Good Friday

My Holy week in Rome only got better from Good Thursday. After staying out late the night before visiting the churches I slept in on Friday having nothing of vital importance to work on. Having no school and no conflicts meant I would be able to attend mass at the North American College: i.e. mass with Matt. He agreed to meet me at the gatehouse of the college ten minutes before mass started at three thirty. I left my apartment super early not wanting to take any chances given the disastrous attempt Stu and I made to find the college. It's a fortyish minute walk from my apartment, and I made it in plenty of time. When getting dressed for this mass I realized that I was going to stick out like a sore thumb in a church full of seminaries dressed in all black, but there was nothing I could do about it. Even if I had an all black outfit I'm still a girl, and that is certainly not helping my case. I ran into my friend Stephen in the gatehouse, who had wisely donned black pants, shirt, and jacket. He blended so well I couldn't pick him out of the crowd during the mass. I was slightly jealous. Matt showed me into the church, and immediately upon walking in my ears were greeted with a truly heavenly song. I honestly think the NAC has the best choir in Rome, it was absolutely amazing. The amazing vocal talents of the deacons and priests were just the beginning of an incredibly spiritual atmosphere that surrounds each NAC mass. I had forgotten how incredibly intense Good Friday mass can be, and it was very long, two and a half hours of mass we had made it through. During the mass I was reminded of just how bad of a singer I really am, not only was the choir amazing, but in this church full of men, not a single one was out of tune/ off pitch. I'm a horrible singer, and it was opening my mouth was difficult, I didn't want to ruin the beautiful sounds that were coming from everyone around me. Not only am I a bad singer, but I don't speak Latin. In church at home it's not a big deal, because no one speaks Latin, and we all mispronounce it together. These guys are fluent, and I didn't realize how poorly I was pronouncing some of these words until everyone around me was doing it correctly. Over all the mass was very moving, the music was incredible, and it was very passionate. The congregation was very somber as it concluded, and Matt and I made plans to meet again for Easter vigil mass the next night. I found Stephen after mass, as we had plans to meet Becca for stations of the cross with the pope at the Colosseum. We had a little time to kill so Stephan showed me this beautiful fountain that is just behind out school, we sat and chatted until it was time to meet Becca. She has spent the day at the Italian mall, and brought our friend Joey along with. We all set out for Termini station where Stephen had to pick up friends from Florence. The bus we took passed the Colosseum and it was already packed at six thirty, the stations didn't start until nine. Joey and I stopped for dinner at the train station, we both got suppli (deep fried mozzarella,rice, and marinara sauce)and iced tea. We missed Stephen's friends getting off the train and had a momentary moment of panic, not sure what we should do. However, they found us in the station (we have no idea how we missed them) and we walked down to the Colosseum. It was nearly eight o'clock now, and it was really packed now. We found a place on a hill just next to the arch of Constantine. The Holy Father was on an elevated ridge technically located in the forum. There was a massive illuminated cross next to the tent he was sitting under. We stood on the hill chatting for the hour before the program started,and then listened in sober silence once it began. The titles of the stations were announced in seven languages, the same as the ones during the papal mass I had been to earlier in the week. The reflections/ readings that followed were only done in Italian, and then there was singing in lain after each one. The time passed incredibly quickly, and though we didn't speak Italian we were each left to our own imaginings of the serious events that happened so many years ago. It was a pretty amazing experience to hear the pope go through the stations of the cross while looking at the Colosseum. While at first it seemed a strange location for a church service, I later realized it was more appropriate than I thought considering the blood that was shed in the first years of the Colosseum's existence. After the service concluded we took Stephen's friends for some roman gelato at gioliti. We met up with even more people from the AUR and shared stories of our various spring breaks, a bunch of the girls had taken ryanair for their flights, and had horror stories that made me missing my flight sound like a walk in the park. We headed home for the night before the trams shut down and turned in after a long and emotionally intense day.