On our recent trip to Italy, Ron and I spent a few days in Rome. Ron and I are both early risers, up and about before six, usually. It seems the Italians are not early risers as each morning we would find ourselves on deserted streets in search of an open café. We stayed in Trastevere, an ancient neighborhood with narrow streets and cobblestone paths. In the center was the piazza, and on the piazza was a basilica, the Basilica of Santa Maria in Trastevere. This basilica is one of the oldest churches in Rome with parts of its structure dating back to the 3rd and 4th centuries. The apse over the altar area is richly decorated with 12th and 13th century mosaics and various Baroque paintings adorn the ceiling. Architecturally, the church is a study in beauty. Spiritually, the church is a study in hallowed ground.
Early in the morning with nobody around, Ron and I would find our way to this basilica, and alone, we would sit in the midst of soft candles and silence, and we would take time to pray, time to rest, time to simply be. We both agree it was the highlight of our visit to Rome.
When we made our trips to the Colosseum and the Uffizi Museum and other spots, we went as tourists. Our objective was to observe and learn. In the Basilica of Santa Maria, however, we went as pilgrims. Our objective was to rest in the beauty of God. As tourists, our posture was curiosity. As pilgrims, our posture was reverence.
Sister Dominic Mary Heath, OP, a cloistered nun, says that reverence is “…the attitude of submission we owe to God as the source of our being…[it] opens our eyes to beauty in the order of creation, in the wholeness of human persons, and in the mystery of divine providence – beauty that is inaccessible to irreverent eyes. As an attitude that accompanies Christian life, reverence is not optional but necessary.” (The Necessity of Reverence, Plough Quarterly Magazine, Issue 20)
We walked into that Basilica understanding that we were and are fully under God’s providence, graced by God to have the awareness of beauty created by God. The time set aside for prayer and silence fortified us and integrated the physical space with our interior lives. The experience deepened and enriched our vacation, making portions of the trip feel more like an offering than a consumption.
There is hallowed ground everywhere. Walk into the Memorial Garden alone and open your eyes to the beauty and feel yourself submitting to God. Find a bit of silence on the beach, in the campground, in the mountains, wherever your travels might take you, and look at something beautiful, surrendering to God’s providence and revering with awe all that God has done and does for each of us.
May your summer days be filled with such moments.
Lori