On Thursday, November 19, at the Swedish Center for Christian Studies (SCCS) the “brothers in Christ, in study, in friendship” of Friar Michele Piccirillo - according to the beautiful expression used by one of the speakers, Mrs. Claudine Dauphin - got together to pay him homage one year after his return to his Creator.
It seems that 100% of those invited responded by their presence, for the center’s conference hall would not have been able to welcome many more. The assembly included not only Franciscan friars who had come as a delegation from the Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, but also other Catholic religious as well as Greek Orthodox people, Armenians, Protestants…
It was a meeting that corresponded with the very nature of this study center, which seeks to be a place of encounter for all the Christians in the Holy Land around the things that bring them together: their common heritage.
Friar Michele had encouraged the center to hold onto this place in the Holy City, and he himself went there many times for conferences to share his passion for the Holy Land and his knowledge of pilgrimages, as the center’s director, Mr. Sune Fahlgren recalled in his welcoming address.
Before the two conferences that looked back on Friar Michele’s life and work, Mr. Georg Hintlian, an Armenian historian from Jerusalem and the co-organizer of this homage, paid emotive homage to his friend, his brother Michele; then Friar Claudio Bottini, the dean of the Studium Biblicum, recalled the origin of his vocation and of his love for the Holy Land.
In the first conference, Mrs. Claudine Dauphin, an honorary professor of archeology and theology at the university of Lampeter in Wales, explained and illustrated how Friar Michele was a whole and unified man. When scholars said they had known the archaeologist but not the religious, Mrs. Dauphin showed that, on the contrary, the Franciscan was reflected in his work as archaeologist through his specialty in Middle Eastern Byzantine mosaics. For a whole theology of creation unfolds in the art of mosaics, a very Franciscan theology in its love and exaltation of nature. For Claudine Dauphin, Friar Michele lived of that on which he worked, for these mosaics show the whole history of salvation.
In the second conference, Mrs. Basema Hamarneh, a professor of archeology at the university of Enna (Italy) who worked with Friar Michele in the excavations of Umm ar-Rasas, Madaba und Mount Nebo, looked back on his work. And in listening to her depiction of the gigantic work done by Friar Piccirillo, one asked oneself how he could read, write, excavate, help, listen, imagine, plan, cooperate, collaborate, participate, exhibit, share, dream, develop, call forth, promote, suggest, contribute, encourage, explore, guide, accompany, initiate, bang his fist, laugh, pray and love to such an extent… everything, as Professor Hamanreh told us, with humility and dedication…
Without hesitating to work with his hands, as Saint Francis had invited his brethren to do, and applying himself to that wholeheartedly, as the Custos of the Holy Land, Friar Pierbattista Pizzaballa, recalled at the end.
gHis love of culture and his dedication to manual work never extinguished his sense for the religious, which pushed him to participate in the liturgical celebrations and to visit the sanctuaries as a pilgrim and a believer.” […] “One remembers Father Michele Piccirillo with admiration for his excavations and his writings, but we Franciscans of the Holy Land remember him especially because he was a good son of Saint Francis and a companion who worked hard during his pilgrimage in the earthly Jerusalem, the image of the heavenly Jerusalem.” The homage to Friar Michele Piccirillo was followed by the invitation of the Swedish Center for Christian Studies to the restaurant, where Friar Michele, though not able to take part, certainly rejoiced from where he is to see this gathering of friends who had come together in joy.
Mab
It seems that 100% of those invited responded by their presence, for the center’s conference hall would not have been able to welcome many more. The assembly included not only Franciscan friars who had come as a delegation from the Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, but also other Catholic religious as well as Greek Orthodox people, Armenians, Protestants…
It was a meeting that corresponded with the very nature of this study center, which seeks to be a place of encounter for all the Christians in the Holy Land around the things that bring them together: their common heritage.
Friar Michele had encouraged the center to hold onto this place in the Holy City, and he himself went there many times for conferences to share his passion for the Holy Land and his knowledge of pilgrimages, as the center’s director, Mr. Sune Fahlgren recalled in his welcoming address.
Before the two conferences that looked back on Friar Michele’s life and work, Mr. Georg Hintlian, an Armenian historian from Jerusalem and the co-organizer of this homage, paid emotive homage to his friend, his brother Michele; then Friar Claudio Bottini, the dean of the Studium Biblicum, recalled the origin of his vocation and of his love for the Holy Land.
In the first conference, Mrs. Claudine Dauphin, an honorary professor of archeology and theology at the university of Lampeter in Wales, explained and illustrated how Friar Michele was a whole and unified man. When scholars said they had known the archaeologist but not the religious, Mrs. Dauphin showed that, on the contrary, the Franciscan was reflected in his work as archaeologist through his specialty in Middle Eastern Byzantine mosaics. For a whole theology of creation unfolds in the art of mosaics, a very Franciscan theology in its love and exaltation of nature. For Claudine Dauphin, Friar Michele lived of that on which he worked, for these mosaics show the whole history of salvation.
In the second conference, Mrs. Basema Hamarneh, a professor of archeology at the university of Enna (Italy) who worked with Friar Michele in the excavations of Umm ar-Rasas, Madaba und Mount Nebo, looked back on his work. And in listening to her depiction of the gigantic work done by Friar Piccirillo, one asked oneself how he could read, write, excavate, help, listen, imagine, plan, cooperate, collaborate, participate, exhibit, share, dream, develop, call forth, promote, suggest, contribute, encourage, explore, guide, accompany, initiate, bang his fist, laugh, pray and love to such an extent… everything, as Professor Hamanreh told us, with humility and dedication…
Without hesitating to work with his hands, as Saint Francis had invited his brethren to do, and applying himself to that wholeheartedly, as the Custos of the Holy Land, Friar Pierbattista Pizzaballa, recalled at the end.
gHis love of culture and his dedication to manual work never extinguished his sense for the religious, which pushed him to participate in the liturgical celebrations and to visit the sanctuaries as a pilgrim and a believer.” […] “One remembers Father Michele Piccirillo with admiration for his excavations and his writings, but we Franciscans of the Holy Land remember him especially because he was a good son of Saint Francis and a companion who worked hard during his pilgrimage in the earthly Jerusalem, the image of the heavenly Jerusalem.” The homage to Friar Michele Piccirillo was followed by the invitation of the Swedish Center for Christian Studies to the restaurant, where Friar Michele, though not able to take part, certainly rejoiced from where he is to see this gathering of friends who had come together in joy.
Mab