In Via
Planning a trip? Or just on the pilgrimage of daily living? We are the podcast at the intersection of faith and travel, assisting you on the journey to encounter Christ. Hear stories, discover travel tips, and learn more about our Catholic faith. Along the way, we’ll show you that if God seeks to meet us in Jerusalem, Rome, Lourdes, Mexico City, or Santiago, he also wants to encounter you - right there in your car, on your run, or in the middle of your workday.
In Via
A Lenten Journey Through Rome's Station Churches with Crux Stationalis
Come with us through the cobblestone pathways of Rome as Joan and her friend Jacob Stein, a Nebraskan turned Italian local, unveil the spiritual significance of the Roman station churches. With each step, we trace the footsteps of countless pilgrims throughout a storied 1600-year-old Lenten tradition, finding profound connections to the martyrs and the very roots of our faith.
Imagine the early morning walks to churches like St. Paul's Outside the Walls, a commitment that is shared amongst American seminarians and priests who study in Rome and the global Catholic community that calls Rome home. Jacob's own transformative experience with a station church during a high school pilgrimage ignited a passion that he now aims to share with the world, bringing Rome's solemn Lenten journey to life through the stories, photos, and videos posted on his platforms.
As we prepare for Easter, Jacob generously extends an invitation to a virtual tour of these hallowed grounds, an offering that complements our podcast with a visual embrace of Rome's holy spaces. In this time of Lent, we are reminded of the essence of fasting and the introspection it calls for. Let's walk this pilgrimage together this Lent, enriched by the history and beauty of Rome's station churches.
Jacob's work can be found
www.RomanStationChurch.com
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCz7lOHRSsZiDBig_2jFZGDw
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cruxstationalis/
Facebook: facebook.com/cruxstationalis
Welcome to In Via the podcast where we're navigating the pilgrimage of life. We are all in via on the way and we are learning a lot as we go. I'm your host, Joan Watson. Join me as we listen to stories, discover travel tips and learn more about our Catholic faith. Along the way, we'll see that if God seeks to meet us in Jerusalem, Rome or Santiago, He also wants to encounter you right there in your car, on your run or in the middle of your workday. So welcome back everyone. Welcome back to In Via the podcast, where we are navigating the pilgrimage of life, but looking at the pilgrimage of life through actual pilgrimages, places. We're going places and we're talking to people about pilgrimage. And today I'm really excited to talk about actually one of my favorite traditions in Rome and it's all about pilgrimage. And we are here to talk about one of the experts of this tradition in Rome, my friend Jacob. Good morning, Jacob, or good afternoon, I should say.
Jacob:Good afternoon for me in Rome, but good morning to you. Yeah, I'm Jacob Stein and we met virtually during the COVID years. You were doing a podcast on the Roman station churches and I was just beginning my sort of social media jump with the station churches, so that's how we met. So I was very encouraged that more and more people were sharing this beautiful tradition. So that's what I do, as you know, and as you said. The first, I think I should introduce myself.
Joan:Yes, go right ahead. And I always have people say three sentences about themselves. Some people are a little more liberal and a little more conservative about those three sentences, so I will just let you introduce yourself to our listeners.
Jacob:Okay, so there might be compound sentences
Joan:That's legit, that's okay.
Jacob:But I am a Nebraskan and I live in Rome and live in Italy. Of course, I love Italian food so I know how to cook and my expert dish with that is risotto. You can ask any Italian. I make a wonderful risotto and I love the church. So I'm happy to talk about the church and for me, I love the church and her tradition, especially in Rome, of the Roman station churches, which is really, at least for the Roman church, is the oldest. Pilgrimage means in the church, and so that's. I'm really happy that we're here to talk about pilgrimage and the Roman station churches, because it's more than three sentences.
Joan:Yeah, no, no, that's good and yeah, it's just. It's perfect timing to talk about this, Although I think a lot of us and we'll get into the whole history a lot of us equate the station churches with Lent, as we're about to embark in the season of Lent. But you know, they kind of go beyond Lent, but we think of them as Lent and I love talking about them because you know, we talk on this podcast a lot about pilgrimage and people think I live in America. A pilgrimage is me going to Rome. You know, in the medieval, you know there were the main pilgrimage sites in the Middle Ages, especially, you know, Jerusalem, Santiago, Rome.
