Thanks to Lella's blog for leading me to this item...
Manoppello to honor Pope
for his historic visit in 2006
Translated from
August 24, 2010
MANOPPELLO - His Holiness Benedict XVI has accepted the honorary consignment to him of the keys to the city of Manoppello, an initiative originally proposed by the German journalist Paul Badde.
In a latter received from the Vatican yesterday, the Holy Father also agreed to a plaque to be installed in the piazza facing the Basilica del Santo Volto (Holy Face) in Manoppello to recall his private visit to the shrine on Sept. 1, 2006, becoming the first Pope ever to visit Manoppello.
(It was also the first of what have been four visits to the Abruzzo region so far - afterwards he visited L'Aquila, then
Sulmona, and recently, he visited three little shrines in the Abruzzi mountains on a private excursion from Castel Gandolfo.)
He arrived by helicopter from Castel Gandolfo and landed on the piazza, where some 8,000 residents and visitors had gathered to welcome him.
Accounts of that visit on Sept. 1, 2006, can be read in the PRF on
freeforumzone.leonardo.it/discussione.aspx?idd=354494&p=47
The letter signed by Mons. Peter Wells to the president of the Communal Council of Manoppello read: "In thanking you for the sentiments that inspired these initiatives, I am happy to inform you that arrangements for the ceremony of consigning the keys are to be made with Mons. James Harvey, prefect of the Pontifical Household to whom you may address your correspondence".
"We wrote back right away," said Villani, "because almost at the same time we received a message from the Prefecture that the ceremony will take place after one of the General Audiences on Wednesdays."
The news was promptly conveyed to the Bishop of Chieti-Vasto, Mons. Bruno Forte, and to the regional prefect Vincenzo D'Antuono, who will take charge of planning participation in the ceremonies.
The plan, Villani said, is to have the marker-laying done on a Sunday morning between the end of September and early October to avail of what remains of good weather in order to have as many people attending.
"It is a historic event for our city. Benedict XVI was the first Pope ever to set foot in Manoppello, even if it was a private visit. We were very happy at the latest response because it confirms to us that his pilgrimage to the Holy Face was also a significant memory for him."
Villani also said that the commune had previously consigned the keys to the city to Paul Badde, the journalist most responsible for calling widespread attention to the Santo Volto, since he first started writing about it and researching it in 2004.
he Holy Face of Manoppello is a piece of very thin fabric measuring 24x17 cm, apparently woven from byssum (the fine hairs of a marine shellfish), on which there is imprinted front and back the image of a man who has undergone torture. Yet the fabric is so fine that a newspaper placed behind it can be read even from a few feet away.
Originally believed to be Veronica's Veil, scholars believe it is more likely a cloth placed over the face of Jesus before he was wrapped in his burial shroud. A German scholar nun has shown by detailed photographs that the image superimposes perfectly on the face imprinted on the Holy Shroud of Turin. Like the Shroud, no explanation has been found for how the image came to be imprinted on the cloth.
The relic came to Manoppello in 1606 and was said to have been left by a mysterious stranger to the member of a prominent local family, which eventually turned it over to the Capuchin friars of the local church for custody. It has been kept since then between two pieces of glass to protect it.
I was quite struck in 2006 by Benedict XVI's early decision to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Face in Manoppello which, like the Holy Shroud of Turin, the Church has not authenticated, but unlike the Shroud, is much less well-known. It was very endearing that an intellectual like him had no hesitation to validate a popular devotion by his own visit. (But then again, he is Bavarian!) Many dearly-loved traditions associated with devotional practices and local cults have bee based on legend or apocrypha but that does not make them any less 'valid' for the believer. Faith is in the heart of the believer and does not need scientific chapter and verse to justify it.
In his homily in Manoppello, Benedict XVI first reminded the faithful that Jesus had told his disciples, "Whoever has seen me has seen the Father", and then: "To seek the Face of Jesus should be the desire of all Christians. We are, in fact, the generation toat must seek his Face. If we persevere in seeking his Face, then at the end of our earthly pilgrimage, thre be he, Jesus, our eternal joy, our reward and glory for ever and ever".
Significantly, he visited Manoppello just a few months before the publication of JESUS OF NAZARETH, which he had described as 'his personal search for the face of Jesus'.
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 25/08/2010 23:41]