Peterborough Cathedral.
© Chef @ Sweetbriar Dreams
www.sweetbriardreams.blogspot.co.uk
unless stated otherwise.
Monday of The Second Week in Lent.
Station at Saint Clement's.
Indulgence of 10 Years and 10 Quarantines.
Violet Vestments.
English: Basilica of Saint Clement, Rome.
Italiano: Basilica di San Clemente al Laterano.
Photo: May 2007.
Source: Own work.
Author: Berthold Werner
(Wikimedia Commons)
The Station is at the Church of Saint Clement, built above the very house of the third successor of Saint Peter, whose name is found in The Canon of The Mass. This Sanctuary, a Parish of Rome in the 5th-Century A.D., is a most faithful example of an old Roman Basilica, although it was rebuilt in the 11th-Century. There are found, under the Altar, the remains of the Holy Martyr and of Saint Ignatius of Antioch.
Our Lord foretells in the Gospel that the Jews will lift Him up on The Cross, and thrice He asserts that they will die in their sin, because they have not believed in Him and done His works.
The wrath of God, which fell a first time on Jerusalem at the time of the Captivity of Babylon (Epistle), was renewed against Israel at the burning of the Temple. Like guilty Christians, they would only be able to return to The Lord by Penance, while the heathen are called, instead, to believe in Jesus, to become part of His people by Baptism.
“Let us mortify our flesh by Abstinence from food and let us Fast from sin by following Justice” (Collect).
Mass: Rédime me.
Preface: Of Lent.
Basilica of Saint Clement, Rome.
Available on YouTube at
Basilica di San Clemente, Rome.
Photo: March 2006.
Source: Own work.
Author: Sixtus
Permission: GFDL
(Wikimedia Commons)
The following Text is from Wikipedia - the free encyclopædia,
unless otherwise stated.
The Basilica of Saint Clement (Italian: Basilica di San Clemente-al-Laterano) is a Roman Catholic Minor Basilica, Dedicated to Pope Clement I, in Rome. Archæologically-speaking, the structure is a three-tiered complex of buildings:
(1) The present Basilica, built just before the year 1100, during the height of The Middle Ages;
(2) Beneath the present Basilica, is a 4th-Century A.D. Basilica that had been converted out of the home of a Roman nobleman, part of which had, in the 1st-Century A.D., briefly served as an early Church, and the basement of which had, in the 2nd-Century A.D., briefly served as a mithraeum;
(3) The home of the Roman nobleman had been built on the foundations of a Republican-era building that had been destroyed in the Great Fire of 64 A.D.
Ceiling of the Basilica of Saint Clement, Rome.
Photo: May 2007.
Source: Own work.
Author: Berthold Werner
(Wikimedia Commons)
This ancient Church was transformed over the Centuries from a private home, that was the site of clandestine Christian worship in the 1st-Century A.D., to a grand public Basilica by the time of the 6th-Century A.D, reflecting the emerging Catholic Church’s growing legitimacy and power.
The archaeological traces of the Basilica’s history were discovered in the 1860s by Joseph Mullooly, Lector in Sacred Theology, beginning in 1849 at the College of Saint Thomas in Rome, the future Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas, Angelicum.
The lowest levels of the present Basilica are remnants of the Foundation of a Republican-era building that was destroyed in the Great Fire of 64 A.D. An industrial building, possibly the Imperial Mint of Rome, was built on the site during the “Flavian” Period and, shortly thereafter, a “domus”, or multi-level house, alongside it, separated form the industrial building by a narrow alleyway.
About a hundred years later (circa 200 A.D.), the central room of the domus was re-modelled for use as part of a mithraeum, that is, as part of a sanctuary of the cult of Mithras. The main cult room (the speleum, “cave”, which is about 9.6 m long and 6 m wide, was discovered in 1867, but could not be investigated until 1914, due to lack of drainage. The “exedra”, the shallow Apse at the far end of the low vaulted space, was trimmed with pumice to render it more cave-like.
English: Mithraeum, under the Basilica of Saint Clement.
Italiano: Mitreo sottostante la basilica di San Clemente.
Русский: Митреум под базиликой святого Климента.
Date: 17 December 2006.
