In recent years, moments when I have a truly spiritual experience in a religious sense are extremely rare. After growing up in an extremely Catholic household and having a certain falling out with the Catholic church, I now basically ignore religion constantly and haven´t said a formal prayer in years. But when I entered the Chiesa del Gesù, the place´s beauty struck me so strongly that I actually wanted to get down on my knees and pray, and that is not something that ever happens to me.
I set out for the church late in the afternoon after another long day, Gia once again serving as my motivation. To be quite honest, I thought of seeing the church as a chore that I knew I simply had to get done and didn´t really have much interest in going. But when I entered the church, I felt infinitely glad that I hadn´t decided to nap instead. First of all, the church was extremely gold, and to put it simply, I love gold. The view of the entire church when you first walk in is absolutely incredible; its detail is incomparable to any other church I had seen thus far in Rome.
Upon starting my exploration, I had a fun coincidental moment almost immediately. I was standing facing one direction, admiring a small interpretation of the Pietì, and when I turned around to continue walking I had to pause because for a split second I thought I was looking into a mirror. The moment passed, I realized that there was, of course, no mirror, and I then commenced thinking about how I had never before seen a mirror in a church in my entire life. I contemplated whether there was some rule about mirrors in churches; maybe they aren´t allowed because they encourage narcissism or something. It made sense to me. After that train of thought ended, I continued on to see more of the church. Passing through the center, right by the entrance, I stumbled upon none other than - you guessed it - a full length mirror. I had literally just been thinking about how I had never seen a mirror in a church in my life, and then one appears right in front of my eyes. How I missed it when I first walked into the church, I have no idea, but there it was: a large mirror right in the middle of the church, postitioned at such an angle so that I could use it to look at the intricate ceiling without straining my neck. Which allows me to move on to...
The ceiling. This ceiling was the most incredible thing I have ever seen. I was so completely awestruck by all of its different layers. It was painted in beautiful colors with ethereal scenes, and in addition to the paintings there were actual statues of angels and other celestial characters hanging from the ceiling. The paintings seemed to be spilling out of their contained spaces and mingling with the statues amidst all of the ornate gold. The combination of the different materials struck me as absolutely mind-blowing. I was grateful there was a mirror there because if I had stayed with my eyes glued directly to the ceiling for as long as I wanted to, I would have had to pay a visit to an Italian chiropractor.
After I was finally able to tear myself away from the ceiling mirror, I continued on through the church to gaze at a giant silver statue which I later found out was of Saint Ignatius. This was possibly the most ornate statue I had ever seen. It looked like it was made completely out of silver and gold, which was extremely impressive considering its size. As I was staring it at it, all of a sudden the lights that had been illuminating it shut off. I had seen this happen in churches before, so I thought nothing of it, but then something a little less expected happened: a giant painting slowly began to rise up from the bottom of the statue and cover it up. I put some euro coins in the slot so that the painting would begin to move back down the other way and I could gaze longer at the giant silvery statue, but nothing happened. I felt like I was in some sort of spy movie where a secret passage could be revealed at any moment. Once the painting was securely in place hiding the statue, I realized that anyone who walked into the church now would have no idea that such a beautiful surprise was hidden behind the ordinary painting. I wanted to run around telling people but decided that would probably be an odd thing to do, so I resolved to let the statue´s existence be my little secret.
My visit to the Chiesa del Gesù was a wonderful surprise. I enjoyed it infinitely more than I ever could have imagined I would and was so glad I decided to go. It really opened my eyes to the fact that I could actually go to a church on my own and thoroughly enjoy it. I honestly think from now on I may make a habit of wandering into more churches just for fun.
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