Why Rome?
Buongiorno, amici! This week in the Eternal City has been the most amazing one yet, bringing together many aspects of our Christendom education over the last two and a half years, but adding a depth and vividness that only on-site study can offer. In both Apologetics and Art and Architecture, we were able to be educated in and by the landscape of Rome, which reminded me why it was so important to come here rather than just to study the same subjects at home.
Our Art and Architecture course is a combination of classroom lectures and on-site tours, taught by Professor Elizabeth Lev. On Monday she gave us a brief overview of ancient art forms, explaining how art changed as different materials became available. Then, on Wednesday, she gave us a tour of the Coliseum, the Roman Forum, and the church of Saint Clement. Professor Lev has a gift for telling history vividly and in a way that stimulates the imagination as well as conveys facts. She explained the history of the Coliseum and the site it stands on, which formerly held an artificial lake made for Nero’s magnificent palace, and how Emperor Vespasian chose to drain the lake and build an amphitheater in its place, providing free entertainment for all of Rome. This was a brilliant example of art being used as propaganda, to solidify the position of an emperor who feared he might not be popular. Then, as we stood in the center of the Coliseum with the layers of arches rising up around us and the open sky above, she described the types of games that went on morning, noon, and evening for the people to watch, how both criminals and Christians were executed publicly in theatrical representations of mythological stories, and how a system of trap doors allowed animals and plants to be brought up and the arena transformed into scenes from faraway places. In San Clemente, Professor Lev took us down through two layers of excavations beneath the current church, showing us the older church from early Christian times and then the pagan shrine to Mithra below that. Finally, in the Forum, she pointed out the ruins of various Roman temples and government buildings, finally leading us to the place where Caesar was cremated and an altar was set up to deify him. There, she described the situation in Rome, a massive empire with stunning marble buildings in its capital and the magnificent Coliseum nearby, a place where men could become gods, and then told us how Peter and Paul arrived just then and claimed to have met God made man. It was an amazing morning, one that I struggle to find words for. The union of faith and history, and being able to stand on the very spots where the events happened, seeing the ruins and imagining how the buildings must have looked when they were still standing, got me into the minds of the ancient Romans the way nothing else can. It made me appreciate why pagan Rome was so successful for so long, but also why it was so amazing and providential that she became Christian. Walking where those people walked, and seeing even a little of what they saw, makes everything about their history much more real and memorable than even the best classroom experience can. Coming to Rome is worth it just for that tour!
In Apologetics on Thursday, Fr. Lebsock brought a guest lecturer in, a priest friend of his who is studying ecclesiology in Rome. He gave a lively lecture on the Church and how she has various aspects--the contemplative, the evangelical, the hierarchical, and the traditional--and how all these aspects are centered around Mary, who is the perfectly receptive, sinless feminine figure the Church must strive to imitate. In turn, Mary is centered on Christ, so that the Church is centered around both, and rooted firmly in divinity while still being human as well, just as Christ is. He pointed out that over-emphasizing any aspect of the Church causes us to fall into heresy and lose the richness of Catholicism, so we should strive to realize the balance of all the aspects. This lecture was very enlightening to me, since I had never thought about the Church in this way before, and I found that it helped me understand better how to explain the Church to non-believers and also how to be a part of the Church myself. Then, for the second half of class, Fr. Lebsock took us up to the roof of the Pontifical North American College where he studies, so that we could have a beautiful view of all of Rome. With St Peter’s in the foreground and the Tiber flowing by, we could see the spires of almost every church and monument in the city. Fr. Lebsock pointed out the route that St. Peter took to get to Rome, and described how he died and was buried on the site where St. Peter’s is today, and reminded us again that God intended from eternity for Rome to be the way she is, and to be the center of His Church which has now spread throughout the world. Again, I realized how blessed we all are to be in Rome and to be able to see and hear and touch the concrete realities of our history and our faith. There is nothing that could ever replace the experience of this semester, and no way to fully describe how wonderful it is.
Now that I’ve done my best to describe the indescribable, I will leave you to ponder your future trip to Rome! Even if it sounds difficult or even impossible to come here for a whole semester, it is completely worth the effort. Arrivederci!