- Astorino: Pittsburgh's Archite at the Vatican was made possible by funding from the Donahue Family Foundation, Daniel H. Shapira, Laird E. Smith, Ronald L. Voli, Easley & Rivers, and the Peter C. Dozzi Family Foundation.

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- What you are seeing here at the Vatican has never happened before.

Until now, only a select few have ever en this place, d there has never been a television camera inside.

But on this day, these people of many faiths have been invited into the Vatican's Chapel of the Holy Spirit.

They are from Pittsburgh, and celebrating the Mass, Bishop Donald Wuerl of the Diocese of Pittsburgh, along with other members of the clergy who have ties to the Pittsburgh region.

- Many, many of us are people with the Pittsburgh connection.

This seems to be a very fitting place for us to come together, for many reasons.

- The Chapel of the Holy Spirit, where Cardinals will meet in private before making a decision that will have worldwide impact.

- This chapel was designed specifically in mind the thought that the Cardinals who would elect a Pope would gather here in prayer before going io conclave.

- Bless and to approve our offering, make it acceptable to you, and offering in spirit.

- Guests this day in this chapel know they are in one of the most important and sacred places on Vatican property.

- This is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world... - They know it was designed by a man from Pittsburgh.

He's here today and he's sitting in no special place of prominence.

- It was my first mass in the chapel.

- Architect Lou Astorino is genuinely humbled by his role in all of this.

- And it was a very, very moving experience fome, particularly as I know it was for my wife.

- As the Mass ends, a group of clearly impressed Pittsburghers linger for a while They want to capture their final images of this place and of this man who designed it.

It's likely they will never be here again.

- Unbelievably beautiful.

Thank you.

- Thank you.

- No, I don't think I do.

They all came up and commented what a humbling experience and beautiful experience it was to be in the chapel and to have been designed by a Pittsburgher was just overwhelming to most of them as it is to me.

- So how did this man from Pittsburgh's working class, Brookline neighborhood end up here essentially in the history books ongside names like Bernini, Michelangelo, and other Vatican masters - I think about it often, and I don't know why.

I'm sorry.

It's, it's tough.

It's.... Excuse me, it is Michael.

Certainly, I can't be the most talent architect in the world.

Certainly we've not done a lot of churches.

It's my first, I am deep religious, no doubt.

t you know, why, why someone from Pittsburgh?

Why?

I don't know.

I just don't know.

- This is Astorino headquarters in downtown Pittsburgh.

Lou Astorino founded this architecture engineering and design firm in 1972.

It is now 180 employees strong.

- Hey guys.

- And Astorino's resume is strong.

He designed PNC park for the Pittsburgh Pirates, the PNC First Side Center office building, the Trimont Condominiums atop Mount Washington.

Astorino supervised the historic renovation of Frank Lloyd Wright's Falling Water.

And overseas, he designed a European transplant hospital for the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center in Palermo, Italy.

- This is the stone that they wanna take out.

You know, architects do too.

You know, we, they, we like our buildings to look good, but we also like 'em to work.

They have to function.

And when they do both of those things, you're happy.

- Sot's no wonder, Astorino's reputation led him to the Vatican.

In 1993, he was hired as a consulting architect on a hotel called the Domus Sanctae Marthae, a place for clergy to stay while visiting the Vatican.

But Astorino would meet with a bitter disappointment.

His hotel plan was rejected.

- I felt that the concept that we had for the Domus Sanctae Marthae had been given to me as an inspiration by God.

And that when, when it was all said and done, that this idea wasn't accepted, that I had let God down, you know, and, and I was terribly depressed and I felt, you know, God myself, everybody, what an opportunity we had to work in a Vatican and I didn't pull it off.

- But a few days later, Astorino's life took what he calls a divine turn, when the president of the Vatican, Cardinal Castillo Lara called him back to Rome.

- And he said, there is a triangular piece of property that's adjacent to the hotel that we'd like to construct a chapel on.

Would you be interested in being, the architect for the chapel?

I...my heart swelled up and I said: Huh?

First thing I thought is, how can you be so dumb?

