Pilgrimage to Rome 2017 (5) - Day 1 concluded

The Church of the Gesù
We concluded the first day of our Pilgrimage with our now customary visit to the Church of the Holy Name, The Gesù.  Having visited the Church of Sant'Ignazio it is only a few minutes walk down through the Piazza del Collegio Romano and down the famous Via della Gatta to the other main Jesuit Church in the City, where St. Ignatius lived in the attached House of the Professed, and where he is buried in the beautiful side Altar that is the focus, each evening at 5.30 p.m., of the ceremony of light and music and Scripture and Prayer, the Macchina barocca.  We made it in good time to enjoy the prayerful atmosphere of the Church in fading autumn light, to pray before the High Altar of the Holy Name, at the Chapel of the Madonna della Strada and the Chapel of the Sacred Heart where the Blessed Sacrament is reserved.  There are many echoes between Sant'Ignazio and the Gesù, particularly in the mirroring of the two main transept Altars, St. Ignatius in the Gospel-side and the arm of St. Francis Xavier in the Epistle-side.  Once again, the nave ceiling is a riot of baroque decoration but, in the case of the Gesù, it is more unconventional.  We are not only seeing the Heavens, as it were, through the frame of an open ceiling, but now the celestial (and infernal!) figures are in three dimensions and falling out of the frame and into our dimension.

After experiencing the Macchina barocca we returned to the Istituto Maria Santissima Bambina for Vespers of the Little Office of the Immaculate Conception and Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament.

St. Brigid's Day Pilgrimage to Limerick

To honour St. Brigid of Kildare, the members and friends of St. Conleth's Catholic Heritage Association made a pilgrimage to the former Jesuit Church of the Sacred Heart in the Crescent, O'Connell Street, Limerick, for Holy Mass celebrated by Canon Wulfran Lebocq of the Institute of Christ the King, Sovereign Priest.  Afterwards, we had the great privilege to hear a talk by Canon Lebocq.  We sang the hymns to St. Brigid in Irish, English and Latin (Gabham Molte Bríde, Far Above Enthroned in Glory, and Christus in Nostra Insula.  We were then given a tour of the Church and Residence to see the immense challenges faced by the Community in restoring the fabric of the building.  Afterwards, members of the Institute of Christ the King Community joined us for a late lunch near the banks of the River Shannon.

The present church, the Sacred Heart church, is situated at the Crescent, on O'Connell Street. It was completed in 1868 and opened to the public on January 27 1869. The architect of this church was William Corbett and the church is in the parish of St Joseph's. According to Murphy, it was originally intended to dedicate the church to St Aloysius but when it was dedicated in 1869 it was called the Church of the Sacred Heart. The façade of the church is Classical/Grecian in design. It was renovated in 1900. There is a statue of the Sacred Heart above the porch. There are no aisles in the church but the nave has two rows of pews. The nave was extended in 1919.

There is a small medallion about 6 inches high of Our Lady and the Child on the front of the gallery, facing the altar.

There is an altar to Our Lady of Lourdes in the right transept. This altar was the first of its type in Ireland. It was designed by Mr. Goldie and was a gift from Thomas E. O'Brien. Above the altar to Our Lady of Lourdes, there is a mosaic of Our Lady and three Jesuit saints. These saints are (from left to right) St Robert Bellarmime, St Alphonsus and St Aloysius Bonzagh. Beside this altar, there is a statue of St Patrick.

In the left transept, there is an altar to St Joseph. A painting of St Joseph and the Infant Jesus forms the centerpiece of this altar. Above the altar, there is a mosaic of St Ignatuis Loyola and his first group of Jesuits. 

The high altar was designed by William Corbett and is made from 22 types of precious marble. On each side of the altar there are statues of kneeling angels. The carving on the front of the high altar depicts a scene from the Last Supper. On the floor around the high altar, there are the symbols of the four writers of the Gospels. The angel represents Matthew, the lion represents Mark while Luke and John are represented by the bull and eagle respectively.

There are nine mosaics above the high altar. The central mosaic is of the Sacred Heart ascending in the presence of St Margaret Mary Alacoque and Blessed Claude la Colombiere. It is surrounded (from left to right) by depictions of St Francis Jerome, St Francis Borgia, St Francis Xavier, St Ignatius, St Stanislaus, St Aloysius, St John Berchmans and St Francis Regis. (From Limerick Diocesan History Project)