Source: Uploaded on Flickr as
Author: Allie Caulfield
(Wikimedia Commons)
A dedicatory inscription identifies the donor as one Pater Cnaeus Arrius Claudianus, perhaps of the same clan as Titus Arrius Antoninus’ mother. Other monuments discovered in the sanctuary include a bust of Sol, kept in the sanctuary in a niche near the entrance, and a figure of “Mithras petra generix”, i.e. “Mithras, born of the rock”.
bring the body of Saint Clement to Rome.
11th-Century fresco in the Basilica di San Clemente.
Source/Photographer: Unknown.
(Wikimedia Commons)
Zephyrinus is delighted to receive this Comment from a Pilgrim visiting Rome.
ReplyDeleteThe Basilica of San Clemente in Rome.
For the Roman pilgrim, having seen during the first 10 days of Lent the off-the-beaten-path sanctuaries of S. Lorenzo in Panisperna and Sant’ Agostino-San Trifone, with their darkened but warm interior art and architecture, or the high baroque yet intimate splendor of Dodici Apostoli (it also has a muted light interior), now comes a personal favorite of this Roman pilgrim, the bright and sunny Basilica of Saint Clement (Basilica di San Clemente al Laterano), between the Via Labicana and the Via de San Giovanni Laterano, only a 12-minute walk (900 M) from the Lateran Basilica and even less of a distance , literally only two blocks, from the Colosseum. (So there is no reason for the Roman visitor to miss it.)
The present church of San Clemente, as the notes by Zephyrinus above mention, dates from approximately 1100 AD when it was built literally upon the earlier 4th C. Basilica but yet retained the design and order of the earlier church. Romanesque in architecture and design, with whitish stucco on its exterior stonework, it retains the classic Roman atrium or courtyard in front of the church, complete with palms, where traditionally the early catechumens and professed Catholics would gather, just as during the stations of Lent, awaiting the beginning of the liturgical services. (However, now one enters from the side on the Via de San Giovanni).
Entering the church, one finds it bright and cheerful, not just because of the warm and welcoming Irish Dominicans, who have staffed it since 1667, but also because the order always has a Dominican docent present at a desk at the back of the church, to help out the wayward visitor.
Dom Gaspar Lefebvre, OSB says S. Clement’s “is the only faithful representation that has come down to us of the old Roman [Christian] Basilica .” Indeed, on entering the church, one finds oneself transported in time back to the 5th C. stational church tradition.
The church has two high lecterns or ambos of beautiful veined marble, on the left and the right in the center of the church, for the classic Epistle and Gospel orientation. There is also an area for the schola cantorum—a choir section with benches, where the singers would sit—-located in the middle of the church so the choir could sing in alternation between each psalm and reading. A classic Baldacchino, also of the same marble, of perfect classic pre-baroque proportions, rises above the altar.
The shrine of the relics of S. Clement, the 3rd pope, translated from the East by SS Cosmas and Damian, are reserved in the “confessio” underneath the high altar, above which marvelous ancient luminous gold apse mosaics (“Byzantine arabesques”) shimmer in the light pouring in abundantly from the vertical side windows. Doves adorn the crucifix of Christ; sheep drink from the 4 rivers of paradise; the apostles Peter and Paul and martyrs Lawrence and Clement sit in discussion in paradise.
It may be the church is so well illuminated because its nave orientation is north-south and either the afternoon or morning Roman sunlight pours in through the stained glass abundantly in a cheery dappling pattern. It is a welcome escape from the press of the traffic outside and to stop and muse and go back in time to one’s ancient Catholic predecessors.
In the Mass of the day for Monday of the 2nd Week of Lent, the focus is martyrdom, testing and preparation of the soul. The Epistle reading is from the Book of Daniel, who, like the martyr Clement suffered testing for his faith. The Gospel from John 7:21-29 is Jesus’ prophecy that he will be put to death on the cross (“When you shall have lifted up the Son of Man, then you shall know that I am .”) Based on these motifs, it may be this is why this station was chosen for the catechumens to start the 2nd Week.
Let us do for Lenten preparation as the Collect exhorts: “Let us mortify our flesh by abstinence from food and let us fast from sin by following justice. “