Pier Luigi Bagatin The walk Of The Seven Churches of Lendinara 2014 Translated by Lorenza Gramegna Lendinara (Rovigo) - Italy Tipografia Lendinarese. © Copyright 2014 Written two years ago thanks to the collaboration of the people who run the Biblioteca Comunale and tho- se who run Università Popolare, The seven churches of Lendinara sold out very quickly. This small book is easy to use. It has accompanied many visitors along the Walk of the Seven churches. The walk draws together the beauty and the unique- ness of the town’s historic and artistic heritage. It also highlights historically interesting points, including charming town landmarks in an itinerary full of charm, whose relics fit into a coherent whole. Our heartfelt thanks goes out to the GAL “History, Bike and Food” project. In its effort to increase the va- lue of the territory’s traditions and to reach out to vi- siting tourists, this guide is being offered in its second printing. We take this opportunity to renew our thanks also to its author, Pier Luigi Bagatin, and to wish our fellow citizens and visiting tourists a productive visit to Lendinara’s seven churches. Lendinara, october 2014 Luigi Viaro Mayor of Lendinara 3 I am delighted to present this pocket-book, as its author P.L. Bagatin calls it, primarily because it is something new for Lendinara. It is not really a tourist guide, but something more and in a way something less. It is so- mething less because it does not go into detail about the churches–it only hints at their most remarkable fe- atures. It is much more than a tourist guide because it understands the nature of the churches, it reconstructs their history and explains our town’s devotion to them. It effectively describes and explains the special cha- racteristics of each of them. Having taken the walk with a group of visitors, I know it is a moving experience. It will be even more so for the traveller who decides to go on this circular walk alone, with the help of just this booklet. It will encourage the visitor to meditate upon the history and the spirituality of this area. The book also engages the traveller on a metaphysical level, examining the journey we all take, from life to death, through reference to brotherhood, to memory, education, harmony, motherly love. The reader-traveller has only to be led by the desire for di- scovery, and to be gently rocked by emotions. 4 Another reason for satisfaction and pride in the produc- tion of this volume is that it honours the Baccari bro- thers (Francesco Antonio, Gaetano, Giacomo) to whom our community owes a great deal for the beauty of the stones and the bricks we daily enjoy. Finally, let’s not forget that Gaetano [Baccari] was also the founder of our Library. Therefore, many thanks to Pier Luigi for all these ac- complishments and for his dedication to bringing this precious pocket book to our Community. Vanna Boraso President of the Biblioteca Comunale “Gaetano Baccari” of Lendinara 5 The idea of writing a booklet grew from the lecture P.L. Bagatin gave last year at our Università Popolare – Ause. It immediately sounded inspiring, and we are pleased that the project was received with enthusiasm. We included this booklet in the project “Culture and Territory in the Planning Skills of Young People”, pre- pared by Rovigo Auser. The publication is therefore the result of a network which has merged the efforts of an institution (Biblioteca Comunale) and of voluntary work (Università Popolare), together with the team spirit which characterizes our citizens’ commitment. The charm of the proposal is that the walk follows a circular route, which allows the visitor to enter the socio-religious context which has characterized the life of Lendinara throughout the centuries. This is a booklet which is pleasant to read, and accom- panies an easy walk…. Tiziano Fontan President of Università Popolare della Terza Età – Auser of Lendinara 6 Introduction THE SEVEN CHURCHES OF LENDINARA Number seven is a magic number in all cultures. Traditionally it expresses totality, completeness, and balance. For Egyptians it was a symbol of life, for Pythagoreans it symbolized holiness, and for Christians it epitomizes the perfection of human nature (by combining divine ternary with terrestrial quaternary). There are seven deadly sins, seven sacraments, seven heavens in the Bible, seven heads of the Beast of the Apocalypse, seven arms of the menorah (the candlestick of Jerusalem’s Temple), seven notes, seven days for the Creation and of the week. And there are seven ancient basilicas in Rome, which pilgrims visited in the seat of the Pope at Easter. The seven basilicas in Rome inspire homage to sacred relics and art treasures. A visit there includes renowned centres