Why on earth are we sporting a picture of the Pantheon on the Solemnity of All Saints? We could make our readers guess and hold a little contest in the comment box to see which of our readers knows the history of today's Solemnity...but it's not fair to make our readers guess. The Pantheon was built by the Emperor Hadrian as a temple for "all gods" -- hence the name, borrowed from the Greek. About three centuries after the Church began commemorating "all martyrs" Pope St. Boniface IV dedicated the Pantheon as a Christian Church under the patronage of the Mother of God and the Holy Martyrs. Over the course of the next two centuries (and thanks to a couple of Popes named "Gregory") a Chapel in St. Peter's Basilica was dedicated to "all saints" and the Solemnity was formally extended to the whole Church on 1 November. A happy Solemnity to all our readers!"A sad saint is a sorry saint!"
St. Francis de Sales
St. Francis de Sales
No comments:
Post a Comment