A weekend in Florence!

Hello everyone! I hope all is going well back home. I'm excited to tell you a little bit about my past weekend in Florence. I was able to spend all day on Friday and Saturday there, as well as part of Sunday. I had a blast! Here are some highlights:

On Friday, we started out by doing some shopping (I bought a great scarf!) and getting familiar with the city. Our first major site was the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore. This Cathedral has a great dome that Florence is famous for. Michelangelo actually imitated this dome when he was designing the dome for St. Peter's basilica. He is known to have said "I will make it bigger, but not more beautiful." The inside of the dome in Florence is covered with beautiful images. We spent a lot of time looking up at it...until our necks were too tired! (I posted a picture of the dome above) That afternoon we were on a mission to find a Carmelite Convent where the incorrupt body of St. Teresa Margaret is kept. St. Teresa Margaret was a Carmelite nun who lived in the 18th century. She had a great devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and she is a good friend of mine. :) Her body has been miraculously preserved and has not decayed over the hundreds of years since her death. So anyway, we were on a mission to find the convent, and though it took us a while, we succeded! I ended up looking at a map for a half hour with three middle-aged italian men, going into an italian high school to ask for directions and to use the bathroom (the poor guy at the desk was really confused and gave me a shocked look), and following another man right up to the door! After all of the adventures we finally made it and were able to spend some time with St. Teresa! (you can see her picture below)

Saturday was a good day as well...we were able to go to Mass in English at the Cathedral! It was great to have Mass in English and to be there in such a beautiful Church! We also toured another famous church: Santa Maria Novella.  For some reason Florence was just really cold that weekend, so we spent a couple of hours inside a cafe drinking hot chocolate (Italian hot chocolate is VERY different from American hot chocolate by the way...its super rich...kind of like a hershey's bar melted in a cup. :) For dinner that night we picked up some groceries and cooked our own mac and cheese at our hostel. We felt like queens eating our mac and cheese, chocolate chip buns, and boxed wine. :) It was an expereince!

Sunday we saw some more of the city and climbed a HUGE bell tower where we could see all of Florence! It was beautiful (even if we had to climb 500 steps to get there). We made it back to campus for Mass and community night, which was a blast! Everyone is really beginning to bond here, and its exciting!

The week thus far has been a little rough...6 people came down with some type of flu last night and today, so we didn't have class at all. Those of us that felt fine found a lovely park not too far from here and played some ultimate frisbee with one of the deacons that hang out with us often. It was fun...yet a little odd to see such a beautiful and huge park in the middle of Rome!

Well that's all I have for now. Be sure to give me updates from back home and let me know what's been going on!

More Churches, Old Friends, and Tiramisu!

Saturday was our last day with Pasquelline. We were able to visit a couple of more churches before she left to head back to Paris. One church that we saw was called Our Lady of Victory. This church holds one of the most beautiful sculptures by Bernini of the Ecstasy of St. Theresa of Avila. We were able to study this statue there, as well as the interior of the church. The next church that we saw was the Church of St. Andrew. It had a large beautiful crucifix toward the front of the church, and it was painted white, which was unlike most the churches we have seen. The shape of the church was that of an oval, so it was very different, yet still kept the main elements of basilica structure. The last Church we saw was the Church of St. Charles of the four Fountains. This was a smaller church that seems kind of hidden because it is surrounded by large buildings. Inside it was very white and simple, differing very much from what we have seen so far. However, it was still interesting to study, and was good way to wrap up our study of the baroque architecture. Last we visited one last Palace to get a final idea of what the wealthy and honored people would have lived in at the time. In short, their lives would have been VERY comfortable and VERY luxurious.

That evening, we met up with a priest from the Bismarck diocese (Fr. Schneider) who is currently studying here in Rome. He took us out to a great pizza place in Trastevere and we were able to catch up with him a little. He is actually on his way back to ND this week for a month to help out with some liturgy stuff, so you might see him around!

