Of bells and balls

I'm not one to go into a church but in a city with over 900 churches I have strayed. Though I might add, as I belong to no creed, I have never attended mass.

I've visited as tourists do the four papal basilicas: St. Peter's, St Mary Major (Santa Maria Maggiore), St. John the Lateran (San Giovanni in Laterano) and the one closest to my home, St Paul Outside the Walls (San Paolo fuori le mura). They are all temples of opulence and magnificence with many a splendid art work ensconsed within but I dislike them.

My favourite church in Rome must be The Pantheon, for its past as Hadrian's Mausoleum,  rather than its present as yet another Roman catholic place of worship. However, it is its conversion to the latter role that over the centuries has saved it from destruction.

My daily life is monitored by the tolling of the bells of my local parish church, a modern ode to architectural hideousness: Our Lady Of Lourdes ( Nostra Signora di Lourdes). The 7.15 bells act as a wake up call and if I'm still in bed by the time the 8.45 bells ring, it's time to quit dawdling and get up.

My alarm clock in Winter

More mournful are the daily tolls that signal the passing of a life. But this is the high point of the Catholic calendar. The Immaculate Conception will be celebrated on the 8th December followed by the Vigilia (Christmas Eve) on the 24th of December and closing with the Epiphany on the 6th of January.

Traditionally, the 8th of December is when families get together to decorate their homes in the timeless tacky glitz that marks the festive season around the globe. Why, even the Pope has a gigantic fir tree erected in his forecourt, a kind donation from a Scandinavian country. 

Families get out the dusty boxes of carefully - or not - stored away baubles and lights along with the Christmas crib. A nod to the fact that this is a Roman Catholic country. The festivity is all about celebrating the birth of a child long ago in a distant land, isn't it?.

Christmas cribs can be formidable elaborations - forget the pastoral delights of 'Away in a Manger' - and enter another dimension. A road in Naples is dedicated to providing the various pieces and figurines that make up a crib, these include politicians and actors alongside the three wise men and other more traditional figures of the nativity.

Every year on Piazza del Popolo in Rome an exhibition entitled '100 presepi' is dedicated to this art of excess and gaudiness. 

The approach of the festive season this year has made me somewhat perplexed. Ten days into November I observed a Father Christmas puppet dangling out of a neighbour's window. Surely, Father Christmas should be preparing for his multiple commercial centre appearances around the world at this point?

 Festive lights began to adorn balconies a week ago though the local discount supermarket got all dolled up a couple of weeks back. The supermarkets began stocking their mountains of panettone and pandoro around the middle of November. And something called 'Black Friday' made its debut.

Signs went up in shop windows 'Black Friday weekend' and 'Black Friday lasts till Sunday' which made me think that some retailers might not have understood that Friday is just a day. 

No use denying it, even in a traditional country like Italy, consumerism is winning.