not their job, that's you and I job to go and get people into the pews, Rob because if the priest is not there when we come in doesn't work, right? So stage of confusion uh very hard uh you know, to, for bishops to have seminarians, right? And uh thank God for the church in Africa and the church in India and we are experiencing it here to the United States that they are going through a AAA stage of growth, so to speak, they still um uh are far from the confusion because of social media present, maybe it's a little less aggressive, right? And they're still having vocation and they still send seminarians and priests into the West to help. Right. So what is this gonna, what is gonna happen in Italy? I don't know. I feel that uh I think it was Pope Benedict the 16 that he said that he was foreseen a shrinkage within the Catholic church. Right? So as a man of faith, I believe that this is not our church, it's his church and he knows what he's doing at the same time. The the devil is right next to us, right? He is the one creating confusion, making all of this noise that we can not hear his voice, right? And so I will suspect that in Italy as kind of a light motive or the benchmark, we will see this, actually, we are seeing this shrinkage that will allow a strengthening within the ranks so that then they will come back much stronger. But this shrinkage is tough and it's undergoing right now.

Well, ok, I'd like to get your perspective on the leadership of the church. Does it seem to be sufficiently aware of what the role they must play is? You've watched three Popes, you've watched John Paul the second. You've watched Benedict the 16th. You knew him also as Cardinal Ratzinger and you've watched Pope Francis and Francis has now been three times in the hospital in the last two years and he's been 10 years Pope and there are people that are starting to think maybe he will not have many more years. So there'll be a candidate emerging maybe as the next pope, what can these men do to lead? Does it matter what they do? Uh is uh are we being too uh concerned about the Papacy or should it be much more decentralized? And our concern should be various seminaries, families, different nations. So if you were the advisor to the Pope and you say there's been much confusion, much shrinkage, but you still think it will emerge and grow. Uh What if that doesn't happen? Uh How can you ensure that that happens? People have said there's been confusion under this pontificate. Do you think there's been continuity from John Paul the second through Benedict to this present Pope and that it will continue and that it will end this shrinkage or are they ineffective or all of them or some of them ineffective? Can you just reflect on these questions of the leadership in the church?

Well, I, you know, this is my personal opinion, right? We are experiencing today 2023 an authentic lack of leadership, right? As a matter of fact, many youngster, many uh many young adults, I give several talks a year to young adults, uh communities, they or or association. They asked me where have the good leaders gone, political leaders, economical leaders, church leaders right now, here is my answer, direct this old lady that are still in the church at 730 in the morning, Bob, these old ladies, they went through everything, they see world wars, they see different Popes, they've seen holy priest, they saw quasi holy priest, but they are still there in the morning 15 minutes before mass to say the rosary and the church will continue and will come back first and foremost, because of these people that they are the continuity within the Papacy, even going back to Paul the sixth, right? Why? And I'll tell you why. Because this lady before mass, they go and they ask the mom, our blessed mother to take care of this mess. And you very well know Bob that when the house it's a mess. The only way that the house in, you know, gets cleaned up, gets organized it when mom says enough is enough and as and Children, they line up like soldier because mom cleaning. So blessed Mary will be the one contributing into this shrinkage into this cleaning because of the prayers of all of these old people that despise 40 50 60 years of tribulation or the last six or seven year of confusion, they're still going there, my fear, my fear. So here's the continuity. So the elderly did not give up and the elderly are there. And that's why I am not afraid. But I sense today that many priests don't pray anymore and that scares me, right? I know many holy priests. But I also know many priests that don't pray. And so how can you lead if you don't feed yourself first within prayer adoration? Right? So his holiness Pope Francis, which I will never dare to judge. It's a man of prayer and I've seen it with my own eyes as I saw Benedict and as I saw Paul John, Paul the second Pope Francis, I don't know in the past week because of his health condition, but wakes up at 4 a.m. Bob. Ok. And he gets out of this apartment already with the kick and he goes into the little chapel and the Swiss Guard are right there and they see him from 415, 420 until 6:30 a.m. in the chapel every day, right? But he doesn't go out and liens or leverages or advertise or promotes that right? Is doing it for him self, right? So to me, I pray constantly for an increasing vocation but also that the clergy, bishops and priests will pray more. I have a sense that they are wrapped up into so much administration into so much strategic thinking, fundraising that they forget to pray. And that's not ok. So to me, as I said, continuity is given by the elderly that despite all the crises, all the events are still there invoking blessed mother health. And my word of concern that becomes a word of encouragement is for all the clergy to please pray. Don't give up prayer because of a meeting, don't do that always pray so that you can lead your flock to the feet of the