Sunday was a day off, and I spent I with a friend (Sr. Julie), who is originally from Bismarck, but has lived in Rome for the last few years. She actually recently moved to Turkey, but was back in Rome for a while, so we were able to catch up. We attended the Angelus with Benedict XVI in St. Peter’s square and I was able to get another blessing and speech from him. J We spend the afternoon looking at some different churches and walking through a park. We saw a beautiful monastery that seemed very old…it was almost like I was living in the Middle Ages as I was looking at the cold damp walls and listening to the monks chant the Divine Office. It was beautiful, and I don’t think I’ll forget it! In the evening, we had community night again, so we had Mass and a loud and happy dinner with the community and some friends. We met our chaplain that evening too, who is a very talkative Australian priest! I think he’ll be a lot of fun…only it was sometimes tough to get him to stop talking to we could eat!

Monday and Tuesday were our first normal days of classes…so only 3 hours of class! I think I’m going to like all of the classes and I don’t think they are going to be too hard. I’m definitely going to learn a lot from Kathleen’s class about monasticism and the Benedictine order, so I’m excited for that. Yesterday we also explored the campus grounds some more and discovered that we really live right next to a farm that reminds me of typical Italian countryside that you’d see in a picture. Tonight we tried making tiramisu on our own for the first time, so we will see how it turns out. We are waiting for it to finish setting as I’m typing.  I’ll let you know how it turns out!

I hope all is well back home. I look forward to hearing updates from all of you…I feel a bit disconnected from the US at times when I’m here, so please keep me posted! Have a great day!

Another (rather long) update...

I hope everything is goign well back in ND as well. I miss you all!

Hey everyone! Here is a quick review of the last few days:

Wednesday we toured the Fernesi Villa. This palace was adorned an all walls and ceilings with beautiful frescos and architecture. Even the bedroom was filled from the floor to the ceiling with paintings. It reminded me of something out of Pride and Prejudice or something, even though that wasn’t in Rome. It definitely was meant for wealthy and important people!

We saw the Spanish Steps also. The square there is always busy with lots of people, so it’s a bit chaotic, but fun. We didn’t spend too much time there, but I’m sure we will be back. I hear that the Church at the top of the steps has the most beautiful Vespers in the evening (Vespers is the evening prayer of the Divine Office).

Last, we toured the Church of St. Mary over Minerva. (Santa Maria sopra Minerva). Again, this was another beautiful church with lots of symbolism. It is the only completely Gothic church in Rome. St. Catherine of Sienna is buried there, right under the altar. As she is one of my favorite saints, it was exciting to be able to see this church right away.

Thursday we studied a bit in Piazza Navona, a very famous Piazza in Rome. It wasn’t quite as busy as usual, though there was still some vendors and musicians and a small corwd. There is a large fountain in the middle that was sculpted by Bernini which represents the four major rivers of the time. It was beautiful and we took a good amount of time to study it.

We visited the Church of the Gesu next. This church is really called the Church of the Most Holy Name of Jesus, but just Gesu for short. This is one of the most famous churches in Rome. It is a Jesuit church, and the Jesuits still take care of it. The founder of the Jesuit order, St. Ignatius of Antioch is buried there. This church is probably one of my favorites, with the beautiful marble and baroque architecture. There are also many times for confession there in different languages. I would really like to make it there for confession and hopefully Mass a few times.

The next church we saw was the church of St. Ignatius. This was another beautiful church, with similar architecture. This church contains an enormous fresco on the ceiling of St. Ignatius being welcomed into heaven. There are a couple of popular saints buried here also, including St. Francis Xavier. Last we saw the Trevi fountain. This was very busy, as we got there as is was getting dark. It was good to see again and learn a little more about the architecture. We got some good pictures and stayed for a bit.

Yesterday was my favorite day so far...so I want to give you a good explanation of it!

We started it off by going to one of the most famous museums in the world…the Borghese Museum here in Rome. This museum has a great history and was certainly my favorite museum so far. Some of my favorite sculptures:

The Rape of Persephone, David, and Apollo and Daphne.  If you google them you can get good pictures of them and understand why they are so famous! They are very realistic and beautiful. To imagine that the sculptures started out as just a large block of marble is amazing. Michelangelo used to say that the image was in the sculpture, and he was just searching for it as he did the sculpting. He used to get upset because he wanted the figures to come to life! But as I stood underneath them, I was almost expecting them to come to life as well!

