Mom and the Pope

What started out like a dream come true for two local women turned into a nightmare when they shook hands with Pope John Paul just minutes before an assassin's bullets cracked through Vatican Square, felling the Pontiff last Wednesday morning.

But the women believe if their group was not in the right place at the right time the Pope would have been fatally shot. Mrs. Claire LeBlanc, organizer of a semi-annual pilgrimage to Italy, said the alleged attempted assassin, Mehmet Ali Agca, tried to push his way into the front row where her group was standing.

Her sister, Mrs. Louise Bergen of Braintree, told the alleged assassin that he could not stand in the front row with the Americans.

Mrs. LeBlanc said this probably prevented the potential killer from getting a clean shot at the Pope.

Mrs. Bergen said the assassin could have easily killed the Pope if she had not spoke up and told him to leave.

"We had been standing for hours, waiting to see the Holy Father. Then, one of the other pilgrims tapped me on the shoulder and said this man is pushing his way in. We think he didn't want to make any commotion."

Mrs. Bergen said, "He seemed odd but I didn't take much notice. I had no idea what he wanted to do".

She said the suspect was about 30 feet away from her when he allegedly shot the Pope over the heads of another American group behind her.

"We were in the first row and the Holy Father passed right in front of us. Had he been with us he would have certainly killed the Pope." Bergen said.

"He shook hands with us. He would have been able to kill him. We were touching the Pope." Bergen added.

Mrs. LeBlanc of Pond St, Natick, confirmed her sister's claim that the Pope would have been killed had the alleged assassin stayed with their group. And she said it was providential that her group was in the right place at the right time.

Mrs. LeBlanc said Cardinal Humberto Medeiros of Massachusetts had written to the Vatican to authorize a group pass for the pilgrims. Due to a delay in the Italian mail system, the Vatican never received the Cardinal's message.

As a result, Mrs. LeBlanc went directly to the Vatican to acquire a pass for her group.

"It was a complete surprise to be put in the front row. We were as close to the Holy Father as I am to you (four feet).

"Had he (the alleged assassin) gone in with us, he would have been directly in front of the Holy Father and his shots would have killed him" Mrs. LeBlanc said.

"I'd have to say it was providential. The angels in heaven protected us and protected the Holy Father.

"Had the Vatican received the Cardinal's letter, we would have been in a different area".

She said her reaction changed from happiness to despair in a matter of minutes when she knew the Pope had been shot.

"We had a moment of joy and then sadness to see him come by in the jeep slumped over."

Mrs. LeBlanc said the Pope passed her group, made a short loop and was on his way back when she heard the shots.

"Immediately when we heard the shots, we all knew that the Holy Father had been shot."

She said the Swiss guards told them that the Pope had indeed been shot as they cleared a path for the returning jeep.

"He was slumped in the jeep and had blood on his cassock and blood on his hands. He appeared conscious, but he seemed to be growing faith because his color had changed."

But from the moment the shots rang out, Mrs. LeBlanc, said her group of 31 pilgrims knew the Pope would survive.

"We all felt in our group that the Holy Father was not killed."

She said there was no pandemonium when the Pope had been shot. People were quiet and they kneeled down and prayed.

"They obeyed the announcement on the loudspeakers, asking everyone to pray for the Pope."

She said in the immediate areas where the assassin was located there was some commotion.

"A nun grabbed the man's legs like a football tackler and wouldn't let go."

"Even when the police had the man handcuffed, the nun was still hanging on to his feet. She tackled him while he still had the gun."

Mrs. LeBlanc is the organizer of the JMJ (Jesus, Mary, and Joseph) San Damiano Center in Natick. She has organized two trips a year to Italy since 1970. The trips are made primarily to visit the Shrine of the Miraculous Madonna of the Roses of San Damiano in a small village that is about a two hour ride from Milan.

Mrs. LeBlanc said people from all over the world come to the Shrine to hear the Madonna speak through a local peasant villager, Mrs. Rosa Quattrini.

As part of the semi-annual trips to the Shrine, the pilgrims tour Vatican City.

In what LeBlanc feels is an almost symbolic coincidence - the Pope, who turned 61 today, was elected on the first day of the apparition at the Holy Shrine.

Mrs. LeBlanc just returned from Italy Sunday night.



In addition to the article above, Tom Ellis from Channel 5 in Boston came to my mother's house to interview her, after which the story was carried on CNN and other news outlets.

There are other things beyond the basics of the news article above that happened. When my mother came home from Rome I asked her what made her get her copy of the letter from the Cardinal. In all the years she went she never took her copy, except this one time. I still remember the look on her face when she made the airport limo stop after it had just begun to roll. She got out of the car and looked like a woman with a mission to get her copy of the Cardinal's letter. She told me she could not explain it but she was impelled to get her copy, that she knew she must not leave without it. When she got to Rome it was the only time the Cardinal's letter never arrived. This is how God's providence set up the place where my mother would be standing with her group. Vatican personnel realized my mother was supposed to have a reserved place for the Papal audience when she presented to them her copy of the Cardinal's letter. For the inconvenience they gave her a place at the railing where the Pope would be going by in the Pope-mobile telling her that sometimes people get to touch the Pope's hand.

When you are in Rome, taking advantage of the excitement, people often try to sneak in with your group if you are not watching. When my Mother was given the place to take her group, Agca, unkonwn to them at the time, snuck in with my Mother's group. When he made his way to the railing he was standing next to my mother. My aunt Louise, sister of my Mother and my Godmother, was tapped by someone in the group about the man who did not belong with my Mom's group. She got on the other side of Agca. My mom looked over at the man and said "I don't think so, and then leaned in front of him and told my Aunt Louise to get him out. My aunt was a retired nurse who dealt with men who had trauma from war, so she was not a pushover. All to happy she took the man (Agca) by the shoulder, spun him around and popped him in the chest with a punch. He drew back and she chased him back into the crowd. He must not have wanted to draw attention to himself so he didn't resist.

After my Mother had him sent back my Aunt came back and took her place next to my mother against the railing where the Holy Father would be coming by in the Pope-mobile. When he went by my mother touched his hand, my aunt did as well, and others in her group. Shortly after he went by Agca pulled out the gun and fired from where my Mother had him sent back into the crowd. So, if Agca had not been pushed back he would have had point blank range on the Pope. Instead of touching the Pope's hand like my Mother and my Aunt, as a trained assassin, he would have been in between them and would have killed the Pope on the spot and history today would be very different.

My mother also told me that when the shots rang out they looked back to see who took the shots, and a small nun tackled Agca, they practically had to tear her off of him. He could have shot her, so the next day the Vatican cited the Nun for bravery.

Some years later I was speaking to a priest who was in the US Secret Service and had met Pope Paul VI. He told me he believe he received his vocation at that time but did not act on it for years. He was still in the Secret Service when Pope John Paul II was elected and was sent to Rome on a Secret Service contingent that had intel there might be an assassination attempt on PJII. He said he was there the day the Pope was shot and said that they had weapons, and intel from other countries, all willing to help. There wre metal detectors, and security measures were in place. When he found out about my mother he was laughing saying: "We had security, intel from various countries, weapons, everything, and God used your mother to save the life of the Pope." He could not get over that.  

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