Sunny Assisi
Cathedral of San Rufino (left) and Basilica of Santa Chiara (right) in Assisi
The last time I was in Europe, I had only made a day trip to Assisi. This time, we spent three full days in this quiet Umbrian hill town made famous for its twin medieval saints, San Francesco (Francis) and Santa Chiara (Clare). It was probably my favorite part of our holiday, and I cannot thank Nancy enough for arranging for us to stay there as long as we did – and in such comfort as we did.
Through her timeshare, we landed a last-minute deal at some vacation condos 5km from the old city. (I wanted to stay in a cave to get the full Franciscan experience, but she convinced be that the on-site sauna would serve just as well: both are dark and damp, and not very spacious. Not sure Francis would be sold on the idea though…)
St. Francis statue at Cathedral of San Rufino
The first day was a beautiful, cold, crisp, clear day, sunny and freezing. I cannot tell you how nice it is to have the lucury in this town not to feel as though one has to see everything in a day. You can – it is not very big – but you get so much more out of the experience with a leisurely pace. We decided to roughly follow the Rick Steves’ Assisi stroll, and started at the higher end of town with the old Roman Amphitheatre, now converted for use as a restaurant with a garden.
Because of the fame of Francis and Clare, I always think o Assisi as the quintessential medieval town that it became by the 13th century, but forget that long before that it was also a Roman town, built in 295 BC. Before the Romans, it was Etruscan. Before that, there were Umbrians in the area, perhaps as early as 1000 years before Christ.
By the end of the third century AD, the town and environs had been largely converted to Christianity by Bishop Rufino, a martyr and the patron saint of Assisi, for whom the cathedral is named. We arrived there just in time to join the Sunday Eucharist, which happened to have an American Franciscan presiding (in Italian). The small baptismal font is near a plaque noting some of the notables who had been baptized there, including Sts. Francis and Clare, Gabriel of Our Lady of Sorrows (the young Passionist saint whose sanctuary we visited in novemeber) and Frederick II.
Chapel of the San Damiano Crucifix at Santa Chiara "Francis, my house is in ruins. Fix it!"
After mass we took a tour of the Cathedral crypt, one of Francis’ frequent places of prayer, mostly dating from the 9th century and later, but including the third century ossuary thought to have held the remains of Bishop St. Rufino, the martyr Apostle of Assisi.
Down the hill from the Cathedral is the Basilica Santa Chiara and a beautiful view of the valley below, including the “new” part of Assisi, also known for its major church, Santa Maria dei Angeli. In addition to the resting place of the little rich girl who “fell in love” with the older Francis and his order, a side chapel holds the cucifix that was in the Church of San Damiano, where Francis had his conversion experience.
Just off the piazza Santa Chiara was the site of the best meal we had all week, a small trattoria 50 meters off the main street boasting traditional Umbrian cuisine. Plenty of time in the shops nearby, and we did not make it much further than the central Piazza Communale, on which you can find an original Roman temple rededicated as a Christian church.
Roman Weather, Translated
I had to share the following email from a friend and fellow Lay Centre resident. Just another sign of the cultural encounter living in Rome:
Our local weather forecast from the American “weather.com”:
Rome: Windy, rain.
But when you click on the Rome weather forecast from the big Italian weather website, they say that the forecast is:
PEGGIORAMENTO, marcata fase perturbata e ventosa per Capodanno.
LAZIO PROSSIMI GIORNI: Il vento di Ponente sarà il vero protagonista dell’avvio del 2010 e sono attese mareggiate piuttosto consistenti sulle zone costiere esposte. Si avrà un calo termico, che potrà favorire qualche nevicata sui monti appenninici. Il freddo diverrà maggiore nel week-end, quando tuttavia si attende un temporaneo miglioramento con ampi rasserenamenti.Which roughly means:
A WORSENING, with markedly disrupted (perturbed) phases and windiness for the New Year.
LAZIO in the coming days: The West Wind will be the real protagonist of the start of 2010, and expectations are for quite large storm surges on exposed coastal areas. There will be a thermal drop, which may encourage some snow on the Apennines. The cold will become even greater during the weekend, however, when a temporary improvement is expected, with ample clearing (literally: ample re-serenity-making).
PS: I am way behind on updating posts, so you’ll get most of the Christmas holiday updates in one fell swoop when i edit and upload pictures; we are off to Assisi tomorrow for a couple days so it will be after that! Do not forget to look for “older” posts that might show up later!