After this, we made our way to the Sistine Chapel. Somehow, someway, father Shea arranged a PRIVATE tour of the Sistine Chapel for our group. If you’ve ever been there, you know that it’s always completely packed and it’s hard to move around at all. The whole experience becomes something not as sacred when it’s so loud and there is so much commotion. So to get a private tour is something very special and very rare. However, we almost missed it! After the Borghese, we ended up waiting a long time for the bus and got behind schedule as we were trying to make our way across the city of Rome. After we got off the metro we literally sprinted for a couple of blocks and up at least a hundred stairs to get to our appointment only two minutes before they would have closed the doors on us! But we did make it…somehow. I guess we all knew what was a stake.

Once we were in we saw the beautiful Raphael rooms..I’ve always loved the images of The School of Athens and The Exultation of the Eucharist. Like I said, the whole experience was very sacred and beautiful being there so alone. After these rooms, we entered the Sistine chapel.  It was a completely different experience than what I had before because we were alone. We had a few minutes of silence before Pasquelline started to tell us about the works. During this silence you could really hear a pin drop. To be where thousands of cardinals had been, and many popes have been elected, and even many saints had walked was amazing. All the while the world is finding out that John Paul II, who was elected pope in that very room, is going to be beatified this year. Who knows why I was blessed with such an experience, but I’m so grateful!

After the chapel we headed to dinner with some campus friends, including a seminarian that I knew from Bismarck! It was a very loud, very huge, very delicious, very Italian dinner at a nearby restaurant. It was a perfect ending to a great day!

Another update!

Hey everyone!

I finally got around to posting another update. It's been tough to find the time...these first couple of weeks are pratty intense and don't follow our normal schedule. Instead of our regular schedule that we will have with just 3 hours of class, for now we are pretty much in class from after breakfast until supper. Crazy! But here you go:

First of all, I realized I've been forgetting to mention the deacons that we met here! On the second day we were here, a couple of American deacons (who will be ordained priests this summer) came to campus and gave us an italian lesson. They are going to be at our campus at least twice a week to help out and just hang out. They are both a lot of fun! They remind me of some of the young priests from back in Bismarck, which is a nice reminder of home. I just thought I better mention them, because we've already spent a few days with them, and they remind me of all of you back home!

On Saturday we started with the Roman Forum. This was the center of religious and political life in ancient Rome. We really got to understand what the forum really meant back then, and with a good imagination, it almost seemed like you were in the middle of a magnificent part of history with large basilicas, temples, and pillars all around! Pasqueline did a wonderful job explaining the architecture also. I have never appreciated the forum more, even though I’ve learned about it and seen it all before! After the forum, we made our way up Palatine hill (another great hill in Rome, next to Capitaline hill). There we saw the house of Augustus, a great emperor.  His house was not as big as I was expecting, which was interesting. Some of the original painting on the wall was still there, which is rare, so it was great to see. The palatine hill had some beautiful trees full of oranges and such in some gardens. We didn’t have time to go inside, but it was beautiful to see from the outside. We met at Constantine’s Arch and Pasqueline was able to explain in great detail the different parts of the structure.So Majestic! Next, we walked to some of the Roman Baths…the “Thermae di Caracalla.” I could not believe how huge they were! The baths were public places where the Romans would come to clean themselves and then enjoy a bath in a swimming pool. They entered through a room and first undressed, entered another room to exercise, and then entered a series of hot and cold rooms for a time before the slaves would clean their skin. After they were clean, the Romans would head to the pool and relax, mingle, and swim. There were large gardens outside of the baths where people could come to visit also. I was most surprised by the size…you could fit all of Kirkwood mall in the baths! And back then it would have been covered in marble with large arches everywhere, and it MUST have been a sight. We went to the Pantheon last, which was awesome. There is no dome like that in the world. It used to be a temple dedicated to all gods ( a pagan temple) but was given to the pope in the 6^th century, who dedicated it to all early Christian martyrs. There were many alters and marble all around…it was beautiful!

