Life-Changing Saturdays
by Fr. Roger J. Landry - June 27, 2008
When I arrived in Rome as a seminarian thirteen years ago, I began to spend an inordinate amount of time in and around St. Peter's Basilica. It was conveniently just down the hill from the North American College. In the hopes of becoming a guide to the Vatican excavations and St. Peter's tomb, I went repeatedly on Scavi tours and devoured books on the excavations, the basilica, St. Peter, the history of pilgrims to Rome, and so much more. Since I was around the basilica so much, I also regularly eavesdropped on moving homilies on St. Peter given in various languages to pilgrimage groups from across the globe.
While I had come to Rome already with a deep love for the fisherman from Bethsaida on whom the Lord had built his Church (Mt 16:18), my devotion for him was greatly expanding and intensifying during my first several months in the eternal city, with obviously beneficial effects in my spiritual life as a whole.
Something happened in me, though, toward the end of my first semester. It was January 25th, the feast of the Conversion of St. Paul. I figured it would be cool to head down to the Basilica of St. Paul's Outside the Walls, the majestic edifice built over the mortal remains of the Lord's "chosen vessel to take his Gospel to the nations" (Acts 9:15). I walked to the bus stop at the foot of the Janiculum Hill on which the NAC is built and hopped onto bus 23. After a 15-minute ride along the Tiber River and the Ostian Way, I arrived at the basilica. I was planning to spend only a couple of hours praying. I ended up spending the whole day.
I had by that point been to this famous Church about ten times. The classical architecture of the inside basilica always captivated me and gave me a great sense of the grandeur of Christian aspirations at the time when Christianity became the official religion of the Roman empire. The stunning 5th mosaics on the triumphal arch and 12th century ones on the apse I could contemplate with total temporal disregard. I also loved the atrium in front of the basilica, which is one of the most beautiful, peaceful and prayerful places in Rome.
Up until that time, however, I used to love to go to St. Paul's Basilica because I thought it was the most beautiful Church in the world, not because of St. Paul. In fact, I think I used to go to the basilica despite St. Paul's presence. Though I admired him for all that he did for Christ and suffered for the Gospel and on occasion would pray through his intercession, I really found it hard to relate to him and to like him. His style of preaching and argumentation, found in the Acts of the Apostles and in several of his epistles, seemed foreign to me. For the most part, I chose to ignore him as much as I could, concentrating rather on Jesus in the Gospels, on the letters of SS. Peter, James and John, and on the writings of other saints with whom I could more easily connect.
All that changed on the feast of the Conversion of St. Paul 1996, which for me was the date of my conversion to St. Paul.
It began in a simple way. One of the most historically precious parts of the basilica is the series of mosaic images of all the Popes, which from the time of Pope Leo the Great in the 440s has an accurate depiction of each popes as well an inscription with the duration of his papacy. I had often taken a quick tour through the papacy by following this 265-part series around the basilica. While doing so, however, I never really looked carefully above these mosaics. That day, doubtless nudged by God, I inclined head a little bit more and noticed above the mosaic image of St. Peter that begins the series, that there was a stunning oil painting of St. Paul's presiding over the stoning of St. Stephen. Since it was the feast of St. Paul's conversion, I thought back to the fact that this was where St. Paul's metanoia started, thanks to St. Stephen's prayers. I looked above further to the right and saw another beautiful painting of the conversion itself, then a third on St. Paul's being baptized and confirmed by Ananias. I realized that these paintings, like the papal mosaics, formed a series that continued throughout the basilica.
For the next 45 minutes, with the enthusiasm of a child, I went one-by-one throughout the basilica studying the 36 paintings and using the zoom on my camera to view the inscriptions underneath each one. At the end of this pilgrimage-within-a-pilgrimage, after struggling to identify some of the scenes, I realized that there were many parts of the life of St. Paul I did not know as well I thought.
Along that journey, I also began to reflect on how absurd it was for me as a future priest not to know St. Paul intimately. St. Jerome had once said, "Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ," and I saw that my ignorance of St. Paul meant a huge unfamiliarity with the New Testament and therefore a serious gap in my knowledge of and friendship with the Lord. I experienced a conversion and made a resolution to take advantage of the privilege I had in Rome to get to know St. Paul well.
For the next couple of years, almost every Saturday, I took the 23 bus or eventually my beloved motorino down to the Basilica of St. Paul, where I would sit for hours against a column in the breezy outdoor atrium reading and re-reading aloud in Italian the Acts of the Apostles and St. Paul's letters. Not only did my faith grow, but my Italian vocabulary did as well! Through these unforgettable Saturdays with him, I grew to know St. Paul much better and to love him very much.
These memories came back to me this week as I've been preparing to initiate on Sunday, with Deacon Leo Racine, a year-long study on St. Paul to mark the Pauline Year. It's clear to me that so many Catholic lay people are in the same position with respect to the doctor of the Gentiles that I was in as a seminarian: knowing St. Paul far less than they should, and for that reason, knowing the Lord and the faith far less than they could. I'm hoping that the Lord will give all Catholics in the Diocese of Fall River during this Pauline Year the same grace he gave me during my years close to the apostle's tomb in Rome: to come to know, love and imitate St. Paul better, so that St. Paul, in turn, may help us to know, love and follow Christ as he did.
Father Roger J. Landry is pastor of St. Anthony of Padua in New Bedford, MA and Executive Editor of The Anchor, the weekly newspaper of the Diocese of Fall River.
