In the morning, I did some quick work at the computer, checked out the weather in Orvieto (rain all day, 80% chance), and packed my raincoat and umbrella, al
ong with the other "essential" items for travel (phone, tripod, book, money, addresses, etc.). As it turned out, there were exactly 3.5 minutes of rain all day. I should have been like a couple of other Brothers, bringing only their umbrella, camera, and money.We met up at 7:45 AM in the hallway in front of the chapel - the community Mass was going on in the Main Chapel at the time, complete with a duplication of the Indian sandle-wax ceremony (dot on the forehead) for all those attended to symbolize Pentecost - and the made our way to the Metro stop nearby.
Even though it was a Sunday morning, the Metro platform was as crowded as if it were commute time. Most, if not all, were tourists making their way into town or to the Vatican for Mass or to the train station for trips around Italy. Ten stops later, in a packed set of cars, we arrived at Termini station and one Brother suggested that we check out whether they had "group rates" for our tickets. Good idea. Br. Bob Guasconi, whose family is from Italy and is our excellent French translator as well, was our interpreter, and we found out that we could save 20% of our tickets this way. On we went to Track 9, Train 528, Car 10, seats 51 - 57 and 61 - 68, or something like that. On the train, the journey took a little over an hour, with one stop in a town in between. There were lots of tunnels that changed the air pressure in the cabins to the point of hurting our ears. Others just slept on the journey.
At Orvieto, the train station was at the bottom of the steep hill on which Orvieto is located. There was a Funiculare that made the 200 meter journey for less than a Euro. Good deal. Soon enough we were walking through the town, a town that was just waking up, under wonderful weather (where's that rain that was promised?), with shops opening up here and there. At one point, I watched a baker in his apron walk out of his shop, go a couple of houses further and toss up a paper bag of fresh bread to a woman leaning out of one of the second-story windows, with lots of smiles and loud Italian in between. Now that's fresh bread! A couple of us decided that this would be a great location for one of those "international communities" that the Chapter has been playing with. In fact, I'll volunteer to live here in such a community! The place reminded me of Assisi, only without all of the religious goods stores.
On reaching the cathedral, you couldn't but be wowed by the facade. By far, it is the most impressive front of any cathedral I've seen yet. Between the intricate mosaic and the delicate carvings (a great "Tree of Life" on one panel), you could study it for some time. We made our way inside and found that the Mass was just at the readings, so we were in good time. The bishop and a bevy of priests were presiding. After the Gospel, the bishop spoke, and spoke, and spoke, sometimes gesticulating wildly with his arms, sometimes whispering, sometimes shouting - but Italian just sounds great, so I wasn't that bored. His speaking patterns reminded me of a History Channel program about Mussolini where he was shown speaking to the crowds (no slight on the reverent Bishop here, however - I'm presuming that his content was less fascist). I'd have been more impressed if I knew what the heck he was saying - and my feet and legs eventually got quite sore from all the standing. The fun part was that a helium ballon (bright red mylar in the shape of a heart) was released early on in his homily, and you could just see that a whole bunch of people watched as it floated slowly to the roof, then floated down a bit and hovered in the center of the sanctuary and then moved off to the side. I don't think that the bishop realized what was going on. Maybe he thought that we were so taken by his words that we were all contemplating heaven.When he finally stopped after som 25 minutes, I though "Good, now we can move forward." But wait, there's more! It turned out that this was a great day to confirm the 150 students from the area who were ready. So that took another 25 minutes. By the time we got to the rest of the Mass, the Brothers were asking things like "So when was that train to go back home?" During the consecration, I had maneuvered to the side and watched a cute bunch of little kids march out to hold lighted candles in a semicircle in front of the altar for the consecration, while the oldest kid swung incense with great pride and precision. After communion, we snuck out the back in order to get good places for the Pentecost ceremony. Right behind us, as it turned out, they closed and locked the main cathedral doors, so we ended up in perfect position for the festivities.
The town band played up a storm, featuring songs like "La Cucaracha" and "Oh Susannah" and other international favorites. What happened to Italian songs? Then through the crowd came these folks dressed up like medieval musicians, towns people, and the like.
They made their way up front and the trumpeteers lined up in front of a large constructed tower in front of the cathedral. At one point, the bishop and some priests came out (They'd finally finished the Mass) and walked to the city hall across the piazza where they showed up minutes later on the balcony overlooking the square. The bishop waved a handkerchief, someone behind the tower waved a handkerchief in response, and the action began.Suddenly, I could hear firecrackers going off down a tiny street opposite the cathedral, and then I noticed a wire strung along the lenghth of the street, some 300 feet from the top of the structure in front of the cathedral to a building at the other end of the tiny street. On top of that building down the street, where the wire was attached, was a painted cloud with a hole in it. And through the smoke and noise of the firecrackers, out of the hole came a metal contraption that looked like a metal sunburst, with some sort of plexiglass container in the middle. It came flying down the wire, gathering speed, until it reached the other end at the top of the structure in front of the cathedral. When it had reached the halfway point, strings of firecrackers inside the destination structure began to go off as well. I haven't heard that many firecrackers since Chinese new year in San Francisco.