Joan:But this is a little different because we're actually talking in some ways, about Romans going on pilgrimage in Rome, and so I can't wait to talk about it as well and I'm yeah, I'm so excited you agreed to do it. Tell us a little bit before we get into what are the station churches. Tell us a little bit more and I know we'll talk about this later in the episode when we talk about how we can engage in the station churches during Lent but tell us a little bit more about, like, what is your day to day life look like right now in Rome and what's kind of your work look like in, even in broad strokes.
Jacob:Well, lent makes it a very busy schedule. There's a few options throughout the course of Lent for those who are doing the Roman station churches, but you know, I'm a student, I work, I translate and I do tours and I do a lot of social media. I manage different pages on social media, catholic pages, different chapels in Rome and things like that. So that keeps me busy throughout the rest of the year. But Lent, you know, tomorrow we're going to begin, we're going to be jumping into Lent with Ash Wednesday, the whole church, because day which liturgically doesn't really it's not a holy day of obligation. Of course we all have to fast, but you're walking around, at least in America and in Rome they put the ashes on the crown of your head, reminiscent of the of the tonsure of clerics, but as we know, in America we usually get ashes on our forehead. So we're walking around and everyone's knowing, oh, I have to go to church today which they don't really have to go to church. But there's this spirit of renewal in this sort of season which kind of becomes very, can be heavy for us and it can be, you know, scary or burdensome as we begin, whatever penances we have and the beautiful thing about Rome and for the Romans is they have this ancient, you know, more than 1600 year pilgrimage that the Romans have been doing and it grew out of a devotion, out of the devotion primarily to the martyrs, and so you know this pilgrimage for the Romans of the Roman station churches. With Lent it, as you said, it expanded to different periods of the year for Advent, for the ember days, where the the Church of Rome would really focus and implore God for graces, as as the Church of Rome was ordaining new priests, and Also give gratitude to our Lord for the bounty of of harvests and economy and things like that. But for Lent, we go from one tomb of a martyr to another tomb of a martyr and and that really shows, I mean, that we know that the seed of the Church of Rome is the blood of the martyrs and and the Romans feel that.
Jacob:And so I'm a foreigner, as I said, I'm from Nebraska. I live in Rome as a foreigner. This is the way that I've been able to over the years that I've been here. I've been here for eight coming on, this is my ninth year here and it's the way that I've been able to enter into this local Church of Rome, which I think we're gonna talk about. We're gonna have to talk about this more because my my work at Crux Stationalis, which is a I chose a Latin word which maybe wasn't the smartest thing but my work at Crux Stationalis, you're talking to the in via podcast too, so and so what I try to do is show that we can follow this tradition universally, that it's, it is this prized possession that the Romans have.
Jacob:But we're all Roman, at least in the West, so we're and we're able to do this, and I and I. There's been very beautiful Traditions that other churches have that know in Chicago, the St John Cantius Community. There they put up a sign every day which says the station church and maybe if they have a relic of the martyr they would put that as well. And I've seen other traditions of some some churches. Some people tell me that their parishioners will come every day for the Masses and they'll have a Mass at a different altar of the church During one week of lent or things like that ways which they're kind of reinventing these Roman station traditions in their own locality. But everything kind of brings back and connects and shows that we all have this possession Of what the church has, and it's kind of a jealous possession which is a pretty beautiful thing.
Joan:Yeah, because, like you said, I mean Especially because the station church originally was so united to the papacy and the Pope would go on pilgrimage that we're all united to him, and so how can we celebrate it even though we're not living in Rome? And so we'll talk about that at the end. But I want to back up and, like, just explain to people. You keep using the word station and I think, as Americans, we think of the stations of the cross or we think of train stations, and so what do you mean by this idea of a station church?
Jacob:so.
