The lady in the fur coat pushed the little priest away. She had a camera. She was going to get a picture of the Pope. It wasn't fair, she said, she had been waiting all morning.

The priest gathered his soutane around him and wrestled with her again as boy scouts and children pelted past him and through the security cordon around the Pope.

But the little priest knew that God had given him one mission that day. No furry lady was going to monopolise the Pontiff and that he knew as surely as he knew that Archbishop Dermot Ryan was his master. The children crowded around John Paul II, reaching for his hand and shouting hello.

People stampeded through the police barrier to where the Pope tried to get into the car beside his helicopter.

The gardaí started to pull them away sharply, tackling a few running figures, spinning children around by the shoulders, and then they quickly linked arms to force the crowd back and make a pathway for the papal car.

But long after John Paul and the hordes had gone into Mass, the little priest and the lady fought it out; the church militant ignoring the church triumphant. No Grecian temple could have outshone the classical beauty of the celebrants' entrance on to that steep altar.

A steady breeze stirred the long line of cream and red vestments as the procession of priests advanced slowly around both sides of the pyramid.

Behind them 32 giant papal flags whipped thunderously in the wind, and across quiet acres of the massed faithful, Bernadette Greevy's dramatic contralto sang a processional anthem, sang that here, indeed, was a depth of occasion. Down the right-hand side of the altar, the sick and the old and the handicapped looked on, dazzled by this display of princes of the church.

A shy Christian Brother sat on his own at the end of a bench, hugging himself with happiness every time the Pope spoke and closing his eyes so as to concentrate harder on what he said.

At first they smiled a little at the heavy Polish accent, roaring appreciation when he spoke his cúpla focail. The voice filled the park, the space and the public address system creating a solemn double echo.

But, by the end of the long sermon, attentions were wandering and the line of old ladies in the invalid area began to fidget. One minute they peered cheerfully at a stretcher case being hurried to safety. Then they turned their stolid gaze on an embarrassed TV man on the press platform who was fluffing his camera report for the seventh time.

But at last a bearded young priest shuffled by with Communion and after that, it was time to open the precious sandwiches