I woke up suitably refreshed after a good night’s sleep. We decided not have breakfast in the hotel restaurant; there were many other options nearby. Mr C settled on ‘Café on the Corner’ which we found was run by a community charity, helping people who have limited learning capabilities or difficulties. We had to wait [...]
Archive for the 'Holidays' Category
Filed under Anecdotes, Holidays, St Albans 2024
St Albans – Day Two
12 Comments CherryPie on Nov 16th 2024
Filed under Anecdotes, Holidays, St Albans 2024
The Wanderer Returns…
… from a birthday adventure
or… was it just a welcome time to chill out
12 Comments CherryPie on Nov 7th 2024
The apostles were moved, not so much by an intellectual apprehension, as by a spiritual illumination. They met men, and the need of those men whom they met cried aloud to them.
Roland Allen
20 Comments CherryPie on Nov 4th 2024
Filed under Faith Foundations, Heritage, Holidays, Rome 2024
The Holy Crib
Commissioned by Pope Pius IX (1846-78), Roman architect Virginio Vespignani built the Confessio (1861-64) in front of the Papal Altar. Vespignani used some 70 different types of marble, mostly from extractions that occurred concurrently in Rome and Ostia.
The Confessio recalls the importance of Saint Mary Major as the Bethlehem of the West and as Rome’s Basilica [...]
4 Comments CherryPie on Nov 3rd 2024
Filed under Art, Faith Foundations, Heritage, Holidays, Rome 2024
The Nativity Scene by Arnolfo Di Cambio
For many centuries, the Papal Basilica of Saint Mary Major was called Saint Mary of the Manger or The Bethlehem of the West, owing to preservation in the Basilica, sine the 7th Century, of the precious relic of the Manger of the Child Jesus (today at the relquary crypt below the Main Altar. Originally, it [...]
4 Comments CherryPie on Nov 2nd 2024
The Papal Basilica of Saint Mary Major has dominated over the city of Rome for 16 centuries as the Marian shrine par excellence and the cradle of artistic civilization. Located at the summit of the Esquiline Hill, it is one of Rome’s four Papal Basilicas. According to tradition, the Virgin Mary indicated and inspired the [...]
6 Comments CherryPie on Oct 31st 2024
