Lenten Stations at Saint Apollinaris's and at Saint Mary-the-New

Non-Italic Text taken from The Saint Andrew Daily Missal for Thursday in Passion Week
Pictures and Italic text taken from Wikipedia (the free encyclopaedia) (unless otherwise accredited)
Station at Saint Apollinaris's and at Saint Mary-the-New
Indulgence of 10 years and 10 Quarantines
Violet Vestments

Facade of Sant'Apollinare alle Terme Neroniane-Alessandrine

The old Station is at the Church built towards 780 A.D., by Pope Adrian I, on the ruins of an ancient temple, in honour of the holy martyr, Apollinaris, the disciple of Saint Peter and Archbishop of Ravenna. A second Station was added in 1934.

The second Station, added by Pope Pius XI, is at Saint Mary-the-New (Santa Maria Nuova), also known as Santa Francesca Romana. Santa Francesca Romana is situated next to the Roman Forum.

Santa Francesca Romana's travertine façade (by Carlo Lambardi, 1615) 

and its 12th-Century Romanesque campanile

By Apostolic Letters, dated 5 March 1934, and published on 15 October 1935, the Churches of Santa Agatha and Santa Maria Nuova (also called Santa Francesca Romana) were raised to the title of Stational Churches. The same Ceremonies are performed and the same Indulgences may be gained there, respectively, as Santa Pudentiana on the Third Tuesday in Lent and Sant'Apollinare on Passion Thursday. These two Churches are not on the published Map of Stational Churches in The Saint Andrew Daily Missal.

In the Mass of the Day, Daniel recalls the humilation of the people of Israel who were delivered to their enemies “on account of their sins” (Introit and Epistle). The Church also mourns over the bad Christians and the heathen, slaves of Satan and of their passions.

With Azarias, she asks the Lord “that all those who ill-treat His servants may be confounded, for it is with a contrite and humble heart that they return to God” (Epistle). She hopes that, faithful to His ancient and solemn oath, He will multiply His people like the stars in the firmament and the sand on the shore (Epistle). She already sees with joy the Paschal night, when, in the baptismal font, numerous children are going to be born to her. She excites the penitents to true repentance and hope by relating the conversion of Magdalen the sinner, who throws herself at the feet of Jesus, shedding tears of repentance, whilst the Jews, represented by Simon the Pharisee, remain unmoved.

 

Interior of Sant'Apollinare alle Terme Neroniane-Alessandrine

(Photo from Wikemedia Commons. Taken by Lalupa, February 2009)

The Gospel relates to the second year of the public ministry of Jesus, who was received in Naim in the house of Simon the Pharisee. Several Fathers of the Latin Church think that this poor sinner was Mary of Magdala, called, for that reason, Magdalen, who was identified as the sister of Lazurus and Martha.

Forming part of the people of God through Baptism, we should humbly, like Magdalen, weep for our sins and generously expiate them. Let us therefore purify our bodies and Souls by mortification and Penance, for it is “by abstinence that we must heal our wounds made by intemperance” (Collect).

 

Pope Gregory XIII (1572 - 1585) granted Sant'Apollinare to the Jesuits in 1574 

He is best known for commissioning, and being the namesake for, the Gregorian calendar, which remains the internationally-accepted civil calendar to this date.

Sant'Apollinare alle Terme is a titular Church in Rome, dedicated to Saint Apollinare, the first Bishop of Ravenna.

The Church was founded in the Early-Middle Ages, probably in the 7th-Century. It is first mentioned in the Liber Pontificalis under Pope Hadrian I, using spolia from the ruins of an imperial building. The first Priests who served the church were probably Eastern Basilian monks, who had fled from persecution during the iconoclast period.

It is listed in the Catalogue of Turin as a Papal chapel with eight clerics and in 1574 was granted to the Jesuits by Pope Gregory XIII, and it was used as the Church of the next-door Collegium Germanicum in the Palazzo di Sant'Apollinare (now owned by the Roman Seminary), which was later united with the Hungarian College to form the Collegium Germanicum et Hungaricum. This remained a Jesuit institution until the suppression of the Jesuits in 1773, when this Church passed to the Lazarists.

 

Pope Pius XI (1922 - 1939)

Raised Santa Francesca Romana to the title of Stational Church

Interior of Santa Francesca Romana, previously known as Santa Maria Nuova

In the late 17th-Century, the Church of Saint Apollinaris was in a poor state of repair. Its rebuilding was considered over a long period but wasn't carried out, probably due to lack of funds. Despite this, in 1702, a chapel was redecorated and dedicated to Saint Francis Xavier, and a statue of the Saint commissioned from Pierre Le Gros, who carved the marble with extraordinary virtuosity (the statue was preserved when the Church was eventually rebuilt some 40 years later and is still in situ).

In 1742, Pope Benedict XIV commissioned Ferdinando Fuga to rebuild Saint Apollinaris's. Fuga added a new façade in the late 16th-Century style, with Baroque elements. It has two stories, with Ionic columns in the lower and Corinthian ones in the upper. The lower level has a central doorway flanked by windows. Above the door is a triangular tympanon. On the upper level is a large central window with a balcony, and two smaller windows to the sides. The façade is crowned by a double tympanon. Fuga also reconstructed the dome. The Church was re-dedicated in 1748.

Francesco Antonio Zaccaria, writer and archaeologist, who died in 1795, was buried in the Chapel of Saint Ignatius of Loyola here. In 1990, the Church was granted to Opus Dei, and is now part of their Pontifical Institute of Saint Apollinaris. In the same year, the notorious gangster Enrico De Pedis, boss of the so-called Banda della Magliana, was buried in the Church's crypt, by authorisation of Cardinal Ugo Poletti. The unusual interment has been linked to the case of Emanuela Orlandi's kidnapping.

 

Pope Benedict XIV (1740 - 1758). He commissioned Ferdinando Fuga to rebuild the Church of Saint Apollinaris in 1742. When elected Pope in 1740, the conclave that elected him had lasted for six months, He is reported to have said to the Cardinals: "If you wish to elect a Saint, choose Gotti; a Statesman, Aldrovandi; an honest man, me".

The Church has a single nave. Along the side are pilasters with Corinthian capitals holding the arches to the side chapels. In the barrel-vaulted ceiling is a fresco of The Glory of Saint Apollinaris, by Stefano Pozzi.

The High Altar was made on the orders of Pope Benedict XIV, with stucco decorations by Bernardino Ludovisi and an early 17th-Century altarpiece depicting Saint Apollinaris' Consecration as Bishop of Ravenna. The crypt contains relics.

The elliptical Chapel of Graces, which is outside the Church proper, is accessed through a doorway on the left. It contains a 1494 fresco of The Virgin, Queen of Apostles, which survived the Sack of Rome because the Priests covered it with lime. It was then rediscovered in 1645 when two boys and a soldier took refuge in the Church during an earthquake. A marble frame with golden stucco cherubs was added by Peter Anton von Verschaffelt.