Lux Mundi

The theme for the 7th Festival of Postcards is Light.  The postcard I chose to illustrate this theme is modern, not vintage, but the Light that it portrays is much older!  This postcard was sent to my parents from me in July, 1985 on my now infamous first trip to Rome, Italy.  The image is the inside of St. Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City. (click on the image for a close-up view, then hit the “back” button to return here)

This image was taken from the nave near the statue of St. Peter, which is shown in the foreground on the right, and is looking towards the magnificent baldacchino or canopy over the altar.  The reverse of the postcard is as follows:

I wrote: “Dear Mom, Dad, & Drew, We are having a great time – very interesting!  See you soon.  Love, Donna + Louie + Tom.  P.S. I was there” Very interesting? An understatement that only a teenager could make with a straight face.  Though, in retrospect, I probably kept it simple so as not to surprise my mother with the little details that would make her crazy, such as our dump of a hotel or the fact that I was wandering around a large city of foreigners occasionally without adult supervision.

The light shown on the postcard appears to enter the basilica from one of the windows near the dome.  While it may look like an overly dramatic image that was “touched up” to sell postcards, I can assure you that the rays of light entering St. Peter’s is often that dramatic depending on the time of day.  I took this photograph years later from a slightly different position in the basilica and got an equally dramatic effect.  I am standing right by the main altar looking towards the left transept – you can see only the twisted columns of Bernini’s baldacchino but not the canopy itself.

Interior, St. Peter's Basilica, Rome - taken by the author December, 2003.

While the play of light on the interior of the basilica makes for stunning photography (and postcards), I chose this for the “Light” theme for another reason – the presence of Jesus, the Light of the World, that I feel within these walls.  For every time I visit Rome and enter St. Peter’s, I can not help but feel the overwhelming love of God in addition to literally being overwhelmed by the immensity of the building itself.  I am drawn back there time and again.

For more images of the interior of St. Peter’s that also show the incoming rays of light, see the Wikipedia article and Sacred Destinations.

[Submitted for the 7th Festival of Postcards: Light]