Monthly Archives: February 2018

THE BONES OF ST. PETER, A ROMAN CITY OF THE DEAD AND A SCAVI TOUR – by Deacon Marty McIndoe

Church, Holy Orders, Relics, Saints

The tomb of St. Peter under St. Peter’s Basilica, Rome

On February 22nd the Church celebrates “The Chair of Peter” which looks at the gift that Jesus gave us in St. Peter and his successors. Symbolically “The Chair of Peter” represents the position of authority and leadership and pasturing that comes to us from the Pope. Physically there is a wooden chair that has been encased in a Bronze sculpture in 1666 by Gian Lorenzo Bernini that is believed to be the chair that St. Peter sat in. It is in the apse of St Peter’s in Rome behind the main altar. It is quite visible and readily seen. What you can’t easily see is the treasure that is buried directly underneath the main altar of St. Peter’s. There you will find the actual bones of St. Peter himself.
The only way you can really see these bones is by going on a SCAVI tour underneath St. Peter’s. I was fortunate to be able to go on the tour on one of my trips to Rome. The tour is absolutely fabulous. It takes you below the present St. Peter’s and below the original St. Peter’s built by the Emperor Constantine in 326. On this tour you go through an ancient Roman Necropolis (city of the dead) and finally to the actual tomb of St. Peter (and early monuments built there in the first and second centuries). Most people do not know that the original St. Peter’s was built on top of a Roman Necropolis and then the present St. Peter’s was built on top of the foundations of the original one. Excavations and archeological digs during the 1900’s uncovered the Necropolis and the tomb of St. Peter.
St. Peter was martyred in Caligula’s Circle in 64ad in Rome. His body was buried nearby on Vatican Hill and early Christians venerated the site by building small memorials and a place to celebrate the Eucharist. It was fairly easy for them to hide this (the Roman’s persecuted the Christians for 2 to 3 centuries) because it was small and within a Roman Necropolis. The Necropolis consisted of above ground Mausoleum’ separated by streets and alleys. The Mausoleum’s were large enough to allow the Romans to put their loved one’s remains (after being cremated) in jars on shelves in the room. The relatives would often gather in the room to honor the dead. The early Christians would not allow cremation and always buried their loved ones in the ground. St. Peter was buried in a tomb underground. The monuments were built above that.
When the Emperor Constantine became a Christian he ordered the Roman Necropolis to be filled in with dirt and a Christian Basilica be built there so that the main altar was directly over the venerated grave of St. Peter. This was the original St. Peter’s Basilica built beginning in 326. Several modifications were made to the basilica between the 7th and 12th centuries but all of these modifications kept the main altar directly over the grave of St. Peter. The present day St. Peter’s Basilica, the largest church in the world, was begun on 18 April 1506 and was completed on 18 November 1626. It is the work of the best of the Renaissance artists. After taking down the original St. Peter’s, but leaving its floor and some foundations and columns, it was built on top and past the original size of the first St. Peter’s. It too was made to have the main altar stand over the very grave of St. Peter.
When starting on the SCAVI tour you go to the lower St. Peter’s and see some of the floor and columns of the original St. Peter’s. You then go under the floor of the church built in 326 in to excavations of the Roman Necropolis. It is amazing to see these streets and alleys and Mausoleums in such great conditions after more than 1600 years. You can even see rain marks in the original soil streets. When Constantine had the Necropolis filled in with dirt, it protected these. We walked in to several of the ancient Roman Mausoleums and saw paintings inside and the shelves where the remains of the Romans were. You could almost picture the families gathering inside (sometimes even sharing a meal there) in honoring their dead. We then proceeded to the place of the tomb of St. Peter. On the way we saw many graves of early Popes and Cardinals who wanted to be buried near St. Peter. There is a small early chapel there and the monuments built in the first centuries. When you come to the place of the burial of St. Peter there is a wall there with ancient Graffiti written by an early Christian that says, “Peter is Here”.
Because there was a time when the Basilica was under attack, the Church leaders took the bones of St. Peter out of his original grave and placed them inside a nearby wall. This was done to protect the bones so they would not be taken. On the tour itself you can see the bones inside a Plexiglas case that our tour guide told us was made especially for them by the US Army (I haven’t been able to verify that). For me, visiting the tomb of St. Peter and seeing his bones was a very emotional and spiritual high. I hope you get a chance to experience that too. These are the bones of the man that Jesus chose to head His Church.
I would highly recommend you do the SCAVI tour if you go to Rome. Tickets are limited and you must contact the Vatican office for them. If you would like to take a virtual tour of the Necropolis and the Tomb of St. Peter, click here: SCAVI tour and on the top right click EN, unless your Italian is good.

