The Lateran Palace in Rome, Where Popes Resided for Centuries, Opens to Visitors

The National Catholic Register ^ | 12/13/21 | Solene Tadie

[marshmallow]

This initiative of the Diocese of Rome results from the Pope’s desire to enhance the cultural heritage entrusted to his protection.

Picutres of the Palazzo Lateranense in Rome now open to the public. (photo: Daniel Ibanez/Solène Tadié / EWTN)

ROME — Starting Dec. 13, pilgrims as well as art and history lovers are now able to access the Lateran Palace, a high place of the history of Christianity in Rome.

Adjacent to the Archbasilica of St. John Lateran, the Cathedral Church of Rome and the seat of the pope as the bishop of Rome, the palace served as the residence of popes for almost a millennium, until the residence was transferred to the Vatican in the 14th century, after the Avignon Papacy.

The Lateran hosted no less than five general Councils, as well as various synods. There, Pope Boniface VIII announced the first Jubilee of the Christian history. It is also there that the Lateran Treaty, by which the Kingdom of Italy recognized papal sovereignty over the Vatican City, was signed, in 1929.

The tour itinerary of the site — also known as the “House” of the Bishop of Rome — extends over 3 thousand square meters on the first floor of the apostolic palace, whose entrance is in Piazza di Porta San Giovanni, next to the cathedral, and includes ten rooms, the papal apartment, the private chapel and the monumental staircase that leads directly to the Basilica.

[hinckley buzzard]

St.John Lateran is also the site of the very first baptistry in the Christian world, a magnificent structure from the first couple centuries AD.

[rktman]

Any immigrants movin’ in?

[ebb tide]

They failed to mention Bergoglio renting out the Sistine Chapel to Porsche for $5,900 a head or pimping out St Peter's Basilica out for an environmental endangerment propaganda light show on the Feast of Our Lady's Immaculate Conception.