Sunday we had a free day, so a few of us went to St. Peter’s square in the morning. We were able to see the pope!! It was very exciting. Every Sunday he greets the crowd in the square and prays the Angelus with them at noon. So we got so see him greet us (he even spoke a little bit in English) and pray with us. When he was speaking English, he told us to “open wide the doors of your heart to Christ.” It was beautiful. Then he gave us his papal blessing! After the meeting with the pope, we got some coffee and lunch, and then went back to the square and enjoyed the afternoon. We just sat by the pillars in the arms of the square of St. Peter’s.  There was a light breeze, warm rays from the sun (we even were able to take our coats off for a bit!), and I was reading a book on the Church Fathers.  I have always wanted to spend a leisurely afternoon like this in the square, and now that I have it was even better than I thought. And I will be able to do it many more times, I’m sure. That night we had our first community night, which includes Mass, a social, some games, and a big meal with all of the students and some guests. We will have them every Sunday night from now on.

Monday we were back to touring all day again. The first church we saw was the church of St. Clement. This was an interesting church because it consists of a medieval  church which is build on top of an older church, which is build on top of an ancient home. We were able to visit all three levels. We spend a lot of time focusing on the mosaics on the top level, which was wonderful. We learned all about the symbolism of mosaics. You can find some great pictures of this church online. Next, we visited another church that I can't find the name of at the moment. This church was also filled with beautiful mosaics, including a beautiful one in the apse. There was a chapel off to the side in this church, which was breathtaking. It was covered in mosaics. Now the mosaics only cover the ceiling and half way down the wall, but when it was built the mosaics would have reached all the way to the floor. The little pieces of the mosaic were aligned in and uneven manner in order to catch more of the light and reflect it in a more brilliant way. In the same chapel was the pillar that was used at Christ's scourging.  Last, we visited the church of St. Mary Major. This is one of the four major basilicas of Rome. It was exquisite, of course. The front and sides are covered with symbolic mosaics. The ceiling is completely covered in gold (said to be from the first gold that Columbus brought over from the new world) and even the floor is beautiful.  The bottom or the church contains the manger that Christ slept in!

Today we toured St. Peter's Basilica and part of the Vatican Museums. Everytime I enter St. Peter's it takes my breath away, no matter how many times I've seen it. I always feel perfectly at home there, and perfectly content. Pasquelline described many of the different sculptures and mosaics. I can't even begin to describe it, it's one of those things you just have to expeience. I plan to spend much of my time here in Rome in St. Peter's, the home to all Catholics. :) The Vatican museums were also wonderful. Again, there is just so much that I can't really being to describe them. I never knew how huge the museums really were! They were awesome though. We saw some very famous sculptings and paintings, including some from Da Vinci, Raphael, and Michelangelo. If you ever have time, its fascinating to look at pictures and read about the Vatican churches and museums.

Well that's it for now. I hope everything is going well back there! God bless!

Abbey

PS- I apologize for the spelling errors in my posts. I sometimes write these in a hurry, and make mistakes. Thanks for your patience with me!

First couple of days in Roma...

