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Travel tips, Food, Lifestyle, Street Art, Events and Exhibitions in Rome and all around Italy.

Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI died, funeral on January 5th

The Pope Ratzinger was 95 years old and in the last few days his condition had worsened. Pope Francis had asked the world to pray for him. With pain I inform you that the Pope Emeritus, Benedict XVI, passed away today at 9:34 am, in the Mater Ecclesiae Monastery in the Vatican”. With this press release, the Director of the Press Office of the Holy See, Matteo Bruni, announced the death of the pontiff who preceded Pope Bergoglio. Pope Ratzinger was 95 years old and in the last few days his conditions had worsened. Pope Francis had asked the faithful to pray for him. Benedict XVI, the first Pope emeritus after his historic resignation from the pontificate in February 2013, ended his earthly journey this morning. “It is with pain that I inform you that the Pope Emeritus, Benedict XVI, passed away today at 9.34 am, in the Mater Ecclesiae Monastery in the Vatican”, reported the director of the Press Office of the Holy See, Matteo Bruni, also announcing that from the morning of Monday 2 January , the body

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December 31, 2022 3:13 pm
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St. Peter’s Dome made from a drawing by Michelangelo

Did you know? The Dome of St. Peter’s Square was made from a drawing by Michelangelo. The most famous “Er cupolone” in the world has dominated the skyline of the Roman panorama for centuries, surprising every time with its majesty. Without a doubt, the dome of St. Peter’s Square is one of the symbols of Rome. It forms the cover of the cruise of St. Peter’s basilica in the Vatican. It is one of the largest masonry roofs ever built; it has an internal diameter of about 42 meters and brings the overall height of the basilica, from the base to the top of the lantern, to over 130 meters. The dome of St. Peter’s is the symbol of the Vatican basilica. It stands at the intersection of the main nave with the transept, vertically above Bernini’s colossal Baldacchino and the access to Peter’s Tomb. The structure is supported by four colossal pillars. Its shapes, an expression of the transition from Renaissance to Baroque architecture, largely reflect the design of Michelangelo Buonarroti, who worked on it until the year of

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December 29, 2022 4:40 pm
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In 1972 a mad man hammered Michelangelo’s Pietà

On May 21st 1972, the day of Pentecost, a 34 years old Australian geologist of Hungarian origin named László Tóth, evading surveillance, managed to hit Michelangelo’s work with a hammer fifteen times, kept in St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. This is what happened that day, which forever changed the methods of surveillance of the masterpieces of art. The Pietà suffered very serious damage, especially on the Virgin: the blows of the hammer had detached about fifty fragments, breaking the left arm and shattering the elbow, while on the face the nose had been almost destroyed, as well as the eyelids. The restoration was started almost immediately, after a study phase, and was carried out by reusing as much as possible the original fragments, as well as a mixture based on glue and marble dust. The author of the scar was recognized as mentally ill. Since then, the Pietà has been protected by a special bulletproof crystal wall. On July 22nd 1971 Tóth arrived in Italy, in Rome, where he first found accommodation at the youth hostel in the Foro Italico

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February 17, 2022 8:00 am
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St. Peter’s Square and the Circus of Nero

Did you know? In imperial times, in Rome, where there is St. Peter’s Square, the Circus of Nero stood. Nero’s Circus stood in St. Peter’s in the Vatican, before the square and the Basilica were built? Right here, in fact, there was an installation for shows, about half a kilometer long. Chariot races, circus performances, Christian executions (including that of St. Peter’s): these are the events hosted, for the amusement of the emperor. The circus of Nero was a spectacle plant of ancient Rome 540 meters long and about 100 wide, which stood right in the place where today the basilica of St. Peter in the Vatican is located, in a valley that went from the left side of today’s basilica to almost to get to the Tiber. The Carceres area, from where the chariots left, was located at the point from which the Via del Sant’Uffizio leaves Piazza Pio XII, while that of the curved side can be traced a few tens of meters after the apse of St. Peter’s Basilica. The work, begun by Caligula and completed by

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February 14, 2022 6:17 pm
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The Pope has decided to stay in Santa Marta