cross. Well, that's a very beautiful call that you are making to return to prayer. Prayer is a personal act. So it's not something that comes from a computer or comes from uh a command. It's a choice and it reaches out from time to eternity. And therefore, it seeks to have some sort of special spirit or power from eternity come back into time and somehow heal the the fallen ness of our world. So it's, it's it's a interchange between time and eternity between the fallen world and, and the perfect world. Uh uh you know, yeah,

no, I was saying, you know that the the the the the the the indication of prayers, right? Saint Pope John Paul, the second is the he was a man of prayer, right? I've seen him when he was walking. You know that on top of the apostolic palace that is a private garden, right? And so John Paul, the second will go up every afternoon and he will wear a black cape and an Irish black hat so that people from the cupola will not spite him because if you are on the cupola and you look down, you see the Giardino pile on top of the Apostolic palace, right? Many times as God, we were up there when he will go out, ok, we will see him and I saw him falling on his knees Bob boom. All of a sudden like going in a stage of ecstasies, which for me being a young adult always felt like is talking to God or to blessed mother directly and he bow down is kneeling down because of the love and respect and the reverence that he has and he wasn't doing that in front of camera. So that's why one day when I was feeling very tired and lonely, you know, he walked by and he stopped and he gave me a rosary, not this one, but he kept a rosary in front of my nose. And he said to me, Mario, take my beats and make them your most powerful weapon because Calling on Mary is the right thing to do in time of despair. So I really wanna encourage everybody that is listening to our conversation or that will be watching our recording conversation to pray to Blessed mother. And if somebody cannot have the energy or the time to even say a daily rosary where start saying a decade, just 10 Mary because mother, blessed mother will finish the rosary for you. And imagine if everybody, especially man, Robert pray a rosary a day, imagine the effect that your and my grandchildren will feel on their skin. 1015, 20 years from now.

Well, Mario, you really have, you've moved the conversation to prayer and you've moved it to the prayer of the rosary and you've moved it to a very specific instruction that John Paul the second gave to you personally to make it your weapon. This is not a weapon of violence, obviously. And yet it's a we a weapon of great commitment. In other words, you can't be shaken by the authorities of the world because you don't allow them to interrupt your focus on the eternal or on the Virgin Mary or on the call for having what is in heaven come down on earth, which we say in the our father, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. So what you're but you are calling on people to take that decision to take a kind of stance over against secular society and step out of it for that 10 or 20 minutes of prayer because you believe it will have consequences.

Not only I believe I have witnessed that, you know, I've been carrying a rosary in my pocket since that day that John Paul the second gave it to me. And sometimes I do not literally have the time throughout the day to say a rosary. And I get at the end of the day and I'm exhausted, but I still try and I fall asleep sometime at half of the second mystery, right? But I know that it will make an effect and an impact in me, in my Children, in my family. If together we pray to the blessed mother, we can only expect a turn to the good. That's the way I see it. That's when I, when I said before priest, I know amazing priest, brilliant man, holy man, many of whom are struggling because the parish requires so much, especially to the United States, right? And so when they reach out to me through my consulting firm, the Borromeo project is everybody can see it. Borromeo project.org, right? The services. The first things I always tell father, I'll help you with your business plan. I'll help you to write procedure and policy. But first I need you, let's start with a prayer, right? Let's remember what is important here. And saint Pope John Paul the second told me and showed to me Benedict the 16th, same thing and despise all the rumors criticism Pope Francis showed it to me as well, right? That he is a man of prayer.

Yes, I'd like you to speak just briefly about Benedict the 16th, the Pope who resigned. Yes. And also then about Francis to bring us up to the present and what you see as their life of prayer and as their leadership of the church, we've already spoken about it, but try to give us a little bit more.

