A Pilgrim’s Reflections
Some key lessons of Church history are preserved in the architecture of Rome

Some fortunate men can trace their lineage back for several centuries. I cannot. The trail of the Lawler ancestors runs cold after just a few generations. Still, while I cannot name my distant forbears, I was thinking of them on Christmas Eve.

After putting the last issue of CWR to bed, I took my own family on a year-end Jubilee pilgrimage to Rome. So on Christmas Eve we were in St. Peter’s Square, celebrating midnight Mass with Pope John Paul II. (Yes, we were tired and cold, and soaked to the bone by the driving rain. But isn’t a bit of discomfort a normal part of any pilgrimage?) I found myself wondering how many of my ancestors could only have dreamed of the privilege I now enjoyed: to celebrate the Birth of Christ together with the Vicar of Christ.

Such thoughts seem to arise naturally during a trip to Rome; the Eternal City encourages a visitor to look back across the centuries. And during my short stay in Rome last December I learned several lessons from the city.

Built on pagan ruins
Ask any Catholic to think about Rome, and chances are good that an image of St. Peter’s basilica will immediately appear in his mind’s eye. That is a healthy reaction; the basilica represents the See of Peter, the focus of unity for the entire Church. But if St. Peter’s represents the Church’s unity, the catacombs represent her vitality. Without the witness of the early martyrs, Christianity could never have flourished in Rome (or anywhere else). If there had been no catacombs, there would be no basilicas.

The topic of martyrdom does not arise often in fashionable Catholic circles today. The elusive “spirit of Vatican II,” which has led progressive thinkers in many different directions, has never guided them to the catacombs. Yet a neglect for the martyrs suggests a lack of interest in the roots of the Catholic faith —the roots from which we still draw nourishment and vitality, even today. Pope John Paul II recognized this problem explicitly in 1997, when he asked for the development of a new martyrology, including a listing of those who died for the faith during the 20th century.

In Rome, many churches are built quite literally above the bodies of martyrs. But other churches are built on the ruins of secular structures or even pagan temples. The early Christians took what was valuable in the surrounding culture, baptized it, and turned it to a higher purpose. Thus they provided a clear example that we might follow in the 21st century. Perhaps we should begin making our plans now to build a new Christian civilization—the “culture of love” that the Holy Father so often mentions—upon the ruins that will be left behind by the imminent collapse of post-modern society.

But what shall we build?
The wealth of church architecture in Rome is astonishing. The number, the size, and the beauty of the church buildings all prompt an American visitor to wonder how our Christian forefathers managed to accomplish so much, with so little technological assistance. Today, despite the wonders of internal-combustion engines and computerized design programs, we cannot produce even one building to rival the ones that our ancestors built in such profuse variety, using horse-drawn sleds and hand tools.

Perhaps it is a blessing that contemporary architects, engineers, and developers have not focused their energies on the creation of new churches; the results might have been both ugly and enduring. (CWR readers may recall the ballyhoo surrounding the competition to design “the church of the year 2000.” The winning entry was an anomic structure which now sits on the outskirts of Rome. Few if any Jubilee pilgrims bothered to visit that church.)

Still, it is worthwhile asking why our society has so little interest in building beautiful new churches and shrines. Is it because so few people are prepared to devote their physical energy or their financial capital to the service of the Church? Is it a failure to understand the importance of beauty in the liturgy? We can throw up mammoth skyscrapers and suspension bridges and athletic stadiums with admirable speed and efficiency. But with a precious few exceptions—Mother Angelica’s magnificent new temple comes immediately to mind —we cannot build beautiful churches.

Rome has its secular monuments, too. Tourists still flock to the Forum and the Coliseum as well as St. John Lateran and St. Mary Major. But the story written in the city’s architecture is a story of successful evangelization: a story of how Christianity engaged, influenced, and ultimately subdued the pagan world. Was that process reversed during the 20th century, so that secular ideologies subverted Christian belief? If so, then we must turn the tables again. Our ancestors have already shown us how that can be accomplished.

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