J2A Pilgrimage to Rome - Part 3 of 6

Tuesday's adventure began with a visit to St. Paul's Within The Walls, probably the most well-known Episcopal Church in Rome.  The church was built in 1873, using architectural designs created by George Edmund Street, and it stands today hidden in the shadow of the Teatro della Opera.  We included this shot because it reflected the neighborhood around the church.

The beautiful mosaics in the church were designed by British artists Sir Edward Burne-Jones and William Morris, as well as the American artist George Breck.  This picture shows just part of the mural that celebrates the birth of Jesus Christ.

The stained glass windows around the church are amazingly gorgeous.  From the right side to the left side of the church, they tell the story of St. Paul.  This window shows the martyrdom of St. Paul, with his death by beheading at the Tre Fontane.  So why were the fans there?  Well, as luck would have it, we came to the church just as it was being prepared for a wedding that afternoon.  We eventually snuck out of the church while they were photographing the bride and the groom.

Our next stop was the church of Santa Maria della Vittoria.  The front of the church is undergoing construction (and apparently has been for a while), so we had to enter through the side entrance, which Alyson stands before in the picture.  Continuing the Angels and Demons theme from Sunday, this church was what Dan Brown used as the Fire-based Altar of Science.

The inside of the sanctuary is beautifully decorated with many religious images, focused mainly on the Virgin Mary.  The church originally started as a church dedicated to St. Paul, but it was changed to the Virgin Mary in 1620 after the Catholic victory at the Battle of White Mountain.  The church contains works by such artists as Bernini, Guercino, and Domenichino.  This picture shows a minor statue of the Virgin Mary.

We then trekked across the city to the Anglican Centre for a 12:45 PM Eucharist service and luncheon.  The Centre was founded in 1966 to build communications between the Roman Catholic Church and the Anglican Community, following a landmark meeting between Pope Paul VI and the Archbishop of Canterbury Michael Ramsey.  The Centre is located on the second floor of a museum and is rather difficult to find.  This photograph represents the first image of the Centre as you walk in: a massive library of Anglican religious literature.

Here is a picture of the sanctuary inside the Anglican Centre.  There was about 20 attendees at the service (including us), and there was a nice lunch afterwards where we got to talk with the ìregulars.î  The crowd was a mixture of retired Americans, foreign college students studying in Rome, and newly transplanted Americans.  I donít think they see a lot of pilgrimages coming through.  B)

After lunch, we worked our way back to the Trevi Fountain area, snapping photographs of fountains along the way, and stopped by The Pontifical North American College, which houses a number of Roman Catholic priests from the United States who are studying in Rome.  It was here that we picked up our tickets for the Papal General Audience for Wednesday.



We will let you know how that goes in our next update.

J2A Pilgrimage to Rome - Part 2 of 6

Our first destination on Monday was the Flavian Amphitheatre, better known as The Colosseum.  A project that took eight years and two emperors (Vespasian and Titus) to build, it would become the home to the greatest spectacles that Rome had to offer:  gladiatorial combat, naval battles, and religious executions.

This picture was taken from the area where the emperor of Rome would sit during the Colosseum events.  The bottom set of ruins represents the storage rooms and apartments built underneath the main floor of the Colosseum, which eliminated the naval battles because you could no longer flood the arena’s basement.  The crumbling white marble seats in the center of the picture showed where the Roman nobles sat during the events.  The whole Colosseum was decked out in marble when it was built, but the marble was removed and turned into limestone that was used to rebuild Rome after many of its wars.

The cross seen in this picture was erected to remember the many Christian martyrs that died within the Colosseum.  This cross was erected in the year 2000 AD, long after the final Christian was executed.  There were no memorials for the many Jewish prisoners that died building the Colosseum.

Our next stop was the Palatine, a huge hill that served as the home to many palaces of Roam patricians and emperors.  The area pictured here used to be the Circus of Domitian, a large oval track that used to host chariot races.  The columns in the ruins showed the three levels that old Roman architecture followed:  start with cement, cover with bricks, and then cover with marble.

From atop the Palatine, you could look down on the remains of the Roman Forum, which was the center of the city’s public life in ancient times.  We briefly got to visit the ruins of the Forum, but the heat exhausted us too much to continue.  By the way, despite what Shakespeare said, Julius Caesar was not killed on the steps of the Roman Forum.  (The Forum had burned down four years before Caesar’s death.)  Caesar was actually killed at the Theatre of Pompey, where we were on Sunday.

The remains of the Theatre of Pompey, as well as four Republican temples, could be found at the Largo di Torre Argentina.  The area currently serves as one of the largest no-kill cat shelters in Europe.

I don’t think where the feral cat is washing itself was the spot where Julius Caesar was executed, but it makes for a good story.












Unfortunately, the middle of Monday heralded two unpleasant events.  First, the credit card that was created specifically for this overseas pilgrimage stopped working.  Second, the service we received at the restaurant was incredibly bad.  We headed back to our hotel in the afternoon, but not before Alyson, Kinsey, and I headed out on a trek to find a post office to mail out postcards.

The trek ended up with us walking around the entire Vatican City, which is an actual country in itself.  Not many people can say they walked around an entire country during an afternoon.

We found a nearby restaurant dinner that more than washed away the unpleasant memories from lunch.

More posts to come…