By Father MieczysЕ‚aw Piotrowski TChr,
Love One Another! 1/2003 → Catholic Church
“Where Peter is, there is the church... he who is not with the Pope is not with God, and who desires to be with God must be with the Pope.” These words, reflecting on the meaning of the visions in Fatima, were uttered by Sister Lucia, the only surviving witness to the apparitions there.
Our Lady of Fatima summons us to convert to a living and authentic faith in the only God of the Trinity, who is truly present in the Eucharist. The Mother of God reminds us that the Pope plays a decisive role in the transmission of the fullness of the faith. The Pope, as the successor to Saint Peter, is the rock on which Christ builds his church (Mt. 16:18). It is to Saint Peter that our Lord Jesus granted full authority to infallibly teach the truths of the faith and to lead and govern the entire church. Saint Peter was the first to establish the bishop’s capital in Rome, and to consecrate it with his own blood, the blood of a martyr. For this reason each successor to Saint Peter in the Capital acquires primacy over the whole Church.
Saint
Peter resided in Rome and suffered a martyr’s death there
in the year 67 A.D., at the time of the Christian persecutions
during the reign of the emperor Nero. The exact place of his martyrdom
is unknown. Historians believe Saint Peter was crucified upside
down in Nero’s amphitheater, which was situated where the
Vatican now stands. He was buried at a nearby cemetery. Many years
of excavations underneath the Basilica of Saint Peter led to the
discovery of the first Pope’s tomb. The tomb lies directly
beneath the Pope’s altar in the Vatican Basilica. This tomb
signifies that each bishop of Rome is Saint Peter’s successor
and by virtue of his office as “the successor of Christ
and the Pastor of the whole Church has full, supreme and universal
power over the Church” (Christus Dominus 2:9).
For thirteen centuries no one questioned the presence of Saint
Peter’s tomb in the Vatican. The first to dispute this were
the adherents of the Waldensian her
esy, who rejected the primacy of the Pope, maintaining that Saint
Peter was never in Rome, let alone that his tomb was there. Likewise,
Luther and other leaders of the Reformation denied the existence
of Saint Peter’s tomb in the Vatican, at the same time calling
into question the primacy and infallibility of the Pope in matters
of faith.
Excavation work beneath St Peter’s Basilica began in the
spring of 1939 following the death of Pius XI, who had expressed
the wish to be buried in the Vatican Grottos. During the digging
of his grave, the remains of a pagan necropolis from Roman times
were discovered. Hearing of this discovery, Pope Pius XII commissioned
a team of research workers to begin excavations and investigations,
which after several years lead to sensational discoveries. During
the 10 years of archaeological work part of a large cemetery was
discovered. Its greatest period of development would have taken
place between the 2nd and the beginning of the 4th centuries A.D.
Sepulchres were discovered along a street, which ran in the vicinity
of Nero’s amphitheater. That superbly preserved necropolis
is a typical pagan cemetery, and in it are also found Christian
graves. To this day one can admire tombs and monuments of unparalleled
architectural beauty, which belonged to affluent Roman families.
In the Valerius’ vault a Latin inscription was found: Petrus
rogat Iesus Christus pro sanctis hominibus chrestianis ad corpus
suum sepultis (Peter prays to Jesus Christ for the Christians
buried near his body). In Popilius Herakles’ tomb the following
inscription was found; IN VATIC. AD CIRCUM (at the Vatican, near
the amphitheater), which confirms the cemetery’s location
on the Vatican hills in the vicinity of Nero’s amphitheater.
In the main, however, these were sepulchres of families professing
a pagan religion.
At the beginning of the 4th century the cemetery was in full
use. According to Roman law the tombs were sacred and inviolable.
The only reason the emperor Constantine (280-337) was required
to break the Roman cemetery law in the case of this necropolis
was the necessity of building a Christian basilica on the terrain
owing to the great devotion Christians had to the tomb of St.
Peter, which was located there. The emperor ordered a so-called
congestion terrarum, demolishing the northern end of the cemetery
and covering tombs which were found in its southern part with
earth. The aim was to obtain a wide flat area on the slope of
the Vatican hill at the same level as the tomb of Saint Peter,
and to begin the construction of the basilica there in reverence
to the first Pope. It bears witness to the tremendous veneration
in which the first Christians held the tomb of Saint Peter.