Joan:So the you know the ancient tradition would be they would meet at a Colletta, which we say that we use that same word when we begin mass, the collect of the masses, prayer which Gathers us, from the Latin so they gathered, we called it the opening prayer for a while, just to kind of tell people like it used to be called the opening prayer, and I'm glad that we've gone back now to calling it the collect, because it has this Idea of collecting our prayers, and so so it's the. Oh, for those who are like what's he talking about, it's the opening prayer, so it's the same, that same word. So sorry, go on, continue.
Jacob:Oh yeah that opening prayer at mass.
Jacob:And so there's that aspect where they would have gathered at this collect church, this collector, this opening prayer church, and it would gather there with the Pope, with they'd all stand behind a crooks Stacionalis, which is why I chose this word, so it's a cross of the station.
Jacob:So each neighborhood in Rome, would you know, there'd be deacons which were assigned there for their own, the services in the, in the, to take care of the poor, to take care of the widows in those neighborhoods of Rome, and they would gather behind that deacon who would be burying that cross and then, with the Holy Father, they would process, you know, all in this grand, I don't know how they did it every day during length, the city had to, you know, obviously the city was much smaller and much more tied up with, you know, it's religion, but they would gather behind this cross and then they would go to a stazio or the station when they would stop, and so that would be the station of this Martyr where the martyr is buried. So nowadays we see these beautiful Baroque churches, or sometimes, you know, we've, they've been returned to, you know, these paleo-Christian or medieval, you know remnants of frescoes and things like that. But and we might, that might confuse us and think we're going to this massive, beautiful church because the church is important. Well, the reason the church is important is because of that relic of that martyr who's there, or the, or the whole, you know, corpse of the of the martyr that's there, and things like that. So. So the station signifies this pause, this Stazio procession to where we go, to a fixed point and we pause and stop on that day, and in Lent we do that every day.
Joan:So and so every day has a different church throughout Rome, the oldest churches in Rome. I think what you explained so and we can talk about what we do this now today in Rome. But what you're describing is going to this church and processing from is probably most clearly seen in on Ash Wednesday. You know, when they do gather. Is it at San Anselmo? Is that correct?
Jacob:And then they process to.
Joan:Santa Sabina. Right, like this idea that, like now, we're going not just to the church of Santa Sabina but we're going to the tomb of Santa Sabina, correct?
Jacob:and that's new In a sense, it was Pope John Paul, the Pope John the 23rd, who brought this tradition back. So this tradition was locked, was almost lost, because you had the Avignon Papacy, where all of these French popes you know, the papacy was in France and so these Roman traditions weren't carried on. And and then, when, once the papacy came back, thanks to St Catherine of Siena, to Rome, it took. It never took on its full force. And then you have reform and revolutions, and political revolutions, and it was illegal to have processions, religious processions, out in the streets. And and it was really, it was a Classmate of Pius the 12th who was the one priest they call him I forget what they call him in Italian, but they call him the station church priest, basically and he maintained this devotion Because there was also this would have been in the 1930s that he was able to resurrect this after the Lateran Treaty in 1927. And so he wasn't alone in that work, because there was also a renewed fervor of devotion to the martyrs through what's called.
Jacob:Now it's called a Pontifical Academy of the Cult of Roman Martyrs, and they're the ones who really maintain this tradition nowadays in Rome, but the growth of their devotion has been over the last hundred, now 140 years. Where the catacombs have been discovered, and underneath Santa Presede, which is St Praxides, which is also a Roman station church For those, of you listeners who have been to Rome.
Jacob:it's one of the most iconic churches. The frescoes are beautiful. The relic of the flagellation column is there it's right there by St Mary Major. It was there that a lot of relics were kept, and they were found by one priest who was involved in this expuleration of the catacombs and archeological sites, named Jean Giovanni Battista Rossi. And so the new fervor that we have in Rome, thanks to the North American college and their seminarians, thanks to the Germans who also carry on a great devotion through these Roman station churches, and as well as this original group which has maintained this tradition for the last hundred years. It grows every year and there's more and more people talking about it, and so that's how I came exploring it.
Joan:Yeah, so it's this ancient tradition. I mean, we have records of the station churches. Early on it was like Pope Gregory the Great and Leo and these ancient, like in the first thousand years they had kind of this set okay, these are the stations of Rome, and then it's lost and then it's brought back. So we have this renewed fervor for this ancient tradition. And so what I love about the station churches is that every year it follows the church calendar and every year Ash Wednesday is the same church, and every year the day after Ash Wednesday is the same church.
