Popes & the Vatican, Catholic Church, World War II, Cold War, Pius XII, Nuns, Friendship 

When the white smoke swirled from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel, the world knew it had a new pope; Eugenio Pacelli was now Pope Pius XII. What the world did not know was that it had also acquired a "popessa" - a tiny, beautiful, brilliant nun named Sister Pascalina, who wielded a secret and unprecedented power. She was the Pope's aide, his housekeeper, his confidante, his adviser, his surrogate mother, and, in critical times, his conscience.

This is the stunning, never-before-told story of the Bavarian-born nun who rose from peasant beginnings to become the most influential woman in the Catholic Church. It is a thoroughly researched documentary that includes information given by Pascalina herself in extensive face-to-face interviews with the author.

She was only twenty-three when she first met Monsignor Pacelli at the retreat house in the Swiss Alps where he had gone to recover from exhaustion after his efforts in behalf of peace during World War I. She devoted herself totally to him, and when he was well he requested that she be appointed his housekeeper in Munich. She took over his household with a perfectionist's zeal, ran his office - never letting a fountain pen go dry - and tended to him personally, rushing to disinfect his much-kissed hand after every audience. She was at his side when communist mobs stormed the nunciature in 1917 and was a witness hen he later placed cash into the hands of a young Adolf Hitler.

Increasingly she dared to voice her criticisms, always pleading morality's cause. But always she encountered him, even though each step up in the hierarchy carried with it the real possibility of their permanent separation. Ultimately she would be the first woman to witness a papal election and go on to live in the papal quarters until the end of Pius' reign.

As La Popessa unfolds the story of this remarkable relationship between a man dedicated to the Church and the woman who served her faith by serving him, it reveals the inner workings of the Church itself during its most crucial period in modern history. It tells of the struggle to survive that let it into raprochement with dictators, investments in companies manufacturing such products as armaments and contraceptives, and support of the Mafia. It is the true story of a great institution, told in terms of the human beings who are its policymakers, its adherents, and its strength.

Taken from the inside flaps.