They went on forever, it seemed. Then the sunburst thing hit the top of the structure and everyone calmed down. The cut outs of the apostles had little gas flames shooting out of the tops of their heads for a while, after sunburst thing had hit the top of the structure - Pentecost of course. Soon, two guys climbed a ladder up into the structure, hung a board out so that one of them could stand on it to reach the metal sunburst, and brought it down the ladder to the base of the structure. There, several people futsed around the sunburst thing, guarded by respresentatives from the police, the caribinieri, and God knows who else. At one point, I saw one person reach in and throw out a wide fluffy thing, casting it into a corner of the cathedral facade. I thought that that might have been the (now dead) pigeon that purportedly was stuffed inside of the plexiglass. Perhaps they had put in a couple of pigeons and just took out the one that survived the journey. But on reflection I figured out that it was a wad of paper towels that had provided a cushion for the live pigeon stuffed inside. You can be sure that the pigeon's journey down that wire - surrounded by noise, smoke, lights, abrupt movement and the complete inability to flap one's wings or do anything to influence one's surroundings - that that journey occasioned activities which would make it necessary to throw into a corner whatever material was sharing its tiny space. (By the way, the animal rights folks - about twenty strong - were relegated to a corner of the piazza, bearing signs such as "Use a fake bird for a real feast."
Then in great ceremony, the sunburst thing was held up to wild applause and taken in solemn procession to the city hall where it appeared on the balcony, with the beaming bishop standing next to it. A little later, a couple was shown with the pigeon. Apparently, the pigeon is given to the couple who were most recently married, for them to keep until next year. I certainly hope that they use a different pigeon every year. There IS such a thing as double jeopardy, isn't there, even in Italy? At first, I thought that perhaps the pigeon would become lunch for the bishop - you never know about these medieval customs.
One more thing, before the sunburst thing appeared on the balcony, the trumpeteers appeared to announce its arrival. However, the town band was still doing one of its La Cucaracha / Oh Susannah numbers. So you had a Charles Ives kind of moment with two different tunes happening at once. It wouldn't surprise me to find out that there is a bit of rivalry between those two groups in town.
Then the thing was over, the barricades were taken down and the people began to disperse into the little shops and restaurants. We similarly did a lot of walking around the area, exploring little streets and keeping an eye out for a restaurant that Bob Berger knew well. At a public map there was quite a discussion as to where to go. We didn't find the restaurant until later in the day and ended up stopping into the self-serve pizzeria / restaurant for lunch. Nothing really looked good to me (No pizza! "We only have that in the evening.") Br. Thomas Jones and I went back to the cathedral area, looking around the shops and stopping at a nice side-walk cafe for pizza and a white wine that was produced by the owner. (I ended up buying some to take back.The group reassembled to walk around some more, getting some great gelato in the process.
On returning to the cathedral to check out the frescoes, I saw John and Bob near the steps speaking with a group of students. It turns out that they were from Manhattan College! This is where John and Bob live and work, and it was Bob's recognition of one of the students that made the connection. They were there on a tour before going to Florence for a month of study. Small world! After John gave them a quick spontaneous tour of the local area, they went on their way. We, in our turn, made our way to "St. Patrick's Well" located on that other side of the ciy. It had been built some 500 years ago as the town hosted one of the Popes on the run from his enemies. Some people (not me) paid 4.50 Euros for the privilege of walking down 258 steps to see the water at the bottom and 258 steps up to see the sky again. The engineering, apparently, is a notable accomplishment (2 corkscrew staircases, for the water donkeys, that operate independently) but I was happy to just stay outside, thank you very much. The walls of the city gave some terrific views of the area. It was especially neat to watch the trains that came in, comparing the slow inter-city trains with the superfast Eurostar trains that smoothly went by on separate tracks at what looked like 200 kmh at least.
Toward the end of the day we relaxed at an outdoor cafe for a while before making our way back down via the Funiculare to the train station. Then the hour or so journey back to Rome and via the Metro to Cornelia station and the Motherhouse. Two of the Brothers were just slightly late catching the Metro at Termini and I watched their blank faces as we passed them as the train left the station. But they caught the next train and found their way back without any problem.Back home, I knew that I had at least two hours or work ahead of me, and there was still the Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament service to do. So I cleaned up, forgot about dinner, and got things ready in the chapel. From 8:30 PM until 10:00 PM we had the prayer service - similar to the ones we had during the days of discernment. There were fewer Brothers there, but this was due to the fact that this was Sunday and many Brothers were still on outings. After putting everything away, it was 10:30 and I began to work on the things for tomorrow - morning prayer service, liturgy committee meeting, and the chapel service for the new Superior General. I finished a little after midnight and decided to forego the blog for some needed sleep, especially since I needed to get up early the next morning. It will be a big and busy day.
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Pictures at http://picasaweb.google.com/gvangrie/ItalyMay27