You know, where was your faith?

This is what you were supposed to do in the first place.

Would you rather do a hotel in the, in the, the Vatican, or would you rather do a chapel?

And the old expression that, you know, God closes a, a door and opens a window is exactly what he was doing.

- Astorino would learn of the chapel's importance, how Cardinals would use it as a place to pray and reflect before going to the Sistine Chapel to elect a pope.

His first question to Cardinal Lara, - What, what do you think this this chapel ought to look like?

What is your opinion of what the end product should be?

And he said, I think it shld be a chapel that reflects today's thinking.

- The look of the chapel would be only one of many challenges.

It had to be built on a small triangular piece of land wedged between the Domus Sanctae Marthae, the Vatican's Hotel for visitors, and the ancient Leonine Wall, which surrounds Vatican City.

- This is the Domus Sanctae Marthae.

This is the Leonine Wall.

- The triangle, some architects would find to be a constraint.

Astorino saw as an inspiration.

- As we oked at the site without the chapel on it, you could see that it's triangular.

And of course, the triangles, the symbol for the trinity, the father, the Son, the Holy Spirit.

So literally and figuratively, this chapel grows from the Holy Spirit.

- The chapel would also grow with the help of some of the finest crafts people in Rome.

- As this thing took shape, and they were bringing artisans out of retirement to do it because it was a complex project working on triangles, they brought a, they brought a retired roofer out to, because a roof is copper and it's bent and it's odd angles, and the geometry is such that it's a very difficult job.

Brought him out of retirement to do the roof.

But you could see the pride in their eyes, all of them, as it stted taking shape.

- When the Chapel of the Holy Spirit was finished in 1996, Cardinal Lara, who chose Astorino for the project, remembered a conversation they had years earlier.

- And when he dedicated it with Jean and I, he said, Dr.

Astorino, they call architects, doctors over there, Dr.

Astorino.

He said, I asked you for a chapel that reflected today's thinking.

You gave us a chapel that reflects yesterday, today, and tomorrow.

I was very humbled by that.

- And humbled as well by this photograph of Pope John Paul II praying in the chapel.

- I met him when construction was just beginning in the chapel, and I was introduced Jean and I, my wife and I were introduced to him as the architect of the, of the Chapel of the Holy Spirit.

And he said, I understand it's gonna be a beautiful chapel.

And I said, I certainly hope so.

You're holiness to know that the Pope's the Pope, one of the most influential popes, maybe the most inflntial pope ever prayed in this chapel, says a lot to me.

Because the chapel is visited by only the most prominent at the Vatican.

And because of its location deep behind Vatican walls where security is tight, the chapel is closed to the public and of course to the media.

How is it we got in to show you Because after months of planning and cutting through bureaucratic red tape, the Vatican agreed that a Pittsburgh audience shoulde the first to see the chapel built by a man from Pittsburgh.

From the outside, you can see the architect challenge.

One wall is just a few fee from the historic Leonine Wall.

- But it doesn't really touch it, it just kisses it.

- The other wall, adjacent to the Vatican's modern hotel residence, the chapel itself fills the span between old and new.

The private courtyard outside is adorned with flowers and plants year round and going beyond the chapel doors overwhelms first time vitors.

- The materials that chose were the, were traditional mateals of the Vatican.

They were travertine, marble, copper, masonry, stained glass, mahogany, all rich traditional materials.

But executed somewha differently to reflect a chapel of today's thinkin That thinking, being an emional chapel, that elicits emotional response when you're in it.

The space is organized in a in a different sense that it would've been organized 500 years ago.

It's organized in the sense of what we know today about mathematics and science and the universe and architecture.

It reflects today's thinking in that sense.

- Visitors are immiately drawn to the focal point of the chapel.

- The crucifix itself came from the Vatican in their archives.

And I picked this one largely for the, the scale of it.

And the, the beautifu sculpture of Christ was just... it was very realistic.

And, and I thought it was, it would be absolutely perfect in the chapel.

And it is.

The crucifix is silhouetd by a, the rays of a window that is exactly the same size as the, the wood on the crucifix.

