Blog Archives

Favorite churches~

5/30/2012

Morning view from my apartment.

The sun is shining again. I’m off to visit two of my favorite churches in Rome, Santa Costanza and Sant’Agnese fuori le Mura. Santa Costanza is a church in the Round, just through the garden and up the hill from Sant’Angnese, which contains some catacombs.

This morning I received emails from two friends asking for prayers for difficult times they are experiencing. So off I go to light candles for them in these early Christian churches.

Santa Maria in Aracoeli: morning prayer~

5/29/2012

Aracoeli Staircase

The Italian way is to stop by a bar and order a cafe or cappucchino on the way to wherever you’re going, so that’s what I’ve been doing. This gets me out up and out early. This morning I returned to S. Maria in Aracoeli (St. Mary of the Altar in the Sky), climbing the 124 marble steps and entering by 8. No one was in this magnificent church, and let me tell you how awesome that was. Just me, the angels and God—that kind of feeling. I love this baroque looking church, which dates back to the 6th century, although you’d never know it by looking. In spite of all the décor, and my, there is plenty of it, I wasn’t distracted. Maybe it’s the time of day, my best prayer time.

My www.acottagebythesea.net blog has a slide show of the rest of my morning at the Roman Forum and on the Palatine Hill.

Amore di Dio and Santo Spirito

5/27/2012

S. Ignazio di Loyola

      Reflecting on yesterdays awesome experience hearing mass and seeing Pope Benedict in St. Peter’s Square, two Italian phrases continue to resonate with me: amore di Dio and Santo Spirito. Amore di Dio (love of God): if only we could hear and believe what that really means and then translate it into our life experiences and ways of living. Santo spirito (Holy Spirit)--the mystery of faith beyond understanding; without that part of the Trinity, I find I’m just trying to figure out God and manipulate faith and religion to my own selfish purposes.

      This morning I visited five different churches. Yes, today is Sunday, but there were more people than I had anticipated attending Mass. Pentecost Sunday? A change in direction? I’ll see how it goes next Sunday.

       A friend just asked me to light a candle for the husband of a co-worker of hers. I’m happy to do so. Just ask.

Mass of Pentecost at St. Peter's Square~

5/26/2012

Pope going right by me.

What a day. Please check acottagebythesea.net to read about my experience seeing Pope Benedict XV! and participating in the Mass of Pentecost at St. Peter’s Square.

Everything was very orderly and caring. TV monitors and loudspeakers were working, etc. But what was most satisfying was how the Mass was definitely celebrated for the people, for all the thousands gathered to participate. Particularly, I was impressed, and surprised, that communion was available to everyone. Priests circulated at the end of the rows and people went up. So did I, figuring that God was fine with it, and the Pope too busy to know.

Church on the Aventine Hill~

5/24/2012

Madona of the Intercession

Lovely churches on Aventine Hill today, lovely in and of themselves and lovely for prayer. These are out-of-the-way churches which see to be visited by people who had some commitment to the sacredness of the place.

I lit a candle in Santa Sabina and in Sant’Alessio, in front of the Byzantine Madonna of the Intercession, brought to Rome at the end of the 10th century.

Philly Airport, first stop

5/22/2012

USAirways Club

I’m at the Philly airport feeling ‘very grateful’ for this trip. On my flight from Boston I began shedding some of those judgments and ‘shoulds” and have begun my list of people to pray for during my time away. Let me know if you’d like to be on the list.

I’ve also stepped into what I call my ‘airport mode’. I try to calm every down and go with the flow, especially when it feels like an avalanche. So for all has been easy. No flight delays or other hassles.

Praying in the churches in Rome~

5/19/2012

In my www.cottagebythesea.net blog I wrote about my upcoming trip to Italy. I leave next Tuesday and will be there a month: two weeks in Rome, two nights in Assisi, one in Cortona and the rest of the time in Florence. I be traveling alone, which is my choice.

But of course, as far as I’m concerned I don’t really travel alone; I travel with God; walking, sightseeing, chatting, praying. It may sound strange, but I never feel lonely; I cherish this day-after-day time sitting in the mystery, breathing in the natural beauty, and speculating about the way of life in all the historic places I visit.

Rome boast 500 churches, many built upon previous structures; some built upon Roman basilicas, which were public buildings in ancient times. Then there are all the sixteen-century baroque churches prominent throughout the city. One of my plans is, in as many churches as I can possibly visit, to light candles for the people I pray for.

A picture of humility~

5/16/2012

Annunciation, Fra Angelico

      I collect postcards of annunciation scenes. I have quite stack of them, mainly from Italy, where you can count on finding at least one annunciation painting or fresco in every church. Although Mary’s presentation is unique in each one, there are certain standard accessories in each picture. Mary always sits or stands on the right, Angel Gabriel genuflects on the left, and a column separates the two of them. Sometimes God is depicted in the upper left hand corner; the Holy Spirit, often in the form of a dove, hovers over Mary or is in flight toward her.

    We can study each annunciation picture through the specific social, cultural, artistic and historical moment in which it was painted. For example, we might observe Mary elegantly dressed, sitting in a rich Renaissance architectural settings, looking up from her reading, with the patrons who commissioned the work kneeling before her.

   I love to study these annunciations through such intellectual lenses, but I am also drawn to the spiritual interpretations that they offer. And it is then that I am attracted to a simple Mary. My absolute favorite is the fresco by Fra Angelico at the head of the stairs to the monks’ cells at the Convent of S. Marco in Florence. Mary is in simple, peasant garb and her hands folded in front of her as she stares, in what feels like a combination of disbelief and fear, at the Angel Gabriel announcing the news.

     Isn’t that the way we feel at that moment of awareness that God’s calling to us?
      Out of disbelief: “I can’t believe, God, that you’re calling me to pray for people.”
     Out of fear: “I’m afraid I’ll let you, God, and all those people down.”
     As far as I’m concerned, the annunciation is the most humbling of all the stories in the Bible.
     “Who me?”
     “Yes you.”

God loves everyone~

5/14/2012

There was much about Mother’s Day at church yesterday—youth choirs, Gospel Choir, sermon, prayers offered. No surprise. The children gave all the women plants, the idea being that although not everyone is a mother, we all do some mothering, and we all have things to learn from the mothers we know.

Of course I was thinking about my mom and what she taught me. What I remembered, what I lifted up during Joys and Concerns, was her desire that her church become Open and Affirming. Mom knew how to cut to the quick. “We are all God’s children, and God loves everyone.”

The Presence of Absence, by Doris Grumbach

5/11/2012

How rewarding and satisfying it is to be invited into the musing of someone’s mind. While perusing the stacks at the library last week I came across Doris Grumbach’s gem of a book, “The Presence of Absence: On Prayers and Epiphany”. In this little book Grumbach ponders what public and private worship means for her faith journey. Brought up Roman Catholic, she is writing in the later years of her life, after suffering from shingles and experiencing both distance from God and longing for God. Grumbach feels the need to shed her church upbringing, which taught her that the only way to worship God was through communal worship, namely through the sacraments.

As I read, I’m cheering her on. I was brought up Protestant and am most comfortable with a personal, private relationship with God. But my Protestant church going was powerful, and, it still is. The communal worship at my current church brings us together to do God’s work in the world--no way to avoid outreach at my church. Sunday service also nourishes my personal relationship with God.

Experiencing God both communally and personally is the obvious way to go. Obvious, because, through teachings and example, that what Jesus taught us.