The rites of papal succession are a great sight to witness, highlighted majestically by Rome’s art and architecture. After his death, a quarter million people waited in line to pay their respects to Pope Francis (2013-2025) in the baroque nave of Saint Peter’s Basilica. Even heads of state came to make a final visit to the Bishop of Rome lying in state in front of the tomb of the saint.
by Elisabetta Procida & Steven Semes
One of the undeniable masterpieces of the early twentieth-century architect Armando Brasini (1879-1965) is the Basilica of the Immaculate Heart of Mary in the Parioli district in the north of Rome. Principal Roman seat of the Missionary Congregation of the Sons of the Heart of Mary (the Claretians), the monumental scale and incomplete profile of the church give it a grandiose but melancholy character offering important lessons for architects and their patrons.
The Catholic Church over several generations has suffered a grievous impoverishment. It has lost its sense of the scope and expression of the sacramental in its sacred architecture and so lost sight of the multitude of functions that architecture serves.
The picturesque city of Marietta, “the oldest town in Ohio,” was founded in 1788. It was the first permanent settlement of a newly created Northwest Territory and a possession of the French government. It was named to honor Queen Marie Antoinette in appreciation for aid that came from France during the American Revolution.
One of those mistaken notions, the consequences of which many of us have felt vividly ever since, is the idea that, in the early Church, worship took place primarily in “house churches.”