Joan:And so when you live it to me, you start to count time by the church calendar, in a sense, right. And so I'm like, oh, it's the church, it's St George, right, it's on Georgia. And rather than like, oh, it's February 16th, right, you think about this time differently, which I really love. Like Ash Wednesday to me will always be it's Santa Sabina's day and to celebrate. And like I have a nephew, george, and I always text him on San Giorgio station church because it's not the feast of St George, but it's a very special day for George because we persist to his tomb. And so I love this kind of double counting of time, in a sense, where we're taken out of our chronos, in a sense time, and taken into this Kairos time of liturgical time. So I love, and I always love, going back to the ancient traditions, right, like this is something in America, you know, 1776 is ancient history and in Rome it's like, oh yeah, pope Leo III established these, you know.
Jacob:and so just taking us back into this rich history that we have as Catholics so often we don't see here in America, right, but so, even so, when I first well, I'll have to say this my first day in Rome, I went to a station church and that was when I was on pilgrimage, when I was a senior in high school, a long time ago, but I didn't know anything about it, but I was on pilgrimage with a priest who had studied at the North American college and so already in the 90s, 2000s, the you know a lot of American priests, which is beautiful. A lot of American priests who are now serving in America have this experience and I hope you know there are some who become very devoted. They go every day in the mornings is when the Americans go at 7am. It's very speedy, expedient sort of, but prayerful and quiet way of experiencing the application churches.
Joan:Whereas many of them walk there, right? I mean, like even today, like a lot of the seminarians will walk there from the North American, which is a huge sacrifice when you're talking about, like St Paul's side, the walls at 7am, right.
Jacob:Yeah, leaving at 6 or even the 545 in order to get there, santa Sabina the only time I've been able to go to Santa Sabina was with the North American College and, yeah, I think I it's not. It's not in the center, easily accessible. Yeah, so, because these churches are where St Paul, st Paul's is, outside the walls he was buried, you know, it's three miles away from St Peter's Basilica, st Peter's outside the center of Rome. Luckily, the North American College is right there. Yeah, for the Americans, but no, the I really I was in America, so then I go back to America.
Jacob:I had this experience of pilgrimage. I had, I studied abroad for a semester and and in Rome, and I have a friend, actually a Roman, who, for since 2013, 2014, has been going every day to the Roman and she was the one who sort of led. We call her the Pellegrino Romano, the Roman pilgrim, because she would be taking photos every day of the stations in the evenings, with the processions, with the relics where so? The Church of Rome in the evenings. Thanks to this, this academia, this academy which carries on this cult of the martyrs, they bring out relics of the parish priest, but it's taken years to sort of train the parish priest to be amenable to these traditions. It shows you that the faithful it's really, it's in our blood. It's in our blood to do, and it has to be the strength of our faith to sort of push, devotion, to push to the challenge, that this is the beauty of the church, that we all have this sort of voice, simply by the way, we kneel down and pray. And.
Jacob:But she worked in, she, she just did it as a fun thing. She put the, she put the photos on her Facebook and then a friend would take them who has a liturgical blog and he was working on. Every day or once a week they would publish these photos. So I'd be following from, you know, nebraska, watching these photos. And then, when I came to Rome and I moved to Rome, I said, well, I have to be doing this. So I finally came along with her and then I wanted to share this. You know it formed its form to me over the years that I've been in Rome.
Joan:So this is the perfect time to ask you know you talk about your time in Nebraska and living kind of vicariously through this Roman tradition. For those of us who aren't in Rome, how can we live the station tradition and how might you help us live this through these days of?
Jacob:the well there's. I'm all over social media so I try to live it myself More and more each year as your, as I'm going through, I'm going to the evening masses usually. Sometimes I go join the Americans in the morning. So what happens? As I said, the Americans go in the morning at 7am and the Italians are there at a different hour every night. So, depending on my academic schedule or my work schedule, I'm able to go in the evenings. And so I go, I take photos, I film, I join in with the processions, Sometimes I sing louder than the others, depending on what, which community we're in, because each we're kind of going and joining in the communities.