You don't see the window, what you see or the rays coming from, from the wood of the crucifix.

And you can see the, the beauty of the, of the ceiling, how it just moves and steps back.

The ceiling, of course, is all triangular that plays off the reflection of the floor and the theme of the Trinity, the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Because the ceiling is so luminous, it feels almt as if it's open to the sky.

You see it so light and airy.

Here we're looking at the altar.

Actually, you can see the three legs grow from the the triangles into a simple slab.

It's made ofarble, the same marble as the floor.

It's called bianco statuario which is a statue marble.

It's pure white.

Behind the altar, is a soaring triangular arch with the gold leaf inscription in Latin Veni Sacnte Spiritvs Reple Tvorvm Corda Fidelium.

Come Holy Spirit renew the hearts of t faithful.

It was somewhat coincidental as we were working back in this triangular section of behind the altar.

The pattern emerged and it, it emerged so that we could have one large white triangle surrounded by 12 white and yellow triangles.

- One whole wall of this chapel is glass, and it was deliberately designed that way to look out onto one of the ancient walls that surrounded the Vatican, the Leonine Wall.

And it says to me, there's an enormously long history to the church.

- The wall is an ancient wall.

It was built over 600 years ago, and it separated Rome from the Vatican and, and protected the Vatican from intrusion.

And once it was uncovered because of its historic nature, we knew that it was, it wasn't in fact a treasure to maksure that we respected and made part of our chapel.

The challenge was we wanted to incorporate the wall, but how could we physically put it inside the chapel without destroying its integrity?

If we were gonna attach to it, we'd have to destroy the integrity of the wall by trying to do some flashing and connecting to it.

And then we didn't know what the, what condition the wall was in.

If it would rain, would it actually be porous and off the water would come into the church.

So there's some practical considerations we had to have.

Here we're looking at the stations of the cross, which are outside.

They're bronze.

They're done by a very famous Italian sculptor by the name of Manfrini.

And they're absolutely beautiful.

The figures are just come to life.

The detail's magnificent.

It's just a true work of art and a very emotional piece of art.

We do light the stations at night and puts off a beautiful glow.

The tabernacle was designed by an artist from Italy.

It represents the idea of a egg in inside a nest.

And inside that egg, of course, are the, are t host.

The colors ithe stained glass were chosen to bvery similar to the colors in the floor.

The top portion being, again, the symbol of the, of the trinity, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

As you look at the son, literally the sunburst being God the cross being the Son, Jesus and the Holy Spirit, the dove.

You'll find this, this symbol replicated in a number of places in the chapel.

And it's a beautiful representation of the Trinity.

This sketch is from February of 1994.

In developing the floor, we took the site and now you can really see the triangular nature of the site.

We took the site and we, we drew a series of intercoecting triangles over the entire site.

We then ben laying an outline ofhe chapel over the triangles.

And y wall of the chapel would fall on a side of the triangle.

And this is where we say it literally and figuratively grew from the Holy Spirit.

The floor really exposes itself when you're standing still for a moment, and you do pause, you know, before you walk on it, because it is a piece of art.

As we can see the floor, it is comprised of the triangles again, but of four different types of marble, bianco statuario.

It's aypical pure white marble from Italy.

The yellow is from Gallo de Sienna, produced and mined from Sienna.

As we get into the smaller triangles, we have a, an emerald green and a deep rose.

The intricate patterns of the chapel floor need a master craftsman.

- Could you see this one?

This is the same, the column, - Because the project is such a, an emotional project in such an importt project.

I love to work with people on it that had pason and probably the most passionate of, of, of all the construction workers was Priscilla Medici.

- Do you like it?

- Oh, it's beautiful, beautiful, beautiful.

- This is very precious marble.

There must be exactly as this one.

- It's a family lbusiness for over six generations.

They've served 11 popes, largely doing floors in the Vatican.

We called upon this outstanding studio.

The patronist of the studio is Priscilla Medici.

She was just a joy to work with.

- This Is a Roman of 2000 years ago.

It's a Roman idea to have marble used as a carpet.

