Upon this Rock

On this date in 1506, which was the first Sunday after Easter, a crowd gathered at the edge of a deep excavation.  As a procession of Cardinals, dignitaries, and Pope Julius II arrived, the crowd split to allow those esteemed members of the community to get closer to the excavation.  After blessing the site, Julius, dressed in a papal regalia of which Benedict XVI would be proud, made his way down 25 feet to the base of the hole, needing to use several ladders within  the terraced pit.  He took with him holy water and an urn of medallions.  As he climbed down, the crowd above moved ever closer to the edge causing part of the edge to fall, making Julius wonder whether he would be buried alive.  Gasps from the crowd were probably more of whether God was going to strike back at the desecration Julius had unleashed.  Julius survived.  He first laid, below the location of the stone, the urn holding a dozen commemorative medals, which had his likeness on one side, and a drawing of the proposed building on the other.  Julius would then place the first stone-- a block of marble--over the location of the urn.   This was the first stone of a new Basilica.  It would be the first stone in what would become the first of four main piers to support the proposed dome of a new Basilica.  Julius’ proposed structure would replace the hallowed building first constructed on this site by Emperor Constantine beginning in 320, and completed about 30 years later.  Combining the vagaries of the human condition, with the fortunes of history, the new basilica would take over four times as long to complete its primary construction as did the first Basilica.  The construction of the second St. Peter’s Basilica is a metaphor for the man for whom it is named, the human condition, and the Church of Rome.  Each of the three would see splendor and scandal, genius and failure, triumph and tragedy.  Today, Good Friday, perhaps more than any other one day of the year best reflects the dichotomy present in each of the three.

Cut away view of old St. Peter's (Source:  U. of Pittsburgh, on-line))

St. Peter was an interesting choice, by Jesus Christ, to be the first mortal leader of men to run what would become an institution sprawled to the ends of the earth.   “Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church.”  Peter, like most fisherman of the time, was likely gruff, rather short with others, and was irresolute in character, and would often speak without thinking.  He lacked the courage of Thomas, and the enduring poetry of John.  But he made up for this with zeal, and enthusiasm.  In other words, he was human—like us.

Foundation of Simon Peter's home in Caphernum (April 2013)

Julius II was, in some respects, like Peter, he was brash, iron-willed, impatient, and at the time of his pontificate he was in the twilight of his life.  Unlike Peter, but like other Renaissance Popes, his private life was not what one would expect from the leader of the Catholic Church.  Although not rising to the licentiousness of Alexander VI, Julius nonetheless had fathered three illegitimate daughters, not all perhaps before taking Holy Orders.  Julius was the nephew of Pope Sixtus IV, and would become a Cardinal at age 16.  The word nepotism is derived from the Italian word for nephew.  Julius would be the new Caesar.  He would undo the work already underway to strengthen and expand the Basilica Constantine had constructed 1200 years earlier.  The original Basilica saw the coronation of kings, the consecration of 184 popes and contained the remains of a large number of saints and martyrs.  The excavation for the first stone was not on virgin soil, and if Julius cared to examine the cross section of the pit as he descended he could have seen over a millennia of history displayed within the soil horizon.  To the faithful it was a scandal to destroy a church so old, so Roman, so very much a part of its history.  But Julius would set in place the beginnings of a building that would be impossible to replicate today.  The objections he heard instead of giving pause, would drive him forward.

Footprints of Caligula's Circus, Old St Peter's (dark line)
and new St. Peter's (light gray) (Source: Columbia University on-line)

Yet, Julius was a generous and discriminating patron to artists, scholars and musicians.  Without him, there would be no Sistine Chapel ceiling, and much of the art that drives thousands to Rome would not be present.  Yet, for this second building he turned to a middle-aged man who had no great buildings to his name, but Donato Bramante did have one building, the Tempietto, which was still under construction, but had graceful proportions, and a beauty so grand, and without a superfluous detail that nothing like it had been constructed since the times of the Roman Empire.  Bramante is the least known of the four giants of the Renaissance.  He was a rival of Michelangelo, a friend of Leonardo, and a mentor to Raphael.  All but Leonardo would have a hand in this grand undertaking.  Bramante would study the techniques of the Romans, measure their buildings, discern the lost techniques, and study the one book remaining from the fall of the empire that dealt with Roman architecture.  In 1505 Julius accepted the Greek cross design for the new Basilica.  He would unite the Roman Basilica and the Roman temple designs to set forth the new Christian Basilica.  His plan was one-third the size of what St. Peter’s is today, but it was still of grand size, building on the Roman ego of more is better.  His plan was a testament to the Renaissance with its proportionality, its color, its discernment.  Knowing that he would not see the end of the construction, Bramante began work on the piers which would hold the dome.  The dome was envisioned as the signature piece of the structure.  The building would expand out, not unlike what the twelve Apostles had done to spread the word of the son of a carpenter from a small outpost in the Roman Empire.

