Santa Maria Maggiore

Santa Maria Maggiore is one of Rome’s basilicas. I still haven’t exactly figured out the difference between a basilica and a duomo (cathedral). The Archdiocese of New York has a cathedral (St. Patrick’s), while the Diocese of Brooklyn has a basilica (big hulking building in Sunset Park). Santa Maria Maggiore is built on the spot where the Blessed Virgin caused snow to fall in Rome; they re-enact this each year by scattering white flower petals. It is also the church where Palestrina was Kapellmeister (not sure what it is in Italian, so German will have to do).

There is also a statue of the Virgin doing what Tom calls "the big arms thing." You rarely see this in art; usually, only Jesus does "the big arms thing." In its treasury, there is a lovely presipio (crèche scene) carved out of stone.

Santa Bibiana

Careful readers of the New Yorker some months ago would have noticed a reference to Santa Bibiana, who is known as the patron saint of hangovers. Anyone who remembers what a hangover feels like has no reason to doubt the condition needs a patron. An “insider guide” to Rome on the web assured me that St. Bibiana’s Church at 154 Via Giovanni Giolitti was open every day all day. Tom and I had walked past it often on our last trip to Rome and never remembered seeing it open. Both the façade and a statue of the saint over the high altar were made by a 27 year old Gian Lorenzo Bernini.

I did find a reliquary which held (well, held once; I can’t tell now) Santa Bibiana’s relics in the treasury under Santa Maria Maggiore.