Lenten Campaign 2025
This content is free of charge, as are all our articles.
Support us with a donation that is tax-deductible and enable us to continue to reach millions of readers.
At 94 years old — 75 of them spent in cloistered life — Sister Francesca Battiloro received what she calls the greatest surprise of her life: an encounter with Pope Francis. “I had asked God, just Him, to meet the Pope,” she said. “I thought it was impossible. But instead, He sent him right to me.”
Traveling from Naples to Rome for Sunday's Jubilee of the Sick and Healthcare Workers, Sister Francesca had one hope: to pass through the Holy Door of St. Peter’s Basilica. Frail, nearly blind, and in a wheelchair, she was granted a private moment for this pilgrimage while a Mass for 20,000 faithful took place outside in the Square.
As she prayed silently near the tomb of St. Peter, she noticed a small group of men in suits approaching. In the middle, another wheelchair. It was the Pope himself, making his first public appearance after being hospitalized with pneumonia. He, too, had the goal of Sr. Francesca: He had gone to pray, confess, and pass through the Holy Door before surprising the crowd outside.
Neither expected the encounter. But there they were, two wheelchairs meeting in the central nave. “How beautiful, how beautiful,” Sister Francesca kept repeating, overwhelmed. She reached out for the Pope’s hand and, by her own account, couldn’t let go.
With a recovering voice and his trademark sense of humor, Pope Francis smiled and asked, “Are you one of the nuns from Naples?” — a nod to a moment 10 years earlier when a group of Neapolitan cloistered sisters swarmed him during a visit to their cathedral.
Sister Francesca had been there too but never managed to get close. This time was different. She and the Pope shared nearly 10 minutes together.
“I kissed his hand, and he looked happy… Truly, God has been answering my prayers lately, even the small ones,” she said.
She didn’t come asking for anything for herself. Instead, she offered her life for the Pope’s recovery. “I told him, ‘Holiness, I’m praying so much, I’ve given my life to Jesus so that you may be healed, and I’ll go instead …’ He smiled.”
Then she added quietly, “Now I just desire to die in an act of pure love. That’s what I want — my final encounter with Him. I’ve lived my life.”
This video (in Italian) shows the moment Sr. Francesca was able to cross the Holy Door!
Loading
Later, addressing the faithful in St. Peter’s Square, Pope Francis called illness “a school of love” and reminded all that “God never abandons us.”
This unplanned meeting in a sacred place, between two servants of God — both in wheelchairs — revealed something profound. Not a coincidence, but a grace. A glimpse into how prayer, when entrusted fully to God, can unfold into something beyond imagination.
In a Basilica rich with centuries of faith, a new page was gently written: small, quiet, but radiant with hope.