View of the Baldicchino by Bernini (Nov. 1990)

Simon, who was to be renamed Peter, by Jesus, was a fisherman living in Capernum, in an octagonal shaped house near the temple, with his wife, children, and his mother-in-law.  Simon was following John the Baptist, and would be introduced to Jesus by his brother Andrew.  Peter was rash, and bold and would act without thinking, but was also easily altered by external influences and did not deal well with difficulty.  Peter was one of three apostles to view the transfiguration of Christ. In a test of his faith, Peter was the one Christ called to walk out on the water.  In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus would take Peter, James and John with him while he went to pray, ask them to remain awake, but they would fall asleep.  Jesus would rebuke them, and end the rebuke with the famous words that describe humanity to this day, “the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.”  Two additional times he would go to pray only to return and see them sleeping.

View of St. Peter's Basilica from across the Tiber (Nov. 1990)

The construction of the basilica would span over 150 years and 22 pontificates.  Julius’ banker would suggest the use of indulgences to pay for the construction of the endeavor.  Julius would not discard the advice, but not put it in practice right away either.  To the Roman mind the use of an indulgence to pay for a building project was not new, and was accepted practice.  The church would pay a steep price for this method of financing construction which hit its peak under Leo X, a de Medici pope, who along with relative Clement VII, would desire more for his family than for the church.  It was during Leo’s reign that a little known Augustinian Monk in Germany would post his 95 thesis on the door of German church.  The practice of paying for an indulgence was apparently not highly thought of in the Teutonic north.  Raphael, the Bramante protégé, would succeed his mentor under Leo X.  Unfortunately, Raphael was a brilliant artist, but had a short life and was not quite the man up to managing a large project.  Perhaps under a different pontiff the results would have been different.  A pontiff like Julius would likely have dealt with the matter of coming reformation quickly, but the party boy Leo put it off, and the church would pay a steep price.  One wonders if Julius would pursue the goal of this grand endeavor if he had known the pain and price the church would pay.  Julius should have known that not all pontiffs would be able to face difficulties in the way he had done so.  The de Medici Popes would go down in history for their level of incompetence. 

Interior of part of the Dome (Nov. 1990)

The second of the two successive de Medici Popes was Clement VII.  A man with a history of vacillation, Clement essentially was self- imprisoned during the 1527 sack of Rome in Castel St. Angelo.  Much of Rome, and her citizens were destroyed during the sack by mutinous troops of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V.  A portion of the group who did the sack followed the new brought teachings of Martin Luther.  Of course, adventures of this kind often gather the bandits, non-contents, not unlike the Syria civil war being fought today, so the sack was by a mixed group each with their own purpose.  It was the pillage, rape, and destruction of a proud city.  While not the first sack, as Rome was sacked during the fall of the Roman Empire, it had repercussions beyond Rome itself.  With Clement imprisoned, he could not well attend to the situation brewing in England with Henry VIII, as Clement did not wish to further offend the Emperor by granting Henry a divorce from his Aunt, Catherine of Aragon.    Although, given Clement, it may have had the same outcome.   The event would also mark the end of the Renaissance in a city, when considered with Florence, was synonymous with the Renaissance.  The population would fall from 55,000 before the sack to about 10,000, with perhaps up to 12,000 of the lost souls having been murdered during the pillage. 

Mosaic of St. Mark.  To indicate proportion, the pen in his hand (look below the letter A) is
5' 2" long, or the height of my spouse.  The letters above are over 6.5' in height. (Nov. 1990)

Peter would awake that fateful night in the Garden of Gethsemane to Jesus being faced by Judas and soldiers who had come to claim him.  Showing his bravado, Peter would desire to defend Jesus, but would back off due to words of Jesus.  Jesus likely saved Peter from a greater humiliation of having been cut down by the sword of a centurion.  While Peter was considered to be a stout, strongly built man for the time, his sword skills were likely little match for a Roman soldier or the police of the chief priests.  Peter would take flight from the scene, but his eyes would meet those of Jesus later, just before dawn.  

