What Does The Prayer Really Say?
W D T P R S

Another great chance for your own captions.

On 3 September was one of the great events of the year in all of Italy, the feast of St. Rose of Viterbo and the carrying of the macchina of Santa Rosa through the narrow streets of the medieval city. This is a centuries old tradition and truly impressive. I have been to Viterbo for this in years past, but missed it this year. It is even televised live in Italy on Telepace.  The procession with the huge macchina goes back at least to 1657 when the patroness of the city saved Viterbo from a plague.  There was an older tradition of a procession in honor of the translation of the relics of St. Rose in 1258 by Pope Alexander IV.

The macchina is shaped like a brightly illuminated tower 28 meters in height and weighing around 11000 pounds (50 quintali). The bearers of the macchina or facchini, about 100 in number, have to pass a difficult test to belong to the fraternity, who are called also Knights of St. Rose. They must carry a large box containing 150kg of metal balls that roll around inside. They dress in white with a white bandana with a red sash to recall the cardinals who bore a smaller macchina the first time. Families have a tradition of having members of this esteemed fraternity.

On the night they carry the macchina they meet the bishop, who gives them a blessing in periculo mortis. They must them carry the macchina through the dangerously narrows and sometimes steep cobblestone streets, making stations along the way, where they rest for a few minutes and eat something. Huge drums are beaten, producing a thundrous sound and as they move, the ground shakes. When the macchina is moving and swaying through the city you can catch glimpses of it above the roof tops, like a bright giant. They carry the macchina from the Basilica of Saint Sixtus to the Basilca of St. Rose. In the past, there have been accidents. In fact, the procession with the macchina was suspended for a while when the macchina fell, but Pope Pius VII started it back up again in 1815.

A new macchina is built, in general, every five years.

 

St. Rose was a very interesting saint.  She was born in Viterbo in 1233.  When young, she was cured of a deadly illness through a miracle and, afterwards, went about the city preaching and working miracles.  Her messages and fervor freaked out the ruler of the city, who exiled her.   In exile, she predicted the death of the Emperor Fredrick II.  Her exile lasted only a few days: Fredrick died and she came home.  She tried constantly to enter the convent of San Damiano, with no success.  She died in 1252.  Sometime later, her body was discovered to be incorrupt and it was translated, as mentioned above, by the Pope with four cardinals carrying the bier.  To the Basilica now named after her. 

Today is the feast of St. Zachariah, the prophet of the Old Testament. Here is the entry in the Martyrologium Romanum with a translation.

1. Commemoratio sancti Zachariae, prophetae, qui populum de exsilio in terra promissionis reversurum prophetavit eique regis pacifici nuntium attulit, quod Christus Dominus triumphali suo ingressu in Sanctam Civitatem Ierusalem mire implevit.

The commemoration of Saint Zechariah, the prophet, who prophesied that the people would return from exile into the land of promise, and announced the news of the King of Peace to it (the people), which Christ the Lord fulfilled with His triumphal entrance into the holy city of Jerusalem.

And now for the patristiblogger angle.   The Fathers comment on the Book of Zechariah. Here is St. Augustine on Zechariah 5 (about the vision of the flying scroll and the woman in the Ephah)  He deals with false oaths in a letter to his good friend Alypius, by this time the bishop of his home town of Thagaste (ep. 125):

As to the suggestion you [Alypius] made in your letter that we should examine together the nature of an oath extorted by force, I beg of you, do not let our discussion turn crystal-clear matters into murky ones. If a servant of God were threatened with certain death, so that he should swear to do something forbidden and wicked, he still ought rather to die than to swear, so as not to commit a crime in fulfilling his oath. But in this case, ... it was only the persistent shouting of the people that was forcing the man not to any crime but to what could be lawfuly done, if it were done. And… the only thing to fear was that a few violent men, mingled with a crowd of mostly good ones, might seize the occasion to start a riot, under pretence of virtuous indignation, and might break out into some accursed disturbance to satisfy their passion for robbery. And when even this fear was unfounded, who would think that perjury could be commited even to avoid certain death, much less loss or some kind of physical injury? That individual called Regulus had never heard what the holy Scriptures say about the wrongfulness of a false oath. He had learned nothing about the sickle of Zechariah, and obviously he had not sworn to the Carthaginians by the sacraments of Christ but by the filthiness of demons. Yet he did not so fear certain torture and a horrible sort of death as to take his oath under complusion, but he went to meet them to avoid perjuring himself, because he had sworn an oath of his own free will.

I wonder if this reminds anyone of any current events.