The excavations carried out in the central area of the basilica,
under the pope’s altar, lead to the sensational discovery
of the tomb and relics of St. Peter. First to be discovered was
a huge cuboidal marble reliquary almost 3 yards wide (2.6 m).
It had been built by the emperor Constantine in the years 321-324.
A small tombstone, in the shape of a hollowed-out chapel, was
found inside the reliquary and was supported by two columns and
set in a red-plastered wall. Since this tiny memorial had been
enclosed in the reliquary it must have been of extraordinary significance.
The research workers had come upon the most important section
of the Vatican Basilica and the entire underground necropolis.
It became evident that this was the first monument to be erected,
in the 2nd century, on St Peter’s tomb. The first Christians
considered the tomb of St. Peter a victorious trophy. Since the
earliest information concerning the “trophy-tomb’
of St. Peter comes from the Roman priest Gaius, this tombstone
was called Gaius’ Trophy. Early in the 2nd century the Roman
Christian community built the “trophy-tomb’ on the
unexpectedly modest grave of St Peter, which had quite simply
been dug in the ground. On its western side a red plastered wall
enclosed it. This wall surrounded a small burial ground about
8x4 yards. Many common and simple graves were found there, placed
around St. Peter’s grave, on top of which sat Gaius’
Trophy. The tomb of the Apostle Peter was particularly highly
venerated, to which the many inscriptions on the so called ‘g-wall’
bear witness, including a large inscription in Greek: “Peter
is here at the ‘red wall’.”
The research undertaken over many years by Professor Margherita
Guarducci led to the discovery of the meanings of the many inscriptions
on the “g-wall’. They were written by the one person
responsible for that place, according to established principles
of mystical cryptography, and were both spiritually as well as
logically ordered. As an example, we know that the letters [u-a]
mean a transition from the end, that is from death to the beginning,
to the fullness of life.
Aside from the names of the dead the name of St. Peter appears,
linked with the names of Christ and Mary, as well as the profession
of belief in the Blessed Trinity; that Jesus Christ is true God
and true man; that he is the second person in the Blessed Trinity,
the Son of God, the Beginning and the End, the Life, the Light,
the Resurrection, Salvation, Peace and Victory etc. In this manner
Christians professed their faith in the Blessed Trinity, Christ’s
Divinity, the intercession of Mary and eternal life and prayed
for their dead. This is extremely important testimony indicative
of the fact that since the very beginnings of Christianity there
was a very deep faith in the Blessed Trinity, Christ’s divinity,
the intercession of the Mother of God and eternal life, as well
as the primacy of St. Peter.
It is also worthwhile to mention at this point the inscription
hoc vince (with this you shall conquer) near Christ’s monogram.
It is the Latin translation of a famous Greek inscription ?,
which the emperor Constantine saw in the sky, together with a
cross, before his victory in the Battle of Milvian Bridge against
Maxentius’s armies on October 28 in the year 312.
Archaeologists were very surprised when they failed to find the
relics of St. Peter in the grave dug in the ground. They were
later found just over 2 yards above the original grave in a recess
in the ‘g-wall’. The recess containing the relics
was discovered on October 13, 1941. It transpired that the emperor
Constantine had transferred the relics of St. Peter from the original
grave to the specially prepared recess in the ‘g-wall’
during the construction of the marble reliquary.
The relics became the subject of anthropological studies of many
years duration. Initially the studies were headed by Professor
Galeazzi Lisi, then by Professor Correnti. The results of the
studies were printed in 1965 in a book published by the Vatican:
Le reliquie di Pietro sotto la Confessione della Basilica Vaticana.
The bones of St. Peter, placed at the time of the emperor Constantine
in the ‘g-wall’ recess, were wrapped in a valuable
purple cloth interwoven with pure gold.
The anthropological studies revealed that the bones belonged
to one person, a male of stocky build, aged between 60-70 years
and 5 feet 5 inches (165 cm) tall.
The scientific confirmation of the authenticity of the relics of St. Peter was an extremely important event. During the general audience on June 26, 1968 Pope Paul VI officially announced the discovery of the relics of St Peter. The following day, during the course of formal celebrations, 19 receptacles holding the relics of the first Pope were laid to rest in the recess of the ‘g-wall,’ where they remain to this day.
The article was published with the permission from "Love One Another!"
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