Statutes on St. Peter's Basilica (Nov. 1990)

Following the de Medici popes, Paul Farnese would take the see of Peter, and the name Paul III, and the church would see a new dawn.  Paul, too had a mistress and would father four children, but unlike other Popes of the time, had there is no record of sexual activity during his reign as pontiff.  Paul realized the need for moral men and that the old ways of business in Rome were no longer acceptable.  Paul would convene the Council of Trent which would set in motion the Counter Reformation, and regain at least some moral authority.  His trump card for countering the Reformation, however, was that of the second of two architects he would appoint.   The first architect, he appointed would be Sangallo, who raised the floor which required alterations to alcoves Bramante had placed within them, and he strengthened Bramante’s already large piers. While Sangallo was at work on the Basilica, it would take all of Paul’s wily negotiating skills to bring forth the man, to fresco the Last Judgment in the Sistine Chapel.  Paul would turn to this man to be chief architect when Sangallo had passed.  This artist was a man who was unkempt, engrossed in his work, felt slighted by the actions of Bramante and the young Raphael, but yet who cared for his soul to take on the commission of continuing work on the project conceived by the Pontiff for whom he had painted the Sistine Chapel.  At an age when most men have been well retired, Michelangelo would answer the call of Paul III.  Paul gave him free reign and he used it to not only put his imprint on the building, but to reign in the graft and corruption that had become so rampant in the project. He not only managed the project with an iron will, but he brought his genius to bear.  Up to this point no architect had quite figured out how Bramante had intended to build the dome, but this genius of the Renaissance figured a way, and started construction on the drum.  Bramante set in motion the width of the dome by the dimensions of the piers, but Michelangelo would take that to a new level with his drum. 

However, the dome would not be completed by Michelangelo, but by one of his workers, who would succeed him as chief architect.  The first modern urban planner of Rome, Pope SIxtus V, would not only see to it that Rome rose from the ashes of the sack, but he would appointment of della Porta would continue the efforts of Michelangelo.  For the next 50 years, no Pope would wish to depart from the gifts of the greatest artist of the Renaissance.  Bramante’s piers had taken seven years (not including the two times they were strengthened), and the master had taken 17 to complete the drum, and here the lowly della Porta was given 30 months to complete signature piece of the one of the greatest buildings constructed by man.  Della Porta would do it in under 22 months, which would belie the engineering feat that it was.  He would alter Michelangelo’s design to make it more practical to construct, but also construct a double dome as envisioned by his mentor.  The outer dome would be more appealing in height and magnificence from the outside, but the lower inner dome would best recognize the required proportionality so important to the beauty of the age.  It was May 1590 when the last stone for the cupola was blessed and a week later Sixtus V would proclaim the vaulting of the cupola complete.  This was the symbol of a city rising from the ashes and rebuilding itself.  The dome rises 438 feet, and has a 138 foot diameter.  It is three times the height of the Roman Pantheon, 100’ higher than the Duomo in Florence.  Every ornamentation would have to be large to be seen and more importantly proportioned to the dome. 

Maderno's Facade from the Square, notice how little of the Dome
 is visible due to the extension to form a Latin Cross (Nov. 1990)

As the church entered its next century, the Counter Reformation was well at work, the Pope was becoming a model of a Christian life.  Paul V, Camillo Borghese, was prudent, practical and a model of decorum.  It would be Paul V who would be the first to alter the design of Bramante-Michelangelo-della Porta.  He would claim the Greek cross to Byzantine, and would demand a Latin cross, in part due to the need to accommodate large crowds within the building, and that the building should be at least as large as was the first basilica.  This was yet another scandal, changing from the design of Michelangelo.  Like Julius II, Paul V forged ahead.  160 years earlier the experts had said Constantine’s church would fall, but the last mass in this once grand building was celebrated in 1608, and in that year the final parts of the first great basilica were brought down to the earth.  Carlo Maderno would earn the rite to extend the nave, and he did it so well that when inside you cannot tell what was Michelangelo’s and what was Maderno’s.  Little seen is that he adjusted the nave to be on center with the obelisk that was relocated from Caligula’s (also known as Nero's) circus by Sixtus V (moving this granite edifice is considered one of the great engineering marvels).  Yet, Maderno is criticized to this day.  Some claim his facade is too narrow for its height (I see the main problem as his front being too high blocking a view of much of the dome while in the plaza), too heavy in the attic, too cramped in detail; of course, how dare he alter the Michelangelo plan.  His addition gives us the 60,000 person capacity building which awes us today.  It is huge, but its proportion is so well accomplished that it does not seem overly huge.

