The Papal City

Excuse my penchant for pointing out the obvious, but this is a point that is ever increasingly badgering me. Rome is the city of the popes! The testimony of Rome, the eternal city, is to those who produced her: the popes! Why is it that we remember the Michelangelo's, Rafael's, Bernini's, Caravaggio's, Titian's and Fra Angelico's and do not acknowledge with at least a fraction of the awe and gratitude those who commissioned them. It seems to me a great oversight, and, particularly in Rome, woeful ignorance.

Why everywhere you look at a splendid monument, ancient or new, you will see the blatant reference to the great men who paid for it! People love to speak of the evils of our Church leaders, and those same people come to this splendid Rome, entirely built and rebuilt and restored by the popes, and ironically curse the Lord in whose memory it has been embellished and kept, precisely by his Vicars on earth.

Just take a casual look at Saint Peter's. Start with the obelisk. The cross is on top right? Yes. But directly under the cross is the sign of the pope who did the work (a large star on top of three hills--which you see all over Rome inside and outside of numerous monuments--it is atop each wing of the Bernini colonnade within the papal coat of arms of Alexander VII who commissioned it) and at its base, in case you missed the upper signs, is the name of Pope Sixtus V. Across the full length of the facade of Saint Peter's (the first Pope) is the inscription of Pope Paul V who built it! We could go on and on and on, as most of the tour books do. But the point of all of this is much bigger than princes of the Church.

What other city in the world has it's streets lined with the greatest works of art and with palaces, seemingly ad infinitum, each with a Church attached (free to enter!) each again filled with the greatest worldly artistic treasures laden with precious stones, metals, and first class marble work, and Saints! All in the name of Christ, and expressly paid for by the official chief representative of Christ on earth . Will those who are so fond of remembering all the political faults of Church leaders throughout history (which criticisms are at least as applicable to any royal house in history, beginning with the royal house of David) remember this one thing.

There is no other city in the world which can boast the boast of the ubiquitous boast of the eternally crowned city of Rome, built and adorned by the popes of every age, expressly, for the glory of God and the benefit and salvation of men. Deo gratias! The gates of hell shall not prevail against the Church of God, as it is built upon the firm Rock--Petrus. That is the lesson of Rome. It is the living testimony of the munificence of the Vicars of Christ. A most worthy testimony to the glory and the goodness of Christ Himself, even from the midst of the sad history of our tragic humanity of which our Church is also indeed a part. The world kills Christ and He blesses us through His unworthy ministers, the priests of the Catholic religion, principally the maximum pontiffs, the pope.