Jacob:So even even for us Romans, it's not like we go to these churches. We go to these churches once a year and we all know each other, the ones who go every evening. So it becomes a little community. But we kind of go and impose. So in the same way I try to let you know via social media, I try to let all of you impose upon my daily, you know, spiritual pilgrimage during Lent.
Jacob:And so I have videos. There's videos where I give tours of the churches, short devotional things, sometimes, sometimes a bit longer, going into the history and those are all on. I have a website called romanstationchurchcom. And then on social media, I'm always under Cru stazionale, which will be sharing this happily share this podcast via that channel as well. And Instagram. Instagram is the easiest one.
Jacob:In fact, your mother is a faithful follower of mine on Instagram. She knows the church is really well. She loves Rome, so she follows through not just during length but throughout the rest of the year. The liturgy in Rome, the just, just, sometimes just a sunny Roman day, is what you get to experience on Crux stazionale. So I know a lot of people are going to be going off social media tomorrow as Lent begins with Ash Wednesday. But some people tell me I go off of social media but I watch your YouTube and I think YouTube helps us with that because it's a bit less social, engaging. Like I said, you can find me on YouTube group stats and there's always new videos coming every year and, yeah, that's the experience.
Joan:And we'll have all those links, of course, in the show notes for people. Because one thing I love about the station church is the station churches is like you mentioned, it's not like you're going to these churches every day. I studied in Rome twice, both of which were during Lent, and it's a way to see the history of Rome, it's a way to see the history of the church in these churches, that some of these churches are only open on their station church day and you're seeing the oldest churches. So you're seeing these great. I mean, yes, you're seeing St Peter's and St Paul's side of the walls, and Mary major and these churches that are very familiar to pilgrims.
Joan:But you're also seeing these like jewels. I mean there's some that I've never seen, like Santa Maria Navicella. You know, there's some that I've never even seen, that most people don't even know exist. But are these jewels like? One of my favorites is Santa Balbina, over by the past the Circus Maximus, right? Well, nobody goes to Santa Balbina, right? It's this little neighborhood church, but you become a pilgrim during Lent in Rome.
Joan:Another one of my favorites is Santa Prisca, which is at the very, very end, and she was an ancient martyr. Some say she was the earliest martyr in the West. There's some dispute about who she was, but if she was a young girl, she could have been the very first martyr in the West. And we have this beautiful church built, but it's tucked away on the Aventine Hill, away from the normal path, like you know, and so I love the station churches because it shows you this great history of Rome and you get to see these jewels just because you're taking a daily pilgrimage. And it is so unique to do a daily pilgrimage within your own city. I think it reminds us that pilgrimage doesn't have to be across the ocean, but this beautiful tradition that the Romans take a pilgrimage in their backyard you know, yeah, and it's a lot of work, so it really does become a Lenten penance.
Jacob:The nice thing is, as you just said, santa Prisca, and it brings to mind you go to Santa Prisca on the, on the the.
Joan:Tuesday, Tuesday of Holy Week, Tuesday of.
Jacob:Holy Week, and because some of you may, if some of you, if you've ever gone to the Latin mass during Lent, sometimes your hand missile might even have the name of the station.
Joan:So that's what that is.
Jacob:That's. That's your odd son, santa Prisca, on the Tuesday of Holy Week. But the beautiful thing, it's Holy Week and you've been going through. You know you're in 50 days of going to these churches and pilgrimages and yet when you go then there's wisteria flowing down from the walls and you have this sort of pre. You know, this anticipation of the joy that we're going to be celebrating in Easter Rome is getting a bit warmer, but you get the smells of the flowers, the city comes to greater life as you're going along and you're seeing neighborhoods, like I said, you don't normally see. You don't go to these churches or they're not open. And and it's interesting because I choose for Crux Stazionalis, you mentioned your. You know some of your favorite churches for Crux stazionalis, the. The image, the icon that I use is the mosaic from St Paul's outside the walls.
