With discretion and reserve for half a century, between the end of the 20th century and the dawn of the new millennium, he served three Popes as Chamberlain: Angelo Gugel, who died last night in Rome at the age of ninety, surrounded by the love of his family. From the brief pontificate of the Venetian John Paul I, who called him among his lay collaborators when he was still a young man from his own region, to the very long pontificate of John Paul II, of which he was a silent witness for almost twenty-seven years, and the beginning of Benedict XVI’s pontificate, with whom, already in his seventies, he concluded his service.

Born on April 27, 1935, in Miane (Treviso), married to Maria Luisa Dall’Arche since 1964 and father of four children —Raffaella, Flaviana, Guido and Carla Luciana Maria—, Gugel was one of the last to have lived closely —the Chamberlains are an integral part of the Papal Family— the brief period of Luciani on the throne of the Successor of the Apostles, giving testimony in the process that allowed his beatification; the much longer period with Wojtyła at the helm of the Barque of Peter, being by his side also at the time of the attack of May 13, 1981; and the first period in which the Polish Pope was succeeded by Ratzinger.

Born into a peasant family and with two years of seminary experience, he was recruited as a gendarme in the Vatican in 1955. After contracting tuberculosis and enduring a long convalescence, he was transferred to the Governorate, until Luciani—his former bishop in Vittorio Veneto, who knew his mother and his wife, having ordained her brother, Father Mario Dall’Arche, a priest—wanted him to work with him. Moreover, he had already served as Luciani’s driver in Rome during the Second Vatican Council and had dined at his home.

Always impeccably dressed, with that understated elegance that is not ostentation, Angelo Gugel maintained the discretion his delicate role demanded even after retirement. He rarely granted interviews. On the centenary of the birth of Saint John Paul II, he shared some memories with the special issue prepared by L’Osservatore Romano to celebrate the anniversary. “My legs trembled when I was summoned to the apartment after the death of John Paul I,” he wrote on that occasion, describing the call to the Apostolic Palace from the Pope “who had come from afar.” “But the atmosphere of trust established by the Holy Father” and “also by Monsignor Stanisław and the sisters, made me feel ‘at home,’” he wrote, referring to Wojtyła’s private secretary, now Cardinal Dziwisz, and the Polish nuns who assisted him.

In recounting the 27 years he spent with John Paul II, filled with activity, meetings, and travel, he recalled international trips across five continents, but also more intimate moments, such as the few days of vacation in Cadore or the Aosta Valley, during which even Gugel would forgo his usual dark suit and tie and don sweaters and hiking pants. “Maintaining discretion about my work, even within my family, was normal. When we went out privately with the Holy Father, my relatives found out through the newspapers,” he added. And he continued to remember every moment of the assassination attempt on May 13, 1981: from the bullet hole to the Pope lying on the ground at the entrance to the Vatican Health Services building to the long run to the Gemelli Polyclinic.

In a 2018 interview with Corriere della Sera, Gugel recounted two anecdotes: “Two days after the election, the Substitute for General Affairs of the Secretariat of State, Giuseppe Caprio, phoned the Governorate at 11:30 a.m. saying, ‘Mr. Gugel, report to the Pope’s private apartment as you are dressed.’ I went up to the top floor of the Apostolic Palace. My legs were trembling. There were only Polish prelates there; I was the only one who spoke Italian.” A useful skill for helping the new pope pronounce his first speeches correctly. “I was stunned when, on the morning of October 22, 1978, before heading to St. Peter’s Square for the solemn inauguration of his pontificate, the Holy Father called me to his study and read me the homily he would deliver shortly afterward: ‘Do not be afraid! Open wide the doors to Christ! Do not be afraid! Christ knows what is inside man. Only He knows!’ He asked me to point out any mispronunciations, and with a pencil, he noted where to place the accents. Two months later, when I met with my former colleagues from the Gendarmerie, he uttered a phrase that left me speechless: ‘If I get the accent on a word wrong, 50 percent of it is Angelo’s fault,’ and he smiled at me.”

In that same interview, he recalled when his wife, Maria Luisa, was expecting their fourth daughter, whom they would name Carla Luciana Maria in honor of Pope Luciani and Pope John Paul II. During the pregnancy, he recounted, “Very serious problems arose in her uterus. The gynecologists at the Gemelli Polyclinic—Bompiani, Forleo, and Villani—ruled out the possibility of the pregnancy continuing. One day, John Paul II told me, ‘Today I celebrated Mass for your wife.’ On April 9, Maria Luisa was taken to the operating room for a cesarean section. Upon leaving, Dr. Villani remarked, ‘Someone must have prayed a lot.’ On the birth certificate, he wrote ‘7:15 a.m.,’ the exact moment the Pope was celebrating his morning Mass in the Sanctus. At breakfast, Sister Tobiana Sobotka, superior of the nuns serving at the Apostolic Palace, informed the Pope that Carla Luciana Maria had been born. ‘Deo gratias,’ exclaimed Wojtyła.” And on April 27th, he wanted to be the one to baptize her in the private chapel.”

L’Osservatore Romano