Consuelo, awesome professor and tour guide extraordinaire.
On Monday, June 6th, all of the Rome Center visited the Vatican Museums. With Professor Consuelo as our fearless leader, my group moved through the rooms fairly quickly, and the crowds were incredible. The art was stunning and I was excited to be in a place with so much history, but I didn’t find much difference between these museums and any other in the city. That is, until we entered the Sistine Chapel.
You aren’t allowed to take pictures inside the chapel (although my mom interpreted that rule as a suggestion when she first visited) and I’m glad for it. Everywhere else in the museum I felt like cattle, slowly but surely being herded through the rooms, not being allowed to stop and admire for very long. In the Sistine Chapel, however, we were allowed to stand around, or sit if you could find a section of bench, for as long as we liked. I might have sat there for five minutes or an entire hour. Time seemed slow in the chapel, almost like Narnia, such that we could sit in this room for years and emerge to find no time had passed.
The day had been long, but that didn’t stop me from venturing on to see St Peter’s Basilica. Awe-that’s the only word to describe how I felt entering the large room, with the high ceilings and golden alter, sun streaming in through the windows.
I’m not catholic, but as I was standing in St Peter’s, and as I would later experience even more deeply, spiritual wonderment doesn’t come pre-packaged, labeled by denomination or even religion. If you’ll open yourself to the possibilities and beauty around you, even the mere act of standing in a sacred space-a place so many people have worshipped, loved, mourned-can be truly moving. Standing in St Peter’s, walking around to see the relics, and watching as pilgrimages came to fruition, I was reminded of the importance of appreciating beauty when I see it. It’s not silly or childish to stand in complete awe of something, as I might have believed in the sixth grade, but intimate, significant, and absolutely thrilling. It’s truly a gift to find something so wonderful.
christine-in-italy 