La Beata Vergine del Santo Rosario di Pompei Arrives at National Shrine

As someone of Italiano descent, I have to say that its about time that the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception is finally adding an Italiano Chapel. The chapel will be known as The Oratory of Our Lady of Pompei. (No that is not a mistake, that is the proper way to spell Pompei.) It will be located in the West Narthax of the Upper Church. The chapel will recognize the deep devotion of the Italian-American Community has for the Blessed Mother. It will honor Our Lady of Pompei and the heritage of so many Italian Americans who continue to minister the Gospel throughout the world.

The oratory will feature a mosiac of Our Lady & the Christ Child based on the painting found in the Il Santuario della Beata Vergine del Santo Rosario di Pompei. (Above right) There will be 2 stained glass windows depicting san Domenico e santa Caterina da Siena. The 5 Luminous Mysteries of the Rosary added by Pope John Paul the Great will also be depicted in the chapel. (For more info on the chapel follow the link to the chapel page on the website. It includes sketches of the mysteries as well as the mosiac.

The devotion honored by this chapel traces its roots to 18th Century & Blessed Bartolo Longo. Bartolo Longo was born 10 February 1841 in Latiano, Italia. His family was wealthy. His parents were devout Roman Catholics who taught him to pray the Rosary as a child. His mother died in 1851 & he began to drift away from the Catholic faith. While at the University of Naples he eventually became involved in a Satanist cult & later a Satanist priest.

Instead of happiness, his involvement in Satanism lead to depression, nervousness, and confusion. He also became bothered with diabolical visions and ill health brought. He sought out an old friend, Vincenzo Pepe. Pepe convinced Longo to abandon Satanism & brought him to Dominican Father Alberto Radente. Fr. Radente helped him in his journey back to Christ. In 1871 Longo became a lay Dominican, taking the name Brother Rosario. In 1872 he arrived in Pompei & bgan charitable work. He met Countess Mariana di Fusco as a result.

However he continued to have doubts about his salvation based on his past life. 1 day as he was walking & stuggling with these doubts. "It was midday and while hearing the bells’ ring he felt inside a voice: “If you spread the Rosary, you will be saved!”. So, he understood his vocation and proposed not to leave Valley of Pompei without having spread there the cult to the Virgin of the Rosary." He began catechising the peasants & encouraging praying the Rosary as well as devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary. In 1875 he began looking for a painting of Our Lady of the Rosary for the church he was building. On 14 November 1874 he arrived in Napoli. Here is how he describes the events that followed: "I began by asking myself and revolving in my mind whither to turn in order to find what I was looking for.

It occurred to me that in passing along Via Toledo, near the Piazza Santo Spirito, my eye had often rested on a shop-window in which various oil-paintings and pictures were exposed to the public gaze. And among others it seemed to me that I remembered one of the Blessed Virgin of the Rosary. I did not know the painter or even his name; but he was by surname, perhaps because a native of Foggia, called the Foggiano.

I therefore determined to direct my steps toward that shop. But a certain fear of finding myself very embarrassed overcame me, as I have never been able to bargain and squabble over prices as is the habit in Naples. “Oh - I exclaimed - “if only I could take Father Radente with me. He, being a Neapolitan, knows how to make such bargains. But where and how am I at this hour to find him?”. I knew that ever since the Dominicans had been expelled from San Domenico Maggiore ten years before, he had lived together with two other Fathers, his companions, in a little house they had rented; and I was also aware of the fact that it was his custom to celebrate Mass every morning in the Church of the Holy Rosary at Porta Medina. “Very well - thought I - I will walk along Via Toledo; if it be God's will, I shall find my friend; otherwise I shall act for myself.

But Providence, which with an invisible hand was directing and holding all the threads that were leading up to an event that in a short time was to be so wonderful, so disposed, that just as I reached the Piazza Santo Spirito, and very near the painter's studio, I met the venerable priest."

Fr. Radente had a painting that Longo could use & thus not have to pay 400 lire for a painting he had been looking at. Fr. Radente had left the painting to the care of Sister Maria Concetta De Litala, of the Conservatory of the Rosary at Porta. Medina. He sent Longo to get it. When Bartolo Longo saw it he was disappointed.

"Alas! The first sight of it broke my heart. It was not only an old and worn-out canvas, but the face of Our Lady instead of being that of a benevolent Virgin, all sanctity and grace, seemed rather that of a rough, coarse woman of the populace. - Whoever painted that picture? Mercy on us! - I could not help exclaiming, with a tone of voice half way between fright and surprise. I felt in my heart that the poor Pompeiians would find great difficulty in arousing in themselves sentiments of devotion looking at that ugly image.

Besides the deformity and unpleasantness of the face, it was missing a full palm of canvas above the head of the Virgin; the whole mantle was cracked, timeworn and worm-eaten, and here and there the colours had fallen off because of the cracks. Nothing can be said about the unpleasantness of the other figures. Saint Dominic on Our Lady’s right looked more like a coarse idiot than a saint, while to the left there was a Saint Rose with a fat, rough and vulgar face, just like a peasant woman crowned with roses”.

Even the historical concept in the painting was wrong, for the Queen of the Rosary was represented as seated, but without any diadem on her head, and instead of giving the chaplet of beads to Saint Dominic, as we are told by those who relate the incident, she was offering it to Saint Rose; and the Child Jesus on the contrary is the One who is giving the rosary to the illustrious Founder of the Dominican Order. I hesitated whether to refuse the picture or whether, under the circumstances, to accept it. I was tormented by the thought that the Mission was drawing to a close, and that I had uncon¬ditionally promised a picture to the three missionaries and the people for that very evening. Besides all knew I had come to Naples for the purpose of buying a painting and were expect¬ing me to bring it with me. What was I to do? “Do not think too long about it” - the Sister said to me with a sweet accent of reproach - " Take this picture with you, it will certainly succeed in eliciting a Hail Mary”."

