Paix liturgique

Another traditional pilgrimage! This time in Italy, in Lazio. It's called Nostra Signora della Cristianità and this was the first edition of an annual pilgrimage in the heart of Catholicism, from the City of Peter, Rome, to the City of Saint Benedict, Subiaco, where around the year 500, Saint Benedict founded his first monastery, which is now the Abbey of Saint Scholastica.

The Benedictines, founded in this part of Lazio by Saint Benedict, would become the quintessential Roman religious order, thanks to Saint Gregory the Great, who founded a monastery similar to the one in Subiaco in Rome itself before becoming Pope, and later thanks to Charlemagne and Benedict of Aniane, known as "the second Saint Benedict," who transformed the Rule of Saint Benedict into the quintessential monastic rule, the Roman Rule.

The pilgrimage, exceptionally well organized by a group of independent laypeople, set out on Saturday, April 25, a national holiday in Italy, from the Papal Basilica of Saint Mary Major, where a solemn Mass was celebrated by Canon Mora, rector of the ICRSP seminary of Gricigliano. Afterwards, the pilgrims walked the magnificent Appian Way, the ancient road by which Christianity entered into Rome with Saints Peter and Paul. (At the beginning of this route is the Church of Quo Vadis, so named for the story of the Apostle Peter, who, fleeing the city to escape martyrdom, encountered Jesus and asked him, "Domine, quo vadis?"; Lord, where are you going?. Jesus replied, "I have come to Rome to be crucified again," a rebuke which led Peter to turn back.)

Then the long procession of pilgrims entered the exuberantly green Castelli Romani, passed through Castel Gandolfo, home to the Pope's summer residence on the shores of Lake Albano, and arrived at the beautiful town of Nemi, perched on a rocky promontory overlooking another lake.

On Sunday, April 26, the pilgrimage reached the sanctuary of Genazzano, where Mass was celebrated. The sanctuary houses the image of Our Lady of Good Counsel, which miraculously appeared there on April 25, 1467, and quickly became an object of great popular devotion. It is remarkably well preserved on a very thin layer of plaster. On Monday the 26th, they arrived in Subiaco at the Monastery of Sacro Speco, the imposing abbey clinging on the rocky cliff, built a thousand years ago and home to the cave where St. Benedict lived as a hermit before founding his first monastery there. This abbey is territorial, meaning it heads a small diocese and has the unique characteristic of being under the direct authority of the Pope. After visiting the holy sites, the pilgrims attended the solemn Mass celebrated in the abbey church, which was completely full—a great success, given that it was not a holiday. Monsignor Marco Agostini celebrated and preached this welcoming Mass and was the leading figure of this pilgrimage organized by a group of independent laypeople. Monsignor Agostini, as is well known, works in the Vatican, in the Secretariat of State. He was a member of the papal corps of masters of ceremonies, from which he was recently dismissed due to a palace intrigue. He celebrates the Traditional Latin Mass every Sunday at 4:00 pm in the Church of Sant’Anna al Laterano, on Via Merulana, and every morning at 7:00 am in St. Peter’s Basilica, in the Chapel of Our Lady of the Bocciata, the most beautiful and spacious inside the Vatican grottoes, that is to say, the crypt of the Papal Basilica.

Thus, in addition to the Pilgrimage of Christendom to Chartres, the SSPX pilgrimage to Lourdes, and the Summorum Pontificum pilgrimage to Rome, regional pilgrimages are multiplying in France (Nosto Fe to Saint-Maximin, Feiz e Breizh to Sainte Anne d’Auray, Arresbatir to Lourdes, and the most recent one from Orléans to Chartres), and other national pilgrimages are also emerging elsewhere: in Spain, Our Lady of Christendom to Covadonga; in Asturias (which was presided over in 2024 by Bishop Agostini: Letter of Liturgical Peace of September 12, 2024, Paix Liturgique France); in Argentina, to Our Lady of Luján; and now in Italy, from Rome to Subiaco. This is one of the great signs of the vitality of traditional Catholicism, despite the absurd attempts to restrict it, marginalize it, and even, on the part of some ecclesiastical leaders, to dissolve it into a new, albeit moribund, Catholicism. In all these shrines that welcome the prayers of pilgrims, a sacred message is repeated: the Tridentine Mass will endure!

Is this not the very same message that inspires the pious and constant devotion of our valiant Parisian sentinels, who, like pilgrims on the roads, and with great merit, pray the Rosary at number 10 rue du Cloître-Notre-Dame, from Monday to Friday, from 13:00 to 13:30, and at Saint-Georges de La Villette, number 114 avenue Simon Bolivar, Wednesdays and Fridays at 5:00 p.m., in front of Notre-Dame du Travail, and Sundays at 6:15 p.m.