Bernini's Colonnade from roof of St. Peter's (Nov. 1990)

The second Basilica was consecrated on November 18, 1626, 1300 years to the day after Pope Sylvester I dedicated the first St. Peter’s.  While the building was enclosed, a great Baroque artist would give the building its soul.  He would cover the altar with the large bronze Baldacchino.  Author R. Scotti writes: “Without the Baldacchino, St. Peter’s would be a fantasia of soaring space, mosaics, gilt, colored stone, columns, niches, statutes, chapels and sepulchers.  Amid the sensory overload, the papal altar—the single element that gives meaning to the vast undertaking—would be lost.”  It is at the altar where the wheat and wine are turned into body and blood.  Bernini would be run out of town when a bell tower he was constructing would falter, but he would be back under Alexander the VII, who was quite unlike his prior namesake.  An interesting aspect, is that he was the grandnephew of the banker who had recommended the sale of indulgences to finance construction. Together the two, Bernini and Alexander VII, would complete the Basilica.  Perhaps their most impressive undertaking is the colonnade and the plaza we so recognize today.  This colonnade represents the arms of the church reaching out to gather the many.  The additions by Bernini bring emotion into play, and emotions are the essence of us earth-born.  It is what makes us human.

Colonnade as viewed from disc in the square, where all four columns perfectly
line behind the other, with only the front visible (Nov. 1990)

The greatest religious building on earth is named for the man who had claimed undying loyalty to Jesus, and in fact would die for him, but within a few hours of that proclamation, on the first Good Friday, he would deny knowing Jesus, not once, but three times! Within a span of hours Peter, the Rock, had changed his opinion, he had succumb to concern of his own life.  Peter recognized his frailty.  When he was to be crucified by Nero in Rome, at Nero's (Also known as Caligula's) Circus, he asked to be crucified upside down.  Christ did not choose a perfect man to lead his church.  It is over his grave that the magnificent St. Peter's sits.

Bronze Statue of St. Peter, notice the wear on his feet

Up close photo of feet, worn by the touch of many hands.
A tactical expression of devotion this man. (Photos from Wikipedia)

The Popes who built St. Peter’s Basilica were not perfect men, but were flawed, were human.  The Church is much more than a building, it is a collection of ideas and more importantly the elemental natures of forgiveness, and salvation.  As Drew Christianson, SJ has written about this holy week:  “So, this week if you would draw near to Jesus in his suffering and death, take on the mind of the one who humbled himself and assumed our human vulnerability and mortality (Phil 2:5-7).  ‘Go to the edges,’ as Pope Francis likes to say, draw close to the poor, the uneducated, the sick and impaired, the intellectually challenged, the frail elderly, especially those suffering dementia, and serve them. For that is where Christ himself would be. That is where Christ wants us to be.”  

Steps on which Peter denied Christ,
Jerusalem next to Chief Priest Caiaphas' Residence (April 2013)

Great architecture does not go to the edge.  Neither does a great building of stone .  But, architecture and stone do inspire us.  They make us want to be better, to use the gifts provided by our creator, and in it we see the power of the human spirit.  For some, like Bramante, Michelangelo, Raphael, della Porta, Bernini and even Maderno, it involves using mind and hands to turn a collection of stones into something grand, for others their gifts involve somethings different, but for all it should involve acts of mercy.  The vulnerabilities, foibles, and frailties that we have are offset by the splendor, sublime and surprising that we can undertake.  No one building more than St. Peter’s Basilica, no one man more than St. Peter, and no one day more than Good Friday represent this on-going dichotomy of being human.  Without Good Friday, there would have been no Easter Sunday.

Have a Blessed Easter!

Note:  Unless otherwise noted, all photos by the author