Italy: Palm Sunday in Assisi

Sunday, April 5, 2009. Church bells awaken us at 7 AM, which only seems proper. After breakfast we head back to Piazza del Comune and wait outside the Minerva Temple/St. Mary Church for the Palm Sunday procession that begins here and will wend it way up the streets of Assisi to the St. Rufino Cathedral. A disparate crowd gathers, some holding olive branches. We see someone handing them out and get one each. A Brit tourist asks me if I know when “the parade starts.” As the crowd swells two men bring two big baskets of olive branches up to top of the steps of the Temple/Church. Near the piazza’s little fountain two police officers casually watch over things and chat with the natives. People greet each other with the Italian kiss of the air beside each cheek. Many elderly women are dressed all in black. At one point the children in the crowd are asked to come up to the top of the steps, where they each receive an olive branch and then stand off the side in a quiet, respectful group. A choir gathers on the top of the steps on the other side, opposite the children.

The crowd now includes several monks in the belt-roped robes, nuns in their usual black and white, and other churchmen in simple black tunics. With the aid of a microphone and a set of small speakers attached to a piece of wood that a man holds up above the crowd, the choir sings a hymn. From out of the church door the bishop steps up in his many layered and colorful vestments, including a miter to die for, and using the microphone addresses the crowd. He then sprinkles holy water on the baskets of olive branches, throws some the crowd’s way which hold their branches skyward, and then says a prayer. The blessed olive branches are handed out to the crowd as the bishop, followed by several other churchmen of apparent high order, walks carefully down the steps, his golden bishop’s staff temporarily held by an assistant. The bishop seems to glance at the fountain that looks perhaps inspirational in the bright morning sunshine, and then at the crowd, and smiles. Getting his staff back from his assistant he begins the procession up to the Cathedral of St. Rufino -- which is classified a cathedral (rather than a church or basilica) because it serves as the bishop’s seat, or more romantically, his throne. We three join the procession, as those who know the words sing hymns along the way, up the narrow streets now crowded not with cars or scooters but only people.

At St. Rufino’s more than a few walkers peal off before we head into the cathedral. The cathedral seems fully packed and we sit with many others in folding chairs toward the rear. Though the scene is quite impressive and the music is lovely, the service is longer than we anticipated, especially the parts requiring the congregation to stand, and we join a few others in making an early exit.

Being near the top of Assisi already, we decide to hike up to Rocca Maggiore. It is warm, but we take our time, stopping now and then to admire the views. This one time mighty fortress still dominates the Assisi scene, and though it might disappoint some looking for more than it is, all three of us thought its several exhibits and historic atmosphere worth the long climb and price of admission.

Jake got a special thrill learning that Frederick of Swabia, as a young boy, might very well have walked the same stones he now walked. Jake thinks you have to love a medieval guy who became, as Holy Roman Emperor, Frederick II, and was (or claimed to be) King of Jerusalem and King of Sicily as well. Frederick also knew six languages, wrote an early “scientific” book on falconry, founded the University of Naples, was (of course) a Christian but maintained a harem, was excommunicated not once but twice, and is assigned in Dante’s Comedy to be among the damned. As a child it is likely our Frederick made his way up the long spiral staircase to enjoy the panoramic view atop this fortress as did Stone, Jake and Figlia some centuries later.

We figured that the several Palm Sunday services would now be over at the Basilica di San Francesco, so we walked to that end of town to see the famous 13th century edifice. We especially wanted to see a fresco that Figlia had studied and written about in an art history class in college. It is "The Dream of St. Martin" by Simone Martini. After a bit of a search Stone spotted it. Figlia looked at it and talked about it with an educated awe that made her parents proud.

We had all come to the world famous Basilica of St. Francis with high expectations. It did not disappoint. Whether it is the good saint’s tomb, which is below the lower basilica and is thick with a dark air of reverence and the hush of scores of true believers kneeling and crossing themselves; or the lower basilica, which squats above the crypt but below the large basilica above, its vaulted walls, ceilings and chapels so crammed with art that one feels almost suffocated by the medieval aesthetic; or the airy upper basilica with its soaring ceiling and its famous repertoire of fresco masterpieces by Giotto, it is impossible to process but a fraction of this sensory overload or to be unmoved by what a man, and mankind, can accomplish. Outside the church, on a giant lawn that fronts the basilica is a large topiary rendering of one word that reminds us all of what mankind too often can't accomplish: Pax.

The drive from Assisi back to Pescara was uneventful, except for the obligatory getting lost for a bit, this time in a town called Foligno, which is Italian for "No Road Signs." Back in our Pescara apartment Stone makes a nice dinner of pasta which we have with some Sangiovese wine we bought in Assisi. Everything is calm and peaceful as we go to sleep. It does not stay that way.