of universal Christianity, from San Giovanni’s in Laterano to Santa Maria Maggiore’s and San Pietro’s in the Vatican, from San Paolo’s to Santa Croce’s in Gerusalemme, San Lorenzo’s, and San Sebastiano’s outside the city walls. The pious tradition, established at the beginning of Christianity, became a pilgrimage in the mid-1500s 7 thanks to San Filippo Neri. The Roman custom was followed in many other towns, where seven churches were visited out of an act of penance. The phrase “to do the round of the seven churches” is still used. From the shrines of Catholicism to the geography of every day, number “seven” appears many times everywhere. They are mere chances –it must be said– to be welcomed with a pleasant smile of indulgence, but also an excuse for kindred spirits to have an opportunity to allow thoughts to soar with open wings. In the endless kaleidoscope of numbers, seven also seems to fit some of the most beautiful things that adorn the centre of Lendinara, namely the churches. There are precisely seven. All of them are centuries old, located in a corner of the ancient heart of Polesine, which finds in them and in the ancient palaces of the noble families and of civic power the hub of its history, and the casket of its memory. A spark of the magic of number seven reveals an itinerary which unites the churches together, a thread which identifies a mental as well as a physical consequential order, which matches their peculiar reality. An invisible guide book of the town of the Canozis and Alberto Mario suggests a walk along streets and across squares which are never the same. In fact, the walk brings travellers back to where they started, in the same way as everything 8 which is circular, completed and well done, goes back to where it started, like to the renowned spirituality of number seven. The seven churches of Lendinara become stations on a historical, artistic and religious walk one thousand years old, spanning over thirty generations which lived here. This booklet is a pocket-book of notes on the seven churches still extant in Lendinara: seven houses of the Lord built by Lendinara’s Catholics to cherish their most intimate and highest prayers at the feet of the Eternal God. They show exacting architectures, the result of hard work, often interrupted by calamitous events, or by the death of those who had first conceived, initiated, and financed them. Yet, in the stratification of the elements which make them up, these churches are still today a deposit of emotions which has lasted throughout time. In front of them and inside them, it is not difficult to imagine the commitment, the talent, and the effort they required. Additionally, the imprints of the religious groups, the priests, the benefactors, and the artists –people who wanted to leave a message, the meaning of their suffering, the reason of their efforts through these churches– stand out distinctly. The seven churches of Lendinara continue to be houses for the local community. Inside them life has daily 9 intertwined with death, and hope for a better future has overlapped with daily anxieties. Here the rituals on weekdays, lived and celebrated by small groups of believers, have alternated with large community ceremonies and important rituals. Here the Te Deums have ratified the survival of regimes or their end, as well as the crisis of ideas shattered by radical changes. Santa Sofia’s, Sant’Agata’s –now San Francesco’s– San Rocco’s, San Biagio’s, Sant’Anna’s, the Santuario della Madonna, San Giuseppe’s –this is the order of the walk, strictly on foot, in order to enjoy a pause for contemplation from one church to the other, but also to link them all at the end of the walk, along streets which have witnessed a wealth of sensations of all the generations that have gone before. On visiting these buildings full of the past, and on viewing the passions narrated through paintings and carvings, through the spaces created by vaults, pillars and columns, the soul is lifted up, our fears are disclosed, our expectations revealed, and our dreams soar. In the same way, this walk in Lendinara – though not so very long –looks inside the traveller, at the reason why the walk is undertaken. It sharpens the traveller’s impressions, weighs emotions, and suggests reasons deeper than mere tourism. 10 Of the seven stages, the following pages offer a simple portrait. A few words are enough, just like when we take some friends on the tour on a week day, when there is no mass in progress, no pomp, no people, perhaps with the door of the church wide open to let in the first spring sunshine to give the church an airing after the winter, and a blade of new light reveals forgotten or previously unnoticed colours and details.