 

Mary’s House, Stations of the Cross and Visions – by Deacon Marty McIndoe

Blessed Virgin Mary, Church, Jewish roots, Liturgy, Miracles, Mystics, Prayer, Saints, Spirituality, The Holy Land

Mary’s House in Ephesus

We find the Stations of the Cross in just about every Catholic Church. Walking and praying the Stations of the Cross has been a popular Catholic devotion from the earliest of times. It is especially popular during the season of Lent. Did you know that the first Stations of the Cross were made by the Blessed Virgin Mary and that what we have today followed the pattern that she set up 2000 years ago? Our earliest traditions tell us that St. John took the Blessed Virgin Mary out of Jerusalem to Ephesus to protect her from the dangers in Jerusalem. Tradition tells us that Mary, after Jesus’ ascension used to walk the path that He had walked on His way to the Cross. When she moved out of Jerusalem she could no longer walk on that very path.
St. John built for her a House on a hill just outside of Ephesus (modern day Turkey). I was fortunate to be able to visit that home and it was an earthshaking spiritual experience for me. When Mary lived there she decided to walk out a path remembering the way of the cross that Jesus and she walked in Jerusalem. She set up stones and markings on trees to commemorate Jesus’ walk. Mary would walk along that path with its Stations of the Cross just like she had walked it on the actual streets that Jesus had walked. It was a special devotion for her.
One of the Church’s modern mystics and visionaries was Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich who was born in 1774 and died in 1824. She had numerous visions of Jesus and Mary and in her writings she recalled her visions, “Behind the house, at a little distance up the hill, the Blessed Virgin had made a kind of Way of the Cross. When she was living in Jerusalem, she had never failed, ever since Our Lord’s death, to follow His path to Calvary with tears of compassion. She had paced out and measured all the distances between the Stations of that Via Crucis, and her love for her Son made her unable to live without this constant contemplation of His sufferings. Soon after her arrival at her new home [in Ephesus] I saw her every day climbing part of the way up the hill behind her house to carry out this devotion. At first she went by herself, measuring the number of steps, so often counted by her, which separated the places of Our Lord’s different sufferings. At each of these places she put up a stone, or, if there was already a tree there, she made a mark upon it. The way led into a wood, and upon a hill in this wood she had marked the place of Calvary, and the grave of Christ in a little cave in another hill. After she had marked this Way of the Cross with twelve Stations, she went there with her maidservant in quiet meditation: at each Station they sat down and renewed the mystery of its significance in their hearts, praising the Lord for His love with tears of compassion. Afterwards she arranged the Stations better, and I saw her inscribing on the stones the meaning of each Station, the number of paces and so forth. I saw, too, that she cleaned out the cave of the Holy Sepulcher and made it a place for prayer. At that time I saw no picture and no fixed cross to designate the Stations, nothing but plain memorial stones with inscriptions, but afterwards, as the result of constant visits and attention, I saw the place becoming increasingly beautiful and easy of approach. After the Blessed Virgin’s death I saw this Way of the Cross being visited by Christians, who threw themselves down and kissed the ground.”
Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich’s writings were published about 50 years after her death. At that time Mary’s House in Ephesus was unknown to the western world. Two priests, Fr. Julien Gouyet and Fr. Eugène Poulin were so intrigued by the descriptions of Mary’s house in Emmerich’s writings that they went in search of it. The house was found using the descriptions from the visions. It was located in the center of old ruins of a monastery. The foundation of the house dated to the first century and Hebrew inscriptions were found on its stones. Even the hearth was located at the exact location of Emmerich’s visions. Although unknown to the western world, the locals celebrated the place for as long back as they could remember. They called the place “Panaghia-Capouli” which meant “The Door of the Holiest.” Perhaps more remarkable to us today is the fact that the locals had an annual pilgrimage that took place each year on August 15th, which was not declared the Feast of the Assumption of the Immaculate Virgin Mary until 1950. Today, some use the name “Panaya Kapulu” to describe the house on the hillside. Even though the majority of the locals are Muslims, they continue to celebrate and honor Mary there.
Our local guide told us that about ten years ago there was a terrible brush fire on the mountain where Mary’s house is. They said that the town people (Muslims) gathered to protect Mary’s house from the fire, even leaving their own houses in harms way. Fortunately they were successful.
I hope that each Friday of Lent you are able to pray the Stations of the Cross. When you do, say a special thank you prayer to Our Lady.

