Ancient Rome

Today we started early by touring the ancient and amazing basilica of San Clemente. Sadly unlike the Italians, the Irish Dominicans who run the parish actually enforce their no photos policy and frankly the exterior is rather boring, so Google the church for some amazing mosaics.  On our way we walked around the Palatine hill, and I was geeking out rather a lot over them.  From there we moved to the Colosseum and from there to the Forum.  I think my classmates were rather bored, but I had a great time.

Il Colloso.  Sorry for the odd angle, but it refuses to rotate.

The Forum through Trajan's arch

The all-important temple to Vesta

After mass back at the house where we are staying (I keep on calling it that because the official name is Domus Romanus Sacerdotalis, the Roman Priest house- it was built to lodge bishops for Vatican II and they cut the suites in half and turned them into rooms), we headed over to San Maria in Trastevere (St. Mary's across the Tiber), which is one of the oldest churches in Rome.  The original nonexistent structure was a house church in the foreign quarter of Ancient Rome where many Jews lived.  There we met with one of the lay movements that does a lot of outreach to the poor and prayed their devotions with them before heading to dinner.  Sorry for the lack of information about the group, but to be honest I was a bit distracted by the church.

Hard to understand why.