So, despite his misgivings, he took it. Next came the problem of getting it back to Pompei. For that he called on a teamster, Angelo Tortora. The teamster carried to Pompei in his cart, on top of a load of manure. Not a very auspicious start. After its arrival Guglielmo Galella, a landscape painter, was called on to do the initial restoration. It was exposed for the veneration of the faithful on 13 February 1876. That very day the first miracle happened by the intercession of Our Lady of Pompeii. In Napoli, the twelve-year-old Clorinda Lucarelli, considered incurable by doctors, was perfectly cured of her epileptic convulsions. Bartolo Longo later gave the Icon to the Neapolitan painter Federico Maldarelli for a further restoration, asking him to substitute the original Saint Rose with the Dominican Saint Catherine of Siena.

In 1965, at the Pontifical Institute of the Benedictine Olivetan Fathers of Rome, a scientific restoration was realised, during which, under the colours put one on top of the other in the course of the restorations wanted by the Blessed Bartolo Longo, the original colours of the Icon were discovered revealing the hand of a skilful artist of the school of the famous Italian painter Luca Giordano (XVII century). In the same year, on April 23rd, the image was crowned by Pope Paul VI in the Basilica of Saint Peter. In the year 2000, for the 125th anniversary of its arrival from Naples to Pompeii, the Picture remained for five days in the Cathedral of Naples where it was venerated by thousands of faithful.

The return journey was made on foot, following the same route of 1875, with several stops in the towns of the Neapolitan province. Al, day long hundreds of thousands of people crowed the roads, walking for thirty kilometres which the distance from Naples to Pompeii. When, in the heart of the night, the Picture arrived in Pompeii, it was welcomed by a jubilant city.

On October 16th, 2002, the Picture came back to Saint Peter on the explicit request of Pope John Paul II who, just next to the “beautiful image venerated at Pompeii”, signed the Apostolic Letter Rosarium Virginis Mariae, by which he introduced the new five Mysteries of Light and proclaimed the Year of the Rosary. (Thus the reason for including depictions of the 5 new Mysteries in the chapel.) [Much of the above history is taken from the Shrine website.]

As for the Shrine, here is the story according to the Shrine's website: "The Shrine was built during two different times. The original temple, with the form of a Latin cross with one nave, was erected between 1876 and 1891 on a project of Professor Antonio Cua of the University of Naples and measured 420sq.m. To welcome the very numerous faithful, the Shrine was enlarged between 1934 and 1939, passing from one nave to three aisles and maintaining the structure of a Latin cross. The project was conceived by the architect and priest Monsignor Spirito Maria Chiapetta who also directed the works. The two aisles which have three altars in every side, extend up in the back of the apse in an ambulatory enriched with four semicircular small chapels. The whole of constructions is harmonised by contrasting structures, in a perfect balance of masses, just studied so that they would not undergo the effects of a displacement due to any cause. The internal area, measuring 2,000 sq.m., can receive around 6,000 faithful. The cubic capacity is of 40,000 meters." The shrine is under the direct control of the Vatican.

The National Shrine is currently raising the $2,000,000 needed for the chapel. Plans are to have it completed by the Spring of 2008. The American Bishops of Italian descent donated $40,000 to kick off the fundraising. & I would be remiss if I didn't ask my readers to join in & donate. You can donate online using their secure website. Or via mail:

Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception
Development Office—Italian Chapel
400 Michigan Avenue, NE
Washington, DC 20017

Bartolo Longo was declared a blessed on 26 October 1980 by Pope John Paul the Great. Pope John Paul called Longo "The Apostle of the Rosary". The Pope also made several references to Longo in his Apostolic Letter Rosarium Virginis Mariae . On 7 October 2003 Pope John Paul made a Pastoral Visit to the Shrine of Our Lady of the Rosary of Pompei to close the Holy Year of the Rosary.

Prayer to Blessed Bartolo Longo

Oh Blessed Bartolo Longo, you who loved Mary with the tenderness of a son and who spread devotion by the reciting of the Holy Rosary and through her intercession received super abundant grace to love and serve Christ through service to abandoned children, obtain for us the grace to live in the spirit of prayer united to God, to love him, as you did, through our brothers. You, who at the end of your earthly journey declared never having tired of praying for every pain, for every hardship, for every calamity, trusting in the omnipotence of God and in the intercession of His Divine Mother, continue to intercede for those who are called to continue your work of faith and love at Pompei and for all the Rosarians of the world. Pray for us that we, after the earthly contemplation of the joyful and sorrowful Mysteries, can with you share the joy of the glorious Mysteries in heaven with Mary, Queen of the angels and of the Saints.
Amen.

Prayer for the canonization of Blessed Bartolo Longo

God, Father of mercy, we praise you for having sent into the history of humankind the Blessed Bartolo Longo, ardent apostle of the Rosary and shining example of a layman deeply involved in the evangelical witnessing of faith and of charity. We thank you for his extraordinary spiritual journey, his prophetic intuitions, his tireless endeavours on behalf of the poorest and the neglected, the devotion with which he served your Church and built the new city of love at Pompei. We beseech you, grant that Blessed Bartolo Longo soon be numbered among the Saints of the universal Church, so that everyone may follow him as a model of life and benefit by his intercession.
Amen.

(Source of prayers: Shrine website)