Jacob:And that is a kind of an obscure major basilica for a lot of people. Pilgrims come and they experience Romans. We don't tend to go that often, you know, and and so but it's a beautiful mosaic. It's a massive mosaic done by Venetian masters, the same ones who worked on the basilica and Venice of St Mark's and, and so the fun thing is also, we go there multiple times, so you get and you do this with a few of them St Mary major, st Peter's, you go for different reasons, so I'd say St Paul's. I kind of have to claim it as my favorite because I use it.
Joan:I know it's a bit weird, but I was expecting some obscure and you're right, like St Paul's other walls, even some pilgrims. You know, if you go to Rome you might not make it to St Paul's, which grieves me greatly because I love St Paul's other walls. I was expecting you to pick a favorite. That was completely obscure. I will so I kind of love, the fact that you pick St Paul's at the wall.
Jacob:So then I, then I opened my Instagram and I saw the icon, I said, well, okay, I had to choose that one, so there's that. But then also, some of the most beautiful traditions that we do in Rome are only done during Lent as well. Some of these processions it's the only time these relics are shown or for Passion Sunday, which is two Sundays before Easter. That's when some churches might veil their crucifixes in in all their sacred images, in violet, purple, in purple drapeings, and so in Rome, some churches do that not many, because everyone's coming to see the beautiful images and everything, but some churches still do, and in the beautiful thing within the, we go to St Peter's on that day.
Jacob:And we process with the litanies of the saints and then, after the evening liturgy, we process one more time and we go and we look up to the, the loja, which is holding the relics of, and in this case, the relic that they say is the veil of that's how they, that's how they announce it the relic that they say which is, or the icon that they say which is the veil of Veronica. So the Romans say that, the Canon say that at Rome. So my devotion is oh, I'm looking on palm of the veil of Veronica.
Jacob:But the beautiful thing is you know, all these churches have been veiled, be veiled. Christ has hidden in telling us, as we wait for Easter, all that we don't get to look on the face of Christ for two weeks. And yet the Romans get this little kind of again a jealous custody of being able to look one more time, even if it's hundreds of feet, feet away, one more time upon Christ upon his face, and then we go away. It's kind of this happy joy, you know, but sad moment in, because it's kind of sticks it to you one more time that two weeks we don't get to look upon, you know, christ on the cross face. But there's beautiful traditions like that which you know. The centuries of Roman history are filled with people who have done these very actions Catholics, you know, the faithful who really it uphold it and inspire the devotion that continues on.
Joan:Yeah, there's so much we can do for Lent. We're called to pray, to fast, to give alms, and everybody has their traditions during Lent, what they embrace and penance, and I encourage people to look at this tradition. Even if you can't make a pilgrimage, even if you're not in Rome and you can't make these daily pilgrimages, you can do them spiritually following Jacob's resources. There's a book called Roman pilgrimage by George Weigel that details each church and Liz Lev does the commentary on the art, and so you can. You know there's lots online. I know mountain the Catholic traveler. He still has a lot of resources on his website. You can follow along and so to really enter into and learn more about our faith through these pilgrimages, even if we can't do them physically, we can do them spiritually.
Joan:So I love, I actually have the for those of you watching the video, I have the Pancifical North Americans Little, the college's red book that they have published on each church, and so every day in Lent I read about the church of the day and kind of because I've been to many of these places kind of spiritually go there right, meditatively, go there and pay, you know, give veneration to the saints. I'm going to let you talk about one more, because St Paul's of the Walls is wonderful. Is there another church that kind of jumps out when we're talking about, kind of the history of the station churches, the history of the church? Is there another church that might jump out that you might share with everyone?
Jacob:Yeah, let me just say one thing though, because you, as you said, you open the book and you read and you imagine these places which you have been, some of them you haven't been to because they're close sometimes. But that's what I try to do with my videos.
Jacob:I try to give, especially there's so many people who even if they come to Rome, they're not going to have time in the time that they come to visit 40 some churches, and so I try to, you know, go there and film in high definition and upload. You know, there's 700 gigabytes that I have on my computer right now of Roman station churches and I try to present it in a way to make it feel like you're there for those who can't be there, but also just because these beautiful images help us. It doesn't, it doesn't matter that you're not able to be there and it's your heritage.
