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!
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