New Year’s in Rome: Best View in the City!
It rained, it poured; God provided his own fireworks display. So, we stayed indoors with a simple dinner and watched Angels and Demons to identify landmarks and pull apart Dan Brown’s ignorance of conclave procedures! Just in time for the display at the Colosseo though, the rain let up and we went up to the terrace. It is as if they planned them just for us!
Here are a couple clips that Nancy filmed from my window – the show starts about 20 seconds into the first one. They are literally firing them off just at the edge of our gardens; no zoom necessary.
[OK, it seems i cannot embed videos without an upgrade. I will load them to YouTube, which you can access here.]
Taormina, Sicilia
Castel Molina above Taormina, Sicilia
The rest of our stay was a sunny and warm 21°C (70°F). We got to explore the beaches and decided to hike from Letojanni to Taormina. Turns out there are no pedestrian friendly paths from one to the other, but we did find some cool ruins of unknown antiquity in some of the less accessible parts of the beach between the towns. (see below)
Taormina itself has been around since sometime around the 9th century BC, it seems. The Greeks built a theatre here in the third century BC, and the Romans expanded and improved it a couple hundred years later. It commands a magnificent view of the Mediterranean and Mount Etna – Europe’s largest active volcano, which looms above the town.
Delectable Sicilian pastries
We enjoyed a Sicilian pizza with a view of the bay, and rode a cable car down to the beach, ate canola and sampled various pasticcherie for their dolci. The best was also found in Letojanni’s Piazza Durante at the Niny Bar, with a great ambiance. Unfortunately, the coffee did not compete with the less sophisticated place we tried before, just across the piazza, but the little pastries they make here are incredible.
While we got some good photos, i also found another travel blog with several really good ones: http://www.galenfrysinger.com/taormina_sicily.htm
Cool ruin of unknown antiquity #1
Cool ruin of unknown antiquity #2
Letojanni, Sicilia
Letojanni and the Mediterranean
Letojanni is a summer resort town, and we were there in the off-season. On the first day, as we hiked down the hill from the resort to town in the rain (about 3km, and 500’ down) it reminded me of Ocean Shores or Leavenworth in the off-season. If you see it during the peak, you cannot get enough of the place, but if you come when nobody’s around you see everything there is to see in about half a day. Nancy’s main frustration was that even the places that were open for lunch apparently did not serve pizza on Sundays or until dinner. Mine was walking back to the resort. Uphill. In the rain. Wearing shorts.
Cafe on Piazza Durante, Letojanni, Sicilia
Thankfully, first impressions are not always accurate. It was Sunday, after all, so many places were closed and the locals were at home observing the Sabbath. And even in the winter, rain is not too common so all the locals were wisely waiting it out. We did stop for a caffé under the awnings of the rather tacky looking “Palm Beach Café”, right on Letojanni’s main square, Piazza Durante, faced by the Church of San Guiseppe. The caffé was excellent, and the server was a genial guy who shared about his trip to the U.S. and about how it was nice and quiet now, but in the summer it was crazy with foreign tourists – Japanese… Americans… Italians…
When we did get back to the room, the view was worth the hike.
Small town, small roads, small Nancy...
Sicily or bust
Trains. On a Boat.
It is a nine hour train ride from Rome to Taormina, about 750 km (466mi), and worth the extra 20 Euros for first class – which just means you get a semi-private cabin with up to passengers instead of open seating among sixty.
Before we left, a friend and classmate here told us that the way they got the train from the mainland to Sicily was by loading the passenger cars on a boat and then shipping us across! There’s only a mile and a half at the straits! If there’s a tunnel running 26 miles from England to France, surely they had a bridge or something for Italy to Sicily. Our skepticism melted when we got to the port of Villa San Giovanni, where, as predicted, they drove the train right onto a massive ferry and we set sail for the Sicilian port of Messina!
When we arrived at about 930pm, we discovered that the train station was actually 5 km drive up a winding road up a vertical climb of 700’ to the town of Taormina. But, we were actually staying a couple towns over, in Letojanni – 7 km away.
Christmas Day at the Lay Centre
We slept. Instead of venturing back to Piazza San Pietro, we decided to sleep in and watch the Urbi et Orbi on TV – a better view, and with no public transit running, we would have spent half a day just getting there and back.
