Faith · Heritage · Science · Rome

Wood analysis dates the Chair of Saint Peter to no earlier than the 6th century

For the first time in 150 years, tourists and residents of Rome can see the wooden throne of Saint Peter the Apostle, previously hidden within the Chair of Saint Peter in the apse of Saint Peter's Basilica in the Vatican. Flying to Rome at once! The relic was

Archive · Faith · Art

The Church as a ship of saints in the Piccolomini Breviary illustration, Lombardy, circa 1475

An allegory of the Church as a ship, which provokes rejection and hostility from the people on the shore. The ship is filled with saints. The mast is the cross of Jesus Christ, crowned with the nest of a pelican feeding its young with its own blood. On the keel

NB! · Archive · Faith · Art · Books

The Evangelist Luke with his symbol, the Eagle, and the motto More volans aquile verbo petit astra Iohannes, in a tenth-century book

Architecture · Faith · Art · Rome

The impressive "Glory of Saint Ignatius" in the Baroque Roman church of Sant'Ignazio di Loyola, one of the largest frescoes in the world and the work of the Italian artist, architect, art theorist and Jesuit brother Andrea Pozzo, is unique not only…

The subject of the painting glorifies Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuit order, and his missionary work. The continents are portrayed in female and male figures, each resting on a characteristic animal: Europe with a sceptre, mounted on a horse; Africa, seated on a crocodile; America, appearing as

NB! · Faith · Society · Ethnography

The Amish, who usually take no part in American political life, have this time not stood aside

NB! · Faith · The East · Art

The Holy Family as Imagined by an Early Seventeenth-Century Artist from Northern India

NB! · Archive · Faith · Monarchies · Heritage · Saint Petersburg

Arrival of Grand Duchess Elizaveta Feodorovna at the site of the foundation of the church of Saint Nicholas the Wonderworker and the Blessed Grand Duke Alexander Nevsky (Nikolo-Bargradsky) at the Imperial Orthodox Palestine Society

Arrival of Grand Duchess Elizaveta Feodorovna at the site of the foundation of the church of Saint Nicholas the Wonderworker and the Blessed Grand Duke Alexander Nevsky (Nikolo-Bargradsky) at the Imperial Palestine Society. The church was blown up in 1932

Architecture · Faith · Moscow · Observations · Heritage

Swiss artists raised the Cathedral of St Gall into the air for its anniversary

I tried to imagine what it would look like if one of Russia's chief churches, St Basil's Cathedral, were made into a hot-air balloon. Swiss artists once raised one of their country's symbols into the air in just this manner: the Abbey Cathedral

NB! · Architecture · Faith · Heritage · Society

The sorry state of the medieval and Renaissance stained glass in one of the oldest churches of France, the church of Saint-Pierre in Chartres, dating from the thirteenth century, is a sad testimony to the French Republic's authorities drifting ever furthe

Black-and-white photo of a man in a suit and a clergyman in vestments and mitre on a balcony with a wrought-iron railing, a photographer behind them.

Faith · Observations · Society

Patriarch Alexy II on bitter words spoken to rulers and to the people

There were times when the Patriarch's duty was to speak bitter words to the ruler's face. Now, it seems, there are coming times when still more bitter words must be spoken to the face of one's own people. Patriarch Alexy II

Black-and-white photograph of an elderly man in white papal vestments with a pectoral cross, raising his hands in greeting.