The papal apartment on the third floor of the Apostolic Palace is ready, after the rapid maintenance work needed to put it back in again after eight years of the pontificate of Benedict XVI. But Francis Pope will move there, at least for now and for the foreseeable future, as early this morning by the Argentine newspaper La Nacion. “Until further notice,” announced the Vatican spokesman, Father Federico Lombardi, the Pope will remain up in the Argentine Domus Sancta Marthae, the residence housed the Vatican where the cardinals during the conclave and where normally inhabit a few dozen priests and bishops in service within the Vatican. Another half of the rooms is available instead of bishops and cardinals passing through Rome for hearings and meetings.

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March 27, 2013 6:48 am

The historical meeting of the two popes, We are brothers

Walk together after dinner crossing their impressions on the priority of the Church. Both excited, they give the “you” feel to be the protagonists of an event unprecedented in history. Then the images of the Vatican Television Center show Francis and Benedict in conversation, sitting in a living room. On the low table that divides them lean a white box with documents and within this there is a sealed envelope. Knelt before the image of Our Lady and prayed together.

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March 23, 2013 8:31 pm
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The real power of the Pope is to serve the most vulnerable

Explosions of popular joy alternating with silences of intense prayer. Francis has spoken out this morning in St. Peter’s Square for the inaugural mass, which officially began his pontificate. Before receiving from the hands of Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran and Angelo Sodano respectively the pallium and the ring of the fisherman, the Pope chose the coat of arms and the motto of his pontificate. “Miserable atque eligendo” is the cliche insert in his papal coat of arms. The Pope at one point he did stop the jeep to go down into the crowd and kiss a paraplegic. More than 130 delegations from around the world are: 31 heads of state, six reigning monarchs, hereditary 3 Principles, 11 heads of government. Thirty-three delegations from churches and Christian denominations, including the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, Bartholomew I. Also present were the delegation Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, sick, Jain. 180 concelebrants. The Pope fell in procession with the Patriarchs of the Eastern Churches at the Tomb of St. Peter.

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March 19, 2013 4:27 pm
Spiral Straircase Vatican

Pope Francis went to pray to St. Maria Maggiore

Pope Francesco I arrived a few minutes after 8 AM in Santa Maria Maggiore, one of the main churches of the capital, which is located outside the Vatican. The Pope entered the church by a side entrance. Waiting for fifty people, most of them reporters and photographers. After half an hour left Papa Francesco Santa Maria Maggiore, after praying in the Pauline Chapel of the Basilica, which is the image of the Salus Populi Romani which gives its name to Santa Maria Maggiore. The Pope was accompanied by the prefect of the Pontifical Household George Gaenswein, private secretary of Benedict XVI, and the vice-Father Leonardo Sapienza.

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March 14, 2013 7:08 am

Bergoglio, the Jesuit Pope that takes the subway

VATICAN CITYThe new Pope, the Argentine Jorge Mario Bergoglio, a Jesuit, 76 years was Cardinal Ratzinger already the most votes after the last conclave. Bergoglio was a cardinal abnormal. He always refused positions in the Roman Curia and the Vatican has always come only when it was really necessary. Among the vices of men of the Church that bears less is the “spiritual worldliness’ careerism church disguised as a refinement to the clerical forms.

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March 13, 2013 7:50 pm
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Habemus Papam: Is Bergoglio

Lombardi: The courage of Cardinalschoice of Pope Bergoglio is a “surprise” and it was a choice that demonstrates “the courage of the cardinals to broaden perspectives. It is the first time a pope from another continent. ” Father Federico Lombardi, director of the Vatican press office accepts her the choice of his successor Benedict XVI. A Pope who demonstrates “style of simplicity and evangelical witness” and that is also a continuity with Benedict XVI. For Lombardi is “a good response to the expectations of the people of Latin America.”21:19 “The Pope has said he wants to pray Our Lady and tomorrow will probably be in Santa Maria Maggiore.” He said the director of the Vatican press office, Father Federico Lombardi, in press briefing

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March 13, 2013 7:33 pm