Joan:It's your heritage regardless of where you're living. It's your heritage that is like these belong to you too, Because, like you said earlier, in a sense in the West we're all Roman, and so embrace this and get to know it.
Jacob:And that would take me to Santa Pudentiana because, St Peter lives there, so that's one of my favorite ones, and we always get a 20 minute sermon every year giving us the details of the mosaic. It houses the earliest mosaic in Western art and it was being, you know, decorated during the fall of the Roman Empire. And so the city of Rome, this grand earthly empire, is being replaced by an empire where it's not just the Roman citizens who have dignity, but it's every person, as a child of God, who has dignity, and there's a beautiful, beautiful analogy that comes up sometimes in Rome, as you're looking on the mosaics or as your priest or cardinal might be preaching about them and they talk about. It was a Church father who said the beauty of a mosaic is that they're not all the same. They're not all golden.
Jacob:Not every single tessata, every single tile in the mosaic is golden, because otherwise we're going to be really looking at a mosaic, but we need this variety of colors, we need this variety of vocations in the church, and that's the beauty. We need the variety of your listeners being in their little local church or going to their cathedral or going here their local church and being part of that active life of the church there, a life of charity. And when someone doesn't live that to their full, there's going to be a hole in the mosaic and we're all going to notice it.
Jacob:And it's a sadness when that's not lived to its full, and so it's a beautiful thing that we're not all experiencing the same things every day. But our pilgrimage is all different. Even when you come to Rome, your pilgrimage is so much different than my pilgrimage because of who we are, and that's the beauty, beautiful thing about having conversations like this, of having friendships, of having people in the church, in the faith, who we can share these things with and also learn and be docile and open to accept an experience which isn't my own and maybe glean from that something even more. And that's the beauty of pilgrimage together, pilgrimage apart, pilgrimage alone, especially in these days of Lent which are coming. It can be, like I said, a lonely, sad burden in some sort of reality, a long wait to Easter, but we are meant no matter where we are to be sort of going on this pilgrimage.
Joan:Yeah, that's a beautiful meditation to take from pilgrimage and looking at the pilgrimage of life that you know. So often we compare our pilgrimage to others, we compare our lives to others, we compare our story to others. We think that this is the story, this is the pilgrimage of my life. That needs to be, and the Lord's like no, I want your pilgrimage, I want your story, I want your life, I want you to be the saint I created you to be. Stop looking and comparing. There's a phrase like everyone has their Camino and you have to walk your Camino, and that's true in life too. And so let's go be the mosaic that God created us. Let's be that little piece, right, even if we're the little piece in the corner. Let's go be the piece that we're supposed to be. So thank you for that beautiful image to close us with. So many of the station churches have beautiful apps, mosaics, and, yeah, I hope that people take advantage.
Jacob:Oh yes, Well, that one of Santa Pudenciana I have. I have the whole sermon translated and I try to give it, I try to express it in a way that just places you right there in front of the mosaic. And that's the beauty of social media, of these podcasts, of this, all these different apostolates which are out there and we're not all able to do the same thing, and that's good. And so it's beautiful that we're able to share this time together too. So I thank you for bringing me on in the yes.
Joan:Thank you, jacob, thank you and, yeah, just kind of repeating again, encouraging people to seek out these beautiful images, these beautiful videos and learning more in this Lenten, pilgrimage Lent we talked about in the ad in Advent, about Advent being a pilgrimage. Lent is a pilgrimage and so seek these resources out, all the good work that Jacob is doing, spending lots of time and energy doing to bring us to Rome virtually, and so to seek that out that. You know the podcast probably isn't the best format to talk about some of these beautiful churches, and that's why we have Jacob's videos to show you these beautiful churches and bring you there this, this Lent.
Joan:So, thanks for joining me, Jacob. It was wonderful. I look forward have a wonderful Lent and I look forward to following along in this pilgrimage of Lent with you. Thank you, joan. God bless, listeners, enjoy this last final day before we enter into Lent and remember Ash Wednesday is that time of fasting. So we enter into this time with our Lord, uniting ourselves with His penance, His 40 days fast, and let us come back on the other side of Easter more like Christ, because that's the whole point, God bless.
