Day 7 - Tuesday, April 18
We started the day with a guided tour of the Roman Forum & Colosseum. We then made our way to a few nearby churches where the students were able to sing.
Where We Went
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Roman Forum
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The Colosseum
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Mamertine Prison
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Church of St. Mary of the Mounts
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Basilica of St. Peter in Chains
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Church of St. Alphonsus Liguori
1. Roman Forum
The Forum, the very heart of Rome, the spot round which centred so many world-stirring events for a period of a thousand years, is now a scene of desolation; its temples are fallen, its pagan sanctuaries have crumbled into dust; its basilicas, colonnades, rostra, monuments lie scattered on the ground, which is cumbered with heaps of broken shafts, fragments of marble capitals and cornices, and masses of shapeless brickwork; only here and there a few shattered porticoes are left, helping us to form some imperfect idea of what this great centre of the civic life of ancient Rome was in the flourishing days of the Empire.
St. Fulgentius, of Carthage, who came to visit the tombs of the Apostles in A.D. 500, happened to pass through the Forum at the time when Theodoric, then King of Italy, seated on a high throne adorned with regal splendour, was receiving the homage of the Senate. The sight of all the grandeur and magnificence there displayed made such an impression on the Saint that he exclaimed: “ Ah, how beautiful must be the heavenly Jerusalem if earthly Rome is so glorious!"
The remains of the Roman Forum
Remains of the Temple of Castor and Pollux
The Arch of Titus
2. The Colosseum
If every part of the soil of Rome is sacred, because reddened with the blood of martyrs, that of the Colosseum is especially holy. The colossal pile before us, “which for magnitude can only be compared to the pyramids of Egypt, and which is perhaps the most striking monument at once of the material and moral degradation of Rome under the Empire,” was commenced by the Emperor Vespasian in A.D. 72, and finished by his son Titus in A.D. 80. The captive Jews, led in chains to Rome after the destruction of Jerusalem, were employed on its construction.
“ We who wander among the ruined arches of the Colosseum,” says Father Anderdon, S.J., " find a difficulty in picturing to the imagination what it was in the days of its splendor.
In the arena, where we are standing, Christian martyrs have knelt with their eyes fixed on the ground, while some 80,000 spectators awaited with impatience the shedding of their blood, and yelled in maddening excitement, “ The Christians to the lions!” Tender virgins, youths, boys of noble aspect, and aged priests, have stood here with their eyes raised to heaven, fearless in the midst of that sea of human passions, undismayed by the roars of the savage beasts that were pacing their dens close by.
All of the Holy Martyrs of the Colosseum - Pray for us!
Exterior
Interior
Faithful and accurate reconstruction of the Colosseum approved by archaeologists.
3. The Mamertine Prison
Italian: Carcere Mamertino
This terrible prison consists of two subterranean chambers or dungeons one below the other, “with only one round in the center of each vault, through which alone light, air, food, and men could pass. When the upper story was full, we may imagine how much light and air could reach the lower. No other means of ventilation, drainage, or access existed. The walls, of large stone blocks, had rings fastened into them for securing the prisoners, but many used to be laid on the floor with their feet fastened in stocks." Originally the only access to each dungeon was by a small aperture in the center of each vault, through which the prisoners were let down by ropes. Sallust describes it as a dark, filthy, frightful den, twelve feet underground, walled in, and covered with massive stones.
SS. Peter and Paul were cast into this lower dungeon during the persecution of Nero, A.D. 65 or 66, and are said to have lain here eight or nine months, bound with chains to the wall. It would be hard to imagine a spot more appalling at the time the Apostles entered it; the thick darkness, the fetid atmosphere, the accretions of filth, the dampness, the intense cold, the tragic associations of the place, must have made confinement in it worse than death.
According to the acts of SS. Processus and Martinianus (the authenticity of which is questioned ) and to the lessons of the Roman Breviary, July 2, the Apostles here converted Processus and Martinianus, captains of the guard, with forty-seven fellow prisoners. There being no water wherewith to administer Baptism, St. Peter by his prayer unlocked a miraculous source which continues flowing to the present day.