Christmas dinner
In the afternoon, the seven of us staying at the Lay Centre were joined by twice as many guests for a Christmas dinner prepared by Donna with a little help from Nancy and me. As with Thanksgiving, it was nice to offer hospitality to friends and colleagues here in Rome, separated from home and family. We entertained guests from the U.S. and U.K., Ukraine, Uzbekistan, and a few countries that do not start with the letter “U”.
Colosseum "crown of light"
David had spent a day or two preparing a piñata, a custom which only three or four of us were familiar with, and he and I got to torment the blindfolded volunteers with our maneuverings. The measures of success for a piñata: several people tried (and failed), lots of laughter, and lots of candy!
As we were getting ready to head back in for dessert, the Colosseum lit up the sky with a “crown of light” in honor of the coming of the Christ-light into the world. Not as busy as yesterday, but a welcome celebration!
Nativity of the Lord: Christmas Mass at Midnight
Preparing for Jill's Feast: AJ, Greg, Karina, Jill, Natalie
Nancy and I, and a small group from the Lay Centre started Christmas Eve with a traditional Italian dinner hosted by Jill, another Domer I discovered at the Angelicum. It was incredible! Antipasti and prosecco to start the night off, followed by soup, pasta, fish… and each prepared and served in proper order, it was almost a pity we had to leave for the mass! Seriously, aside from theology, ministry, and guiding tours of Rome she could open her own trattoria. Not only was it all delicious, it was presented so beautifully, it really made a special evening even more delightful.
Standing on the confessionals at St. Peter's, Midnight Mass 1944
It is from Jill that I learned that Midnight Mass at St. Peter’s is actually a relatively new phenomenon. Until 1944, the last time the bishop of Rome had celebrated Christmas midnight mass at St. Peter’s is believed to be for the coronation of Charlemagne as Holy Roman Emperor in 800 AD. Otherwise, the traditional location in Rome had been Santa Maria Maggiore – which makes a lot more sense given the indispensible role Mary played in the Nativity, and the location there of the relics of the Nativity including what was believed to be the manger in which the Christ child was laid. Since Pius XII’s celebration just after the liberation of Italy during WWII, the popes have celebrated midnight mass at St. Peter’s; but the Romans still go to Mary Major while the Americans and other pilgrims go pray with the pope – though we were not standing on the confessionals this time.
The line begins outside the Basilica of St. Peter
Jill’s place being mere minutes from Piazza San Pietro, we took some liberty with our arrival time. For the first time, what has traditionally been a Midnight Mass was moved up to 10:00pm so we were advised to arrive three hours early – we got there at 7:30 and got into a line that already wrapped around the entire Piazza and had started doubling up on itself. Waiting just ahead of us in line was an American, a theatre professor from Miami, who was hoping against hope to find a ticket to get into the papal mass. (His name is James Brown. No, really – you can look him up.) As it happens, I had had a friend arrange to get four tickets for us before we knew we would be getting enough through the Lay Centre, so Natalie had borrowed three for friends, and there was just one left over – the Spirit works in small ways too! Unfortunately, we lost Jim in the mass crush when our part of the line finally got inside the Basilica, but in a couple hours of waiting in line at least got to make a new friend.
View from our seats, taken after the liturgy
Once inside, we found the massive line had filled the seats in the nave and it looked as if we might have to stand – until they opened the transepts. We got the leftover seats from the “reserved” section in the south transept, directly to the side of the altar. We couldn’t see the pope as he sat in the presiders chair, but had a great view of the liturgy of the Eucharist.
We were placed directly between two of the massive pillars supporting Michelangelo’s Dome, looked over by Sts. John of God and Mary Euphrasia Pellettier on one side and Sts. Juliana Falconieri and Angela Merici on the other. Because of this we could not see very far down the nave toward the main doors. About the time we thought the music was changing from prelude to procession, we heard something like screams, a pause long enough to ask each other what that was about, then cheering. “Ah, they were cheering for the pope like a rock star!” We did not realize that Benedict had been knocked down until after the liturgy and we met up with some students who had been in that part of the Basilica. We did see Cardinal Etchegaray being wheeled out on a gurney behind us, and thought perhaps he had fallen or something. His Holiness did not mention it, and did not even seem fazed by the time we saw him.
