Posted on 04/05/2012 5:17:05 AM PDT by NYer
.- Scott and Kimberly Hahn have been Catholic for over two decades, but this is the first Holy Week they have ever spent in Rome.
“This experience has been for us overwhelming, and yet the best is yet to come – Holy Thursday, Good Friday and the Easter Vigil. I mean, we’re just standing on tip-toes feeling like kids in a candy store. Like how good can it get?” Scott said to CNA on April 3.
The Hahns are in Rome this week with their three youngest sons, 20-year-old Jeremiah, 17-year-old Joseph and 12-year-old David. This morning they attended Pope Benedict XVI’s general audience in St. Peter’s Square.
“It is always amazing to be here in Rome; to hear all of the languages and see all of the peoples that the Gospel has gone to and realize that this is not an American thing, it’s not even a European thing …God has been at work over the centuries calling all kinds of people to him.”
Kimberly said she is always particularly moved “to hear old Italian men and young German children all singing to the Holy Father with the same sort of love I have for him.”
Since being received into the Church in 1986, Dr. Scott Hahn has become one of the most popular Catholic speakers and teachers worldwide. His wife Kimberly became a Catholic four years later. The Hahns later recounted their conversions in the co-authored international best-seller “Rome Sweet Home.” The couple has been married for 33 years and has six children and, very soon, six grandchildren.
The Hahns first visited Rome 20 years ago and had the chance to meet Pope John Paul II.
But the visit occurred at a hard time for the family as it came only one month after the death of Scott’s father.
“To be able to share from my heart the sorrow that I felt for my natural father but to look into the eyes of my spiritual father,” said Scott in reference to Pope John Paul, “and to hear him say ‘I’m sorry, I will pray for him’” was a bittersweet experience.
The encounter made Scott realize that as a Catholic he now enjoyed “the spiritual fatherhood of God through Christ to Peter and to all of his successors down through the ages which unites us worldwide as this Catholic, as this international, universal family of God.”
This is why, he explained, “Rome sweet home is not just the title of a book but the description of my own life experience.”
Kimberly said that the family enjoyed the chance to pray at the tomb of Blessed John Paul in St. Peter’s Basilica and “to be in St. Peters Square where the Holy Father was shot,” which is “a place I love to touch and be close to him there.”
Scott said that other favorite Roman sites for the family include the catacombs where the martyrs of the early Church were buried and “where you find out about how people paid a price a long time ago.” He suggested that “we too may end up having to pay a price” as we “may end up in a post-Christian pagan environment that is as resistant or hostile as theirs.”
Kimberly also loves Rome’s churches since “you just go a short distance and you find another magnificent church” where “even the little side chapels are more beautiful than most American churches.” She hopes that Americans visiting Rome will “catch a vision as to what a Catholic church should look like physically.”
Any opportunity to visit the Pontifical North American College seminary is also “very special” to Kimberly because “these are young men in training who will come back to the States as priests.”
“That experience of the Universal Church has been so powerful,” Kimberly said, summing up their Rome visit so far. “I really can hardly imagine what the Easter Triduum is going to be like, but I’m also really looking forward to that.”
Holy Week in Rome ... I’m jealous, ping.
Instrumental in my reversion to the Church.
Instrumental in my reversion to the Church.
same here....scott and kimberly’s writings, etc, have been a Godsend.....
Glad to hear he is well enough to travel, following his recent illness.
Prayers up!
The open air masses are incredible, with the joy and enthusiasm of people from all over the world, chatting in their native language.
The way of the cross at the Colosseum is also overwhelming.
Ok, ok, it is nice, but sometimes it could be too many people in the Basilica and you prefer going to one of the many Cathedrals...
Actually it’s not all that great unless you are lucky enough to score some passes to the special events that get you a decent view. We got passes to the Good Friday mass at St. Peters, which was wonderful, but the actual outside Easter Sunday mass was so crowded we couldn’t see a thing. Dittos for the Via Crusis, the crowds are huge.