Well, Benedict, Pope Benedict, I interacted with him mainly when he was Cardinal Ratzinger, an academician, an intellectual, right? And uh when he became Pope Benedict the 16th, I was still as a consultant within the absa ministration, you know, the the the the finances of the Vatican. OK. And So in few occasion, uh we were received in the and then we interacted and it was a profound uh Koshi tore yet a profound knowledge of Catholic social teaching among gazillions of things, obviously, right? But he was the one that instilled in me, the desire to identify a moral content within the financial world, for example, right? And uh he was the one that pointed me the way when we were advising the management of the assets to always be respon morally responsible investors. Right? So, and that he wasn't a finance guy, right? But his fate, his understanding of the truth allowed him in his geniality to interact and to express specific concept to different groups of people, like finance people and having his holiness, you know, a deep theologian and amazing studios getting to the core saying, put your money where it belongs according to moral values. Who that's Benedict, right? And then you come to uh Pope Francis in a totally different uh theological way, you know, definitely not a man of studios like Benedict, more a pastoral figures, right? A joke constantly. Uh joking is the one as a matter of fact that there was a group of us and he told us and I hope I'm not going to be disrespectful, but he told us the joke that there are only three things that God doesn't know. And uh we were kind of saying, OK, where is he going with this? And he said the first thing that God doesn't know is how much money the Franciscan really have. The second thing that God doesn't really know is how many religious order of sisters there are in the world. And the third thing that God doesn't really know is what a Jesuit think. Right. So you will say funny stuff. So I will never have experienced Benedict the 16th saying a funny, silly joke like this, for example. right? But even Francis showed to me in a meeting in the um in the occasion of the establishment of the, the, the, the, the the the commission for the protection of Children. That for him, the sex scandals and the financial scandals were problem that not only needed to be addressed but needed to be solved and needed to identify guidelines and best practice to start preventing them moving forward. Right? So Benedict theologians, he will talk about Romano Guardin, you know, quoting uh a sentence from the book uh Leather from Lake Como that nobody has ever read for instance of Romano Guardin. And then you get instead to Pope Francis that doesn't quote anybody but is spot on, on current uh situation and sinful actions and he wants people to come up with solution. So that's my experience with the two Popes Benedict and Francis, both men of prayers, totally different angle to come to their pr ministry. Obviously,

when you were referring to the fact that there's so few people attending mass going into the church in Italy. You said the old women continue to come and you think this will be handed on to the future and you're very hopeful of this. What is it that the church is offering? Maybe even when it's empty? Why is it important that there be a place in this world where there is a silence that calls for you to be somehow in the presence of what surpasses daily life and what surpasses human concerns. What is it that the church offers in the message of Jesus Christ?

Well, I, you know, I don't want, I'm not a theologian, but to me is the message of salvation, right? So the church doesn't impose the church offers. That's the way I always saw it and perceived, right? And that's why my answer to you is it's a message of hope, right? And the hope will lead you and guide you toward the truth. Because think how many cases you know of a taste that on their death bed, they came to the realization that there was hope and they converted it and they received the sacrament and that, but you know, you know what I'm talking about. And so and so to me is this is his church. My simple faith is such that I get angry when I read uh things that are wrong that are done wrong by late or clergy. I get angry thinking how much our Lord in heaven suffers for our stupidity of committing these sins most of the time, these grateful sins. But my hope is connected with this infinite love. And that's what the church represents, represents, hope represents this infinite love. And for many individual takes them all their entire life to convert, to understand the interrelation between hope and truth. That's why the church is there and that's what it

offers. Well, it's uh impressive to me. You're talking about taking all your entire life to come to one conclusion that there is hope and that there may be forgiveness and the redemption. And it's interesting that the final words of every Hail Mary refer to the Mary pray for us now and at the hour of our death, can you reflect on that? And then I think we'll close our conversation for today.

Well, I will, I, I cannot imagine Bob what Mary went through at the feet of the cross seeing what was going on with her son, but she knew that she was part of a bigger, much bigger, for sure. She couldn't understand right event in history. So when we ask Mary, when we pray the rosary, when we go down the mystery, when we reflect on the life of our Jesus Christ, our savior, right? Every time that we say the Al Mary, we are humbling, asking blessed mother to intercede so that God will clarify the path for a lot of individual that we are never gonna encounter. We are never gonna meet but they will benefit of our prayers, right? So that's why most of the time I remind people that sacrificing and suffering, it's OK. It's ok to suffer. It's ok to sacrifice some TV screen so that you can sell a rosy, sacrificing and suffering are redemptive and we have to give it a try because we are called to greatness and we need to stop judging. We need to start acting in conclusion today. It's time to lead and not to leave.

Ok. So very, very encouraging words from you that the act of prayer can have an effect globally instantaneously over time and space. It seems that it's only involving myself or yourself or someone. But you're saying it ripples out to the end of all things and that little action has its place and has to be counted and is part in some way of the redemption.

So I've seen it in action. You know, we believe in one Catholic and Apostolic church. We know how hierarchically structured, right? And I've seen it with Saint Paul John Paul the second, with Benedict and with Francis, they are men of prayers. Let's be united with them first and foremost in prayer.

Yes. OK, Mario, I appreciate your time taken from your busy schedule. And uh do you think we'll be able to talk again?

I would love to because, you know, it's a pleasure for me to, to chit chat and maybe the next time when we talk, uh I'll talk to you about my time with another saint which was saint Mother Teresa and everything that she taught me. So that is for another time. All

right, I, I met Mother Teresa as well. We have a note from Lady Rotha who is on the isle of man. She's been listening to us. She says, thank you, gentlemen. Thank

you. Thank you. Thank you and God bless you all. Thanks again, Rob.

Thank you and we will see you next week.