It was a dank miserable day when the Aer Lingus flight – callsign Shepherd 1 – splashed down at Ireland West Airport in Knock, Co Mayo. Pretty typical for August in these parts, they say.
But when Pope Francis carefully descended the slippery stairs on 26 August 2018, he received a greeting that cut through the chill.
“I seized my opportunity and I gave him a kiss on both cheeks,” admitted Mary McCarthy, laughing at the egregious breach of protocol.
“We’d been briefed to greet him naturally, but I don’t think he was too upset. I’ve a picture to prove that he was okay about it. He got an Irish welcome, maybe with an Italian twist.”
Ms McCarthy, her husband John and their four children had the honour of greeting Francis, as he had requested a local family to meet him ahead of dignitaries.
“He was just like us,” says Ms McCarthy. “Very joyful to be in the west of Ireland.”
Read more: How Pope Francis broke with tradition – even in death
Diplomats were further perturbed when a Mayo Gaelic football jersey was thrust into the hands of the Holy Father. The county has famously failed to win the All-Ireland Championship since 1951, when the returning victorious team apparently overtook a funeral cortege, and were cursed by an angry priest.
Mayo’s long quest to lift the Sam Maguire trophy is part of Irish lore. “Mayo for Sam!” then US president Joe Biden would shout when he visited these parts five years later.
In 2018, “Mayo for Psalm” was emblazoned on t-shirts at Knock, as the Pope – a keen football fan – simply scribbled “Francis” on the jersey with a marker.
But divine intervention has yet to appear. Mayo have lost two more finals since Pope Francis endorsed the shirt.
“Maybe this is the year,” Ms McCarthy hopes. “Maybe the Holy Father is going to do it all the way from heaven. I think he’ll be a saint of some sort, and I’ll definitely be praying to him for a win.”
It was the second day of Francis’s flying visit to Ireland, the first by a pontiff since John Paul II in 1979. He too had come to Knock, the site of Ireland’s most famous shrine. Around a million people a year visit the chapel where an apparition appeared to locals in 1879.
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Here, Francis paused in silent prayer, before meeting with parishioners including Terry and Maureen Campbell, and their daughter Karen. “It was just a magical moment,” recalls Ms Campbell. “Just waiting for him to come around and meet Karen, it was such a great privilege, a great honour.”
“Karen couldn’t believe it was the Pope, when it was all over she couldn’t believe she had actually met the Pope,” says Mr Campbell.
It’s a difficult time for the couple as their daughter, who had Down’s syndrome and other complications, died three years ago at the age of 44.
“When he did pass away, the first thing I said to Maureen was ‘he’s with Karen’. Because Karen to me was a saint. Just even talking about it…I get full up, you know,” says Mr Campbell.
Although Francis felt obliged to address the thorny issue of historic clerical abuse in his address at Knock – begging for forgiveness – in his unscripted moments in Co Mayo, he appeared content and jovial.
Fr Richard Gibbons, the parish priest and rector of Knock Shrine, remembers that.
“I welcomed him here personally and told him a little bit about the apparition, and then he asked a few questions about it. He was in a very happy kind of mood. He was joyful, in great form and he rose the spirits of everybody who was here.”
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The funeral of Francis will be watched keenly in the west of Ireland this weekend. The sadness felt by the people of Knock will be a measure of the fondness for their famous visitor; a man who was both pope and pilgrim.
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You can watch full coverage of the Pope’s funeral live on Sky News on Saturday