If you are in Rome for an extended holiday around that time see if you can get into the Vatican office (the one with the Swiss Guard in front) and tell the Pope’s secretary that this is your first visit to Rome as newlyweds. Even if you’ve been married for 20 years, if it’s your first visit to Rome as a married couple that counts. You will get some souvenirs and a pass for an audience with the Pope. No, you won’t get to go into some small room and have a conversation with His Holiness but it will get you in the same row that he uses to walk up to the altar after the Popemobile drives him up and down the rows that they make so he can greet the thousands who will be in the square. Then, if you are very lucky, you may get to be one of the people he speaks to, pats on the head or blesses.
When the Pope is walking down the aisle there will be a group of men in black suits that look like Secret Service agents surrounding him. Some of them are actual bodyguards but most are photographers, snapping pictures of everything in sight. Get a business card from one of them if you can. It will give you the address of a studio that will have pictures by the thousands posted in the windows. If you find one with you in it order prints of your special event. We have pictures of John Paul II patting us on the heads and blessing a handful of Rosary beads that she was holding out to him. A beautiful moment from our visit to Rome.
If you aren't fussy about where you stay, you can find good value around Termini Station where each floor of a building is run as a separate hotel. We think entrepreneurship is dead or at least discouraged in Europe. I was always surprised to find little, shops, bars, restaurants tucked into tiny spaces doing fierce business. It gladdened my heart.
Sorry to hear Scott had been ill and I do pray it is not chronic. Scott is a giant among our apologists.
Journey Home, and Scott and Steve Ray brought me into the Church in ‘01 from a non-denominational.
Love the Hahn’s
If I had any opportunity to travel, I’d spend the Holy Week is the Holy place, Israel...I don’t think Jesus was ever in Rome...
Google “White House Easter” message. You won’t get any hits except for GWB and Clinton.
What are they, like, celebrities?
I’m happy for the Hahns. I hope they have an absolutely lovely time.
And now, back to planning Easter music. I wish we were doing it in Spanish!
I always wondered why Peter left Israel and went to Rome. I found out why. Paul had gone to Rome...the center of the Gentile community at the time, the POWER of the world.
He wasn't doing very well in evangelizeing as he had never known or met Jesus, aside from his amazing vision. The Romans weren't buying Paul's evangelization so he got Peter to join him there. That obviously did the trick.
The Romans were going to crucify him as they did Jesus and Peter asked to crucified upside down as to be crucified JUST like Jesus was not acceptable for him. He thought that he didn't deserve the honor of dying JUST like Jesus.
THIS kind of history is part of the Apostolic Tradition that sola scripture Protestants decline.
Scott Hahn is a WONderful speaker. He has been inspirational to ME, a cradle Catholic. How blessed we Catholics are to have him in the fold.
Read my post, #16. It explains why Peter ended up in Rome.
In the end the Apostles scattered as they were made totally unwelcome in Jewish Israel. Doublting Thomas went as far east as India. When the Portuguese landed in India there they were amazed to find so many men named THOMAS. They weren't prepared, I guess, for finding ANY Christianity that far east from Israel.
A 1st century tomb in China, a wealthy man, had a SMALL stone carving of the nativity scene in his elaborate tomb.
The Apostles were instructed by Jesus to go forth and teach all nations. They sure did their jobdidn't they? Rhetoical.
For Catholics the pope and cardinals are minor "celebrities" and the bishops are SORT OF celebs. Priests are respected and liked according to what kind of priests they are. Great priests inspire us; ho-hum priests bore us with their homilies and personalities. Most priests are somewhere in between those two extremes.
Jesus is The Celebrity of all time and space.
I'm speaking for Catholics from my OWN very humble point of view...ONLY.
St. Peter could be crucified because he was not a Roman citizen. St. Paul was a citizen, so he was beheaded.
When we’re discussing the Bible in my prayer group or in Sunday School class, I’ll often begin a statement with “Scott Hahn suggests ...,” or “According to Scott Hahn ...”.
1. Yes, I know. Paul had the "privilege" of choosing, even though he was Jewish too. The citizenship of Rome could be purchased. Paul was smart to do so. It might have had to do with his trade...tent maker.
2. Now that Scott Hahn has "crossed the Tiber" is he still quoted by you or others...or just ignored? Just curious.
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