- That's a beautiful idea.

She understood the art of the floor.

She understood the craftsmanship that was needed to produce the floor.

- This is an antique.

This is antique?

- Yes.

- How old is this marble?

- 2000 years.

- 2000 years old.

We went to the Medici studio, where outside our large blocks of various marbles from all over the world, that we chose the four basic floor colors from, Through a wonderfu process that as we walked around and something looked like it was a close color, one of the workers with a bucket of water and a sponge would wet the marble to bring out the actual color of it.

And I would say, yeah, that's, that's perfect.

Let's pick this color, this color, this color.

Medici studio, within two days had done a, a pattern for us, a sample true to color, the actual materials.

It was just a very emotional moment to see that pattern in her studio become a, a reality.

- You like it?

- Oh, I'm so glad we chose it.

It really is a beautif piece.

- Elegant red, because the red to be elegant, must be the violet red, - Not orange.

A deep, deep, deep right, right.

A deep blue violet that - I work very pleasantly with the architect.

That means that he understands marble.

This is my point of view.

- My fondest memory is him creating this floor just at the kitchen table there and with all his colored pencils and drawing the triangles and putting the differt colors in that he thought would work.

I can remember thaas if it were yesterday.

You can't en express how wonderful it feels to know that your husband is such a part of this - Jean Asterino did much mor than watch her husband at work.

She attended important meetings, served as project manager, interpreter, and sometimes counselor.

- I think during this process I kept asking why.

And you know, you're always waiting for answers when you, when you pray, it's either a yes or a no answer.

And it was just that praying evy day, coming to St.

Petes while Lou was working, or even at home, just praying and making sure that everything would be okay.

And he answered our prayers.

- And Jean's importance on the project can't be overemphasized because she was the glue that held us together between the American side and the Italian side.

And she, she was able t straddle that line beautifully.

I feel every sp of the way that I was a pencil in someone's hand, as I've always said, I'm prouof this, not because I did it because I was a pencil.

- Astorino is still putting final touches on the chapel of the Holy Spirit.

A sculpture of St.

Peter's cross is planned for the rear of the chapel.

- We have a, a piece of sculpture that's an inverted crucifix to remind those as they leave the chapel of the humility of St.

Peter was crucified upside down.

- The inverted crucifix will be positioned in the chapel on axis with St.

Peter's grave, whichs located 100 yards away in St.

Peter's Basilica.

- As you go through our chapel, it crosses at this point, this is the point, the center line of our chapel, at this point, something very important had to happen.

This is where the St.

Peter Sculpture will go.

I think it'll be a very moving piece - For now.

The Chapel of the Holy Spirit remains a small jewel at the Vatican.

But the world will know this place when Cardinals deciding on a new Pope will come together here in prayer.

- I have not had a chance to pray there often because I, when I went there, I w there to work.

What could I, you know, what could I correct if there was something wrong and did, is there something I didn't think of?

Is it, does it look right or is the lighting right?

And no, I'm I I until this trip, I hadn't had a chance to reflect on the chapel - As a chapel.

No, I'm not Catholic.

Within our group were were Protestants, Catholics, and, and Jews.

And it was just remarkable.

And we all, I'm sure view it in the same fashion.

So by your gifts, will I utter praise In the vast assely, I was struck by its beauty and its simplicity and perhaps even its understatement.

And it was done with a great deal of thought.

I will treasure those few days.

For a long time - When I walked in, I had the sense of intimacy and serenity, very nice to meet you.

It really felt special being there and thinking that this was done by a Pittsburgher, - The architect from Pittsburgh who left a treasure in Vatican history.

- And along with that comes an awesome responsibility, you know, to, for a lot of things.

How you live your life, how it has absolutely changed my life.

What do I do with it?

Thi thing is this.

Chapel is a gift.

It's gift to the Vatican.

It's a gift to the bishops and the cardinals that we use it and the priest.

But it's also a gift to me.

And what do I do with this gift?

It weighs heavily on me and I just hope I do the right thing.

Chapel will always be, always be the greatest thing I've ever done