Sacred water from the river Jordan exported to the US in 1905

Armenian businessmen pose together with an orthodox priest and a police constable (?) in front of barrels filled with sacred water from the river Jordan, which were to be exported to the US in 1905:

In December 2010 it was reported that the export of sacred water had resumed after a pause of 100 years:

For the first time in almost 100 years, Jordan is resuming the export of consecrated water from the site where Jesus Christ is believed to have been baptized, officials said Tuesday.
The export of sacred water from the Jordan River came to a halt with the defeat of the Ottoman Turks, who controlled Jordan and other Middle East countries before the outbreak of World War I.
For much of the past century, the area on the eastern side of the river has been a military zone.
"Jordanian firms have been qualified for the bottling and packing of consecrated water from the baptism site," said Dia Madani, chairman of the Baptism Site Board.

Pope Francis celebrated his first Easter Mass at St. Peter's Square

Today Pope Francis celebrated his first Easter Mass at St. Peter's Square followed by the Urbi et Orbi blessing - "to the city and the world" - from the papal balcony. It was a moving and memorable event for the new pope and the crowd of about 300.000 people gathered in the Square as well as for the millions of television viewers around the world. 

On the birthday of Johann Sebastian Bach

“The aim and final reason of all music should be none else but the glory of God and refreshing the soul. Where this is not observed there will be no music, but only a devilish hubbub.” 
― Johann Sebastian Bach

Today is the birthday of Johan Sebastian Bach, arguably the greatest of all composers. He was born in  Eisenach on 21 March in 1685 as the eight child in his family. 

Have mercy, my God,

for the sake of my tears!

See here, before you

heart and eyes weep bitterly.

Have mercy, my God.

The Christmas Eve Mass in St Peter's Basilica in 2012

Watching Christmas Eve and Easter Masses celebrated in St Peter's Basilica in the Vatican has been tradition in my family for decades now. I find it amazing that they are able to create a feeling of warmth, even intimacy, in spite of the huge size of the St Peter' s - it can easily host more than 15.000 people.

Pope Benedict XVI celebrating the Christmas Eve Mass in 2012

Masses celebrated in St Peter's Square, pictured below in a 19th century drawing by Boudier, are even bigger events, with up to 80 000 people attending.

Three old photographs from the Holy Land

The three photographs below show Nazareth, Capernaum and Gethsemane in the 1890s:

In the New Testament, Nazareth is described as the childhood home of Jesus, and as such it is a center of Christian pilgrimage, with many shrines commemorating biblical events.

Capernaum was according to the Gospel of Luke the home of the apostles Simon Peter, Andrew, James and John.  In Matthew 4:13 the town is reported to have been the home of Jesus.

Gethsemane, the garden at the foot of the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem is the place where, according to the gospels Jesus and his disciples are said to have prayed the night before he was arrested, the day before his death.

The medieval Church of St. Mary in Helsingborg

The medieval Church of St. Mary (14th - 15th cent.) is oldest building in Helsingborg. It replaced a small sandstone church in the same spot. At the time it was one of the Denmark's biggest town churches. (Scania and Helsingborg became part of Sweden in 1658).

My own favorite among the treasures in the St. Mary's is the altarpiece, which depicts scenes of the life of St. Mary and the childhood years of Jesus. The altarpiece is dated to the middle of the 15th century, and is considered to be of North German (probably Lübeckian) origin. 

Composer Dieterich Buxtehude, who followed his father as organist of the St. Mary's in 1658, must have had many opportunities to admire the work of the German craftsmanship ...

PS

Had Buxtehude been active now, he would probably have enjoyed the beautiful Marcussen and Son organ from 1959:

The Romanesque Cathedral of Lund

The Cathedral of Lund in Scania (Southern Sweden) is the most important Romanesque building in Scandinavia. At the time it was built - during the first half of the 12th century - Lund was already the seat of an archbishop whose diocese covered all of Scandinavia. (It should perhaps be pointed out Lund as well as the entire Southern Sweden, was part of Denmark until 1658, when Sweden took over). 

The two towers were made higher in connection with the renovation in the late 19th century. 

 

The Lund Cathedral was built in the same style as the Speyer and Mainz cathedrals in Germany. The outer length of the cathedral is 87m.

The cathedral in c. 1870, before the renovation.
(image by wikipedia) 

The Romanesque apse.

The arched gallery in the apse.

The portals are built in Lombardian style. 

The south portal.

The north portal.

The interior of the Cathedral is 80m long. The nave is 21m high.

The Gothic altarpiece dates from 1398.

Detail of the astronomical clock, the Horologium Mirabile Lundense, from around 1424. An organ in the clock plays In Dulci Jubilo twice daily. 

This "clock" is from 1623.

A beautiful stained glass window.

More information on the Lund Cathedral also here.

A shining little village church in Austria

The other night, when I woke up early (at about 5 A.M) I turned on the TV, just to have something to occupy myself with. I accidentally began watching the Austrian HD channel Servus, which during the early morning hours often shows nice views of the Austrian alps, shot from hot air balloons. 

This time the cameraman on board the balloon had (most likely) been filming in the early morning hours, with mist, clouds and shadows over the beautiful Pinzgau region, not far from Salzburg. Suddenly he had noticed a hole in the clouds, and in the middle of the hole was a small village church.

I happened to have my camera close by, and took this picture of the church:

PS

The shining little village church inspired me to add a text to the picture.