October 24 Civic Ceremony to confer on Pope Benedict XVI the Key to the Commune of Manoppello

Another key is ready to be handed over to the apostolic keeper of the keys. This time it is to be granted by the civic officials of the Commune of Manoppello where the Holy Face of Christ is always on display. The inspiration for the design of the key is taken from the great work of art by Perugino in the Sistine Chapel which shows Christ handing over the keys to Peter. The ceremony is to take place Sunday October 24 at the Church of San Nicola in Manoppello where tradition holds that the Holy Face was given to a citizen of Manoppello in 1506 by an angelic personage. The Vatican Band will be part of the ceremonies which will continue at the Basilica of the Holy Face with the unveiling of a monument in stone to commemorate the visit of Pope Benedict XVI to the Shrine of the Holy Face on September 1, 2006. Also during the ceremonies the piazza adjoining the Basilica will be named Piazza Papa Benedetto XVI in his honor. The key will be received by Pope Benedict himself on November 3 at the Wednesday audience.

Pope Benedict XVI to Receive Keys to the Commune of Manoppello

Pope Benedict XVI Arriving in Manoppello on September 1, 2006




Pope Benedict XVI speaking in the shrine of the Holy Face on Sept. 1, 2006 with the Holy Face just behind him and the local Archbishop Bruno Forte of the Archdiocese of Chieti-Vasto at his side


Pope Benedict XVI will receive the keys to the Commune of Manoppello in a ceremony to be conducted during a Wednesday audience at St. Peter's Square. This special honor which will link the Pope more closely to the city of the Holy Face was proposed by Paul Badde during the ceremony in May at which he himself received the keys to the Commune of Manoppello. As well, the space next to the shrine of the Holy Face where Pope Benedict's helicopter touched down on the day of his visit to Manoppello on Sept. 1, 2006 will be renamed Pope Benedict XVI Plaza. The civic officials of Manoppello led by Mayor Gennaro Matarazzo and the President of the Communal Council