Praying in the upper dungeon of the prison
Exterior of the prison
Lower dungeon where SS. Peter & Paul were kept
4. Church of St. Mary of the Mounts
Italian: Chiesa di Santa Maria ai Monti
In a small house, No. 3, Via dei Serpenti, died St. Benedict Joseph Labre, the holy mendicant, on April 16, 1783. His favourite church was the neighbouring one of S. Maria ai Monti, and there, as he knelt before the Blessed Sacrament on the day mentioned, he felt that his end was near. Rising, he staggered to the church door, and unable to proceed further, sat down on the doorsteps, where his agony began. A kind friend, who happened to be passing, took compassion on him and carried him to his own house near the church, where the Saint breathed forth his pure soul to God that same evening at the early age of thirty-four years.
He was born in the diocese of Boulogne, France, in 1748, of pious parents and in easy circumstances. A saint from his childhood, his one desire was to consecrate himself to God in some austere Religious Order, and he became a novice first of the Carthusians, then of the Trappists, but in both cases was compelled to leave because of his frail constitution. In the world he resolved to lead a life of absolute poverty and severe penance; so, renouncing his home and the comforts of life, he wandered through Europe as a mendicant pilgrim from, sanctuary to sanctuary, living on the scraps of food that were given him as alms, and sleeping on the bare ground. In 1777 he came to Rome, never to leave it up to the time of his death, except for an annual pilgrimage to Loreto. His time was spent in prayer in the different churches of the Holy City (chiefly in the Gesù and S. Maria ai Monti) and in works of charity to the poor, for whom he begged alms, whose children he catechized, and whom he taught by his holy example to bear with resignation their hard lot. At night he retired for a short rest to some church porch, but more frequently to the Colosseum, where he was favoured with heavenly visions. He was canonized by Pope Leo XIII in 1881, and his shrine is placed in his favourite Church of S. Maria ai Monti.
Notable relics in this basilica
St. Benedict Joseph Labre
Singing in front of the tomb of St. Benedict Joseph Labre
Interior of the church
Exterior of the church
5. Basilica of Saint Peter in Chains
Italian: Basilica di San Pietro in Vincoli
This beautiful church was built in 442, during the Pontificate of St. Leo the Great, by Eudoxia Licinia, daughter of Theodosius the Younger, and wife of Valentinian III; hence it is called the Eudoxian Basilica. She here placed the chain with which St. Peter had been bound in prison at Jerusalem, brought from the East by her mother Eudoxia Athenais.3 Another chain of the Apostle was already venerated in Rome, that with which he had been fettered in the Mamertine prison. St. Leo the Great united the two, forming one continuous chain about two yards long. This precious relic is preserved in a bronze safe under the custody of a special confraternity.
Some say that the two chains united miraculously in the Pontificate of St. Sixtus III.
Notable relics in this basilica
St. Peter's chains
Praying in front of St. Peter's chains
Moses (Michelangelo)
Exterior of the basilica
5. Church of Saint Alphonsus Liguori
Italian: Chiesa di Sant'Alfonso di Liguori all'Esquilino
Close to S. Prassede, at the entrance of the Via Merulana, stands the Church of S. Alfonso (St. Alphonsus de Liguori), a modern Gothic building belonging to the Redemptorist Fathers.
The church was built in 1855 near the site of the ancient Church of S. Matteo in Merulana belonging to the Austin Friars, which was consecrated by Paschal II (about A.D. 1 100) and reduced to a heap of ruins by the French in 1810. In the Church of S. Matteo, the famous picture of Our Lady of Perpetual Succour, brought from the East in the thirteenth century, had been greatly honoured since the year 1499. An Austin Friar named Brother Orsetti hid the picture when he and his community were driven from S. Matteo, and at his death in 1853 he bequeathed it to another. In 1866, with the express will and consent of Pope Pius IX, the miraculous picture was placed in the Church of S. Alfonso, where it is greatly revered, and where numerous ex-votos attest the miraculous favours received.
Notable sights in this basilica
The original image of Our Lady of Perpetual Help
ICA Student Choir sings Christus factus est and the Regina Coeli in front of the original image of Our Lady of Perpetual Help
Exterior of the church
Interior of the church