Presepe at Piazza San Pietro
The liturgy was beautiful. Last time I was in Rome, for the close of the Jubilee, midnight mass had been held outside, in the Piazza. This was my second papal Eucharist inside St. Peter’s this year, and both times there has really been a sense of reverence and participation in the liturgy, even despite the size of the church and the numbers of people celebrating. The mass parts were in Latin, the readings in Spanish and English, the gospel sung in Latin and the pope’s homily delivered in Italian, the prayers of the faithful in Russian, French, Tagalog, Portugese, and German. The music is increadible, of course: the only places outside Rome I have seen compare for quality liturgy and liturgical music is the Basilica of Sacred Heart at Notre Dame and St. James Cathedral in Seattle. (The National Shrine in D.C. sometimes makes the cut, too…) Nancy was tempted to record the entire liturgy, but we settled for trying to get some of the music.
Afterwards we stood in front of the presepe (crèche, Nativity scene) at the foot of the obelisk in the middle of Bernini’s piazza, listening to a group of sisters singing carols. After an hour of trying to hail a taxi, we got a couple to take us back to the Lay Centre without trying to rip us off (Thank you, Karina!!)
On returning to the Lay Centre, Donna had prepared for us an “American breakfast” – pancakes with Canadian maple syrup, eggs, bacon, and orange juice – the most proper way to celebrate the birth of Jesus at 2:00am! And, to be honest, I do not think I have ever appreciated American fare so much!
Scavi San Pietro
If you ever come to Rome, go on the “Scavi” tour of the excavations under St. Peter’s. You may have to reserve a spot several weeks or months in advance, but it is well worth it.
St. Peter's on Christmas Eve
Rome is history built upon layers of older history. It is easy to forget that much of the great sites, churches especially, have been built or entirely reconstructed as recently as the renaissance and baroque periods. The massive St. Peter’s Basilica that we see now was built over a 120 year period, throughout the 16th and early 17th centuries.
Like the Lateran palace of the popes and a number of other buildings in Rome, the original Basilica of St. Peter had been left largely in neglect during the Avignon papacy and the papal schisms of the 14th and 15th century, and was in need of repair and restoration. Pope Julius II ordered the demolition of the Basilica, which had been built by Constantine more than a millennium before. The new would be built on the site of the old, with the altar as the center point and locus of continuity.
[For a great read on the history and the personalities of popes and architects involved in the building of the new St. Peter’s, I highly recommend R. A. Scotti’s Basilica: Splendor and the Scandal – Building St. Peter’s . It was given to me as a gift from a good friend, a priest with whom I worked closely while we were planning to build a church for the parish we were serving.]
Baldachino and high altar
Visitors to the Basilica today can tour the main level, designed largely by Michaelangelo, Raphael, Bramante and others, and then can go down to the “Tomb of the Popes” on the level of the old, Constantinian basilica for free and without tickets. If you did not know about the Scavi, you might think this level of the Vatican Grottoes was the lowest. But even Constantine built upon an older layer of history.
Before Constantine legalized Christianity in the Roman empire and began to build imperial unity by building churches, the Vatican was a hill, on the slopes of which was a Necropolis – a city of the dead. Mausoleums constructed literally as houses for the dead, pagan and Christian side by side (or on top of each other) in family plots clustered around the area. In order to build his massive basilica, Constanitne ordered the hill leveled and the slopes filled in, up to about the roofline of many of the houses of the dead, which were then filled with rubble and debris to make room for the basilica platform.
Vatican Necropolis under St. Peter's
It was in the midst of this necropolis that a small shrine was built up against a red wall. Over the few hundred years between the construction of the shrine and its being covered by Constantines basilica, more and more Christians were found to be buried as close as possible to the shrine, often without care for previous graves so that several layers of graves were found right on top of one another radiationg out fromthis shrine. But the shrine itself remained undisturbed.
It was this Necropolis that was excavated under the orders of Pius XII between 1939-1949. The remnants of the shrine was found, as described by ancient sources (in 160 AD, Gaius described the Trophy of St. Peter) – the tomb of Peter had been discovered!
Unfortunately, it was discovered to be empty.
During the course of excavations, other graves were found, and in one of the walls adjacent to the tomb, some human remains were discovered. In 1942 the rector of the basilica took it upon himself to move these without going through the archaeologists working in the area, to preserve these possible relics of some unknown saint. Years later they were “rediscovered” by one of those working on the excavations, and testing confirmed they fit the demographic profile of St. Peter at the time of his death and are presumed to be his remains, moved from the original grave to the adjacent ossuary in the wall for veneration, perhaps.
