I'm back!

Where have I been?  Rome.  It was a short but such an invaluable sojourn.  Let me share a highlight.

For so long, I have wanted to visit the Basilica of St Clement near the Coliseum. I knew it as having catacombs but I was wrong as it is about something else much more profound, as I was to find out on finally visiting it when in Rome for yet another Caritas International meeting. 

This basilica is not about catacombs but about the very history of the Christian faith.  Yes, you enter a 12th century church but then you enter underneath to see two more layers.  First, you walk down into the excavated ruins of a previous basilica, but wait as there is more, as the ancient basilica is built upon a pagan Roman temple.  Wow!  Just too much for one short visit. 

In the 1st century, a pagan temple was built on this site which remained there until Christianity became the religion of the Roman Empire in the early 4th century.  At this time, the pagan temple was transformed into a Christian basilica dedicated to St Clement and so it stood until it fell into ruins some 800 years later and was covered over for the present day basilica to stand.

As I wandered around underneath in what was the old basilica and then around the ancient pagan temple, I could only imagine what happened here and what life was like.  Being there gave me a sense of awe, a sense of being part of something greater than myself.  It hit me how who we are today is formed by being built layer upon layer of history.  We are the sum of our parts. We are who we are because of what has gone before us.  The beauty of the Church has been not the ability to condemn and destroy what has gone before but to embrace and build upon what is so as to enrich our legacy and who we are.

I could see again how the Church is at its strongest when it is able to embrace the world that is, not when it condemns it.