I had a bit of trouble getting into the pantheon, because tourist visits were suspended for the service, but I managed to find a police officer and scrape together enough Italian to get him to understand what I wanted so that he let me in.
The mass turned out to be a Palm Sunday Vigil service, which didn’t completely surprise me, but I had elected to look over the readings for Saturday instead. It worked out well enough though, because the readings were really fascinating and perfectly suited to the transition into Palm Sunday and the rest of Holy Week. The gospel was an odd text in which the pharisees are sort of prophesizing Jesus’ death, situated right between His resurrection of Lazarus and His triumphal entry into Jerusalem. Apart from the oddness of the prediction, this passage struck me because the pharisees were worried because Jesus’ actions made it clear to everyone that he was the Messiah which they knew meant that their earthly pleasures were going to be disrupted – which is basically Machiavellian thousands of years before Machiavelli. They plotted to launch a battle against God Himself (and consequently the people’s belief in Him, though the Incarnation allowed them to be much more direct) and turn the people back from the spiritual revitalization he was calling them towards in favor of a series of secular, worldly pleasures and conveniences.
“If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation.” (John 11:48)
In any case, it turned out to be fine because an English translation of the first and second readings were provided in the lyric sheet we were provided and I am familiar enough with the Gospel that I was mostly able to eek out what was going on.
The fact that the Mass turned out to be a Palm Sunday service was act pretty cool, because we got to start the service at the other end of the building and then walk across so that we interacted with the space more instead of remaining clustered near the front altar. It was really special to be able to celebrate Mass in that space, not just because it’s a beautiful building and I can say I did it forever, but because that building was built for worship, and being a part of that legacy was something which really resonated with me. Paul’s sermon of the unknown god kept running through my mind, particularly the phrase: “what therefore you worship as unknown I proclaim to you” (Acts 17:23). It really helped the space come alive for me. I knew that it was historically and archeologically significant, and that it (like so many classical Roman buildings), had been claimed as a Catholic church, but I nevertheless had felt like I was experiencing it as an outside observer. Being able to participate in a Mass in this building transformed my experience of the space – so that I was able to recognize that it wasn’t just some bit of history which the Catholic church saved from destruction so that it is able to be around for us to study in modern times; it is a living piece of the city which welcomes visitors to brush against its significance at the level they are able to.
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