NOTE: There are several traditions about Mary’s house and about the location of her Assumption.  The Church has not ruled on this.

THE FOURTEEN STATIONS OF THE CROSS

1. Jesus is condemned to death
2. Jesus takes up his Cross
3. Jesus falls for the first time
4. The Virgin Mary meets Jesus
5. Simon of Cyrene is made to help Jesus bear the Cross
6. Veronica wipes the face of Jesus
7. Jesus falls for the second time
8. Jesus meets the women of Jerusalem
9. Jesus falls for the third time
10. Jesus is stripped of his garments
11. Jesus is crucified
12. Jesus dies on the Cross
13. Jesus is taken down from the Cross and laid in the arms of Mary
14. Jesus is laid in the tomb

In God We Trust – by Andy Rooney

Godly Patriotism, Jewish roots, Scripture, Uncategorized

    Andy Rooney

DID YOU KNOW?
As you walk up the steps to the building which houses the U.S. Supreme Court you can see near the top of the building a row of the world’s law givers and each one is facing one in the middle who is facing forward with a full frontal view it is Moses and he is holding the Ten Commandments.

 

DID YOU KNOW?
As you enter the Supreme Court courtroom, the two huge oak doors have the Ten Commandments engraved on each lower portion of each door.

 

DID YOU KNOW?
As you sit inside the courtroom, you can see the wall, right above where the Supreme Court judges sit, a display of the Ten Commandments!

 

DID YOU KNOW?
There are Bible verses etched in stone all over the Federal Buildings and Monuments in Washington, D.C.

 

DID YOU KNOW?
James Madison, the fourth president, known as “The Father of Our Constitution” made the following statement:
“We have staked the whole of all our political institutions upon the capacity of mankind for self-government, upon the capacity of each and all of us to govern ourselves, to control ourselves, to sustain ourselves according to the Ten Commandments of God.”

DID YOU KNOW?
Patrick Henry, that patriot and Founding Father of our country said:
“It cannot be emphasized too strongly or too often that this great nation was founded not by religionists but by Christians, not on religions but on the Gospel of Jesus Christ”.

DID YOU KNOW?
Every session of Congress begins with a prayer by a paid preacher, whose salary has been paid by the taxpayer since 1777.

DID YOU KNOW?
Fifty-two of the 55 founders of the Constitution were members of the established orthodox churches in the colonies.

DID YOU KNOW?
Thomas Jefferson worried that the Courts would overstep their authority and instead of interpreting the law would begin making law an oligarchy.

DID YOU KNOW?
The very first Supreme Court Justice, John Jay, said:
“Americans should select and prefer Christians as their rulers.”
How, then, have we gotten to the point that everything we have done for 220 years in this country is now suddenly wrong and unconstitutional?
Lets put it around the world and let the world see and remember what this great country was built on.

It is said that 86% of Americans believe in God. Therefore, it is very hard to understand why there is such a mess about having the Ten Commandments on display or “In God We Trust” on our money and having God in the Pledge of Allegiance. Why DO WE LET THE 14% DICTATE WHAT WE SAY AND DO???!!!