The various altars of St. Peter's
Talk about innovation and continuity, the story of the Church! Consider the layers built one on top of another to mark the apostle’s martyrdom:
- A first century grave (c.70AD)
- A second century shrine, the “Trophy” of St. Peter (before c. 160AD)
- Constantine’s monument then basilica (c.315)
- The altar of Gregory the Great (c.600)
- The altar of Callistus II (c.1120)
- The altar of Clement VIII (c.1600) – the current high altar
- Bernini’s Baldachino
- Michaelangelo’s Dome
Nancy and i were fortunate enough to find space on a tour just a few days ahead, and joined two families (one from Portland!) who had reserved their tours weeks in advance.
Via Merulana Pilgrimge
- Basilica San Clemente
There are four major basilicas in the world, all located here in Rome. Two of the four, the Archbasilica of San Giovanni in Laterano and Santa Maria Maggiore, are just 1.5 km (almost a mile) apart and linked by a straight road, Via Merulana.
Nancy enjoying a cappuccino
We started by heading for San Giovanni and the Christmas market set up out front. Before getting there, though, we made an obligatory stop to tour the three levels of the Basilica of San Clemente. The current basilica, which you have to climb down a flight of stairs from street level to entre, is a 12th century basilica built upon the ruins of a 4th century basilica, which is itself built over two structures including a Mithraeum – a temple to the Roman god Mithras, popular with the Legions.
Then we stopped by a caffe bar popular with the Lay Centre residents, L’800, and had an obligatory cappuccino and cornetto.
'Holy of Holies' atop the Santa Scala
The Archbasilica of the Most Holy Savior and Sts. John the Baptist and the Evangelist at the Lateran, as it is formally named is the Cathedral of Rome, housing the cathedra of the bishop of Rome. Of all churches in Christendom, it holds a place of precedence for this reason. It was dedicated in 324 and for centuries was the primary church associated with the pope, who resided in the attached Lateran Palance. It is only relatively recently that the Vatican, with its “new” St. Peter’s Basilica and apostolic palace that the focus of the Petrine ministry has shifted across town.
Christmas market at S. Giovanni
Across the street is the Santa Scala (the Holy Stairs) which, according to pious legend, were brought to Rome by St. Helen in the early 4th century from the praetorium of Pontius Pilate in Jerusalem where Jesus stood in trial before the Roman authority that condemned him to death. They were originally placed of the Lateran palace, but moved to the current site in the late 17th century. Here they ascend to the Sancta Sanctorum (Holy of Holies), once the private chapel of popes and so-called because of the extent of the reliquary contained therein. The inscription above the chapel at the top of the holy stairs even reads non est in toto sanctior orbe locus (Nowhere in all the world is holier than this place).
Our Lady of Perpetual Help
On our way northwest to Mary Major, we stopped in at the Church of St. Anthony of Padua, titular of Cardinal Cláudio Hummes, Prefect of the Congregation for the Clergy, and then in the church of St. Alfonsus Liguori, a parish church of Rome staffed by the Redemptorists and home of the original icon of Our Lady of Perpetual Help (14th cent). While in the neighborhood we also stopped at the Basilica of Santa Prassede, but it was closed for pranzo.
St. Mary Major
The Basilica of St. Mary Major is major both because of its status as one of the papal/patriarchal basilicas, and as the largest Marian church in Rome (out of 26!). During the messy period after the Avignon papacy, it served as the papal headquarters before the Vatican became the new site. Apparently, until the post-WWII years, the papal midnight mass was always held at Santa Maria Maggiore, and only with Pius XII was it moved to St. Peter’s in 1944. This makes sense given that the relics of the manger are kept at Mary Major, and has been associated with the Nativity for centuries.
Reliquary of the "crib" of Christ's Nativity
According to pious legend, a dream of Mary appearing on the Esquiline hill prompted Pope Liberius (352-356) to trace the outline of the proposed church in the miraculous snowfall of August 5, 352 predicted in his dream – the origin of the Marian title “Our Lady of the Snows”. More likely, and consonant with archeological research at the basilica, it was built and dedicated shortly after the Council of Ephesus in 431 and its confirmation of what we now consider orthodox Christology by acknowledging Mary as Theotokos (God-bearer, Mother of God).
Providentially, the bookstore at the Pontifical Oriental Institute across the piazza opened just as we were leaving, so I was able to duck in and get a copy of the new 7th edition of Fr. Ron Roberson’s essential book, The Eastern Christian Churches, which has unfortunately not been available through Amazon.com or other online sources since it came out last year.
The Ecumenism Blog 