Hello Everyone!
I hope everything is going well back in America. Things are going wonderfully in Rome! Here is a brief overview of our past couple of days:
On Thursday we had a brief introduction to the city of Rome! After some opening comments and some important campus information given by Miss Crane, we had a quick pranzo (lunch)? And then headed into town after a break. We first headed to San Pietro (St. Peter's) and saw the beauty of the basilica at night. It was all lit up and had a large nativity scene and Christmas tree outside. The tree was almost as tall as the obelisk in the square! It was lovely. :) The lights in il Papa’s (Pope Benedict the XVI formally, but il Papa once you get to know him ;) bedroom and office were on, so we knew he was awake! It was so wonderful to be that close to the holy father again. Next we headed to the church of the Most Holy Name of Jesus, or "Giano" for short. There we attended Mass which was wonderful (though it was all in Italian), and got a chance to look around the church. St. Ignatius of Loyola is buried there…he is the founder of the Jesuit order. It was a powerful expereince. We were able to pray right in front of the place where he is buried! Next, we headed down to trestevere, a very quaint and domestic little part of Rome with winding streets and large crowds! We ate at a great pizzeria (a place where pizza is served, of course) and then headed back to campus. We learned so much about the bus and metro system, and I feel like I understand the layout of Rome much better. With a good map and a few minds working together, I think that a group of us should be able to get around the city alright. :)
Today was another exciting day with the start of classes. This week and next week we are going to focus on art history alone, learning from a lady named Pascaline who works at the Louvre in Paris. She is here for the week taking us around Rome and showing us the diifferent art and architecture. After an introductory class for a few hours this morning, we headed out into the city to see some of the sites. We started with the Colosseum and were able to see the inside and out. The archietecture and history of it was explained very well to us by Pascaline.  It seemed like we could have spent a whole day there- it was so interesting! I'm glad we had an explaniation of everything, as things seemed to be much more alive when I understood it better. After the Colosseum, we headed to a museum on top of the Capitoline hill. This is the hill where Rome was first begun by Romulus, as legend has it. The square on top of the hill was designed by Michelangelo, and the buildings there were wonderful to study. Two of them serve as a museum, and the third still serves as Rome's 'city hall' today. The museums were filled with magnificent roman sculpures and mosaics. We were able to study very famous works of art there with the guidance of Pascaline.  If you are ever bored, you can look up some of the works online. I don't know the official names, but I can give you subjects of some of my favorite pieces: Equestrian sculpture of Marcus Aurelius, "The dying Gaul," The she-wolf nursing Romulus and Raemus, and sculpture of a greek goddess Venus. There was much much more, but these are just some highlights. 
After dinner tonight I was given a couple of surprises for my birthday! We were all able to enjoy a platter of different pastires for dessert and I of course got to listen to everyone sing to me. Kathleen, the director of the campus, gave me some Jane Austen coasters  as a gift, which is super exciting! We both love Jane Austen, and I plan on reading some of her works while I'm here. Kathleen keeps a bunch of them in the library here of us to read. :) After dinner a few of us went out for some gelato and vino (wine), to celebrate.  
Everyone is still adjusting to the time change, and so is still a bit tired. I have been doing pretty well though, which I'm grateful for. Tomorrow is another big day, with a tour of the Pantheon, the Roman Forum, and a couple of other sights on the agenda. I'll keep you all posted! Have a great night!

Finally Here!

We made it to Rome! It's been quite the trip, though! We left Bismarck on Monday, and flew to Chicago. We began our flight to Frankfurt, Germany from Chicago, but about an hour and a half into the flight, the pilot announced that we would be making an emergency landing in Toronto. We never really knew why (all that they told us was that some radio signals were not working). But we heard that somehow it was on CNN...so we got the full story today. It's quite amusing actually, and it involves coffee! You should check it out: (It's on the list of their top stories!) http://edition.cnn.com/2011/TRAVEL/01/05/canada.flight.diverted/index.html?hpt=T2

Amusing, but it did delay our arrival in Rome a day and a half. But we made due. :) We ended up flying back to Chicago and getting a Hilton hotel voucher for the night. The rooms were really nice and it was good to get a few hours of good sleep. We got to sleep around 5:30 am and slept soundly! The next day we caught another flight to Frankfurt at about 4:00pm. This time we arrived safely in Germany. :) However, it was another headache to find our flight to Rome! The German language barrier was dificult to get around, and we found out that we were not booked in the next flight to Rome like we were supposed to be. We ended up wandering around the airport asking for help and talking to different people for a few hours before things were figured out. But we finally got on a flight out and left Germany at about 4:45pm (that's German time....so 9:45am in ND). It was kind of fun to spend the day in Germany after things were figured out, anyway, and hopefully we didn't look so lost anymore!
When I stepped off the plane, I could just smell and feel that I was in Rome. It felt just like it did the first time I was here! The air is much more damp here than back home. The campus is beautiful and very nice. Everything was ready for us and the sisters were waiting. They are so joyful! We had a great dinner and a quick gelato run before we came back to campus to unpack and settle in for the night.
I'll have to fill you in more on the campus later...it's almost midnight here and I'm exhausted! But in a good way, of course! I hope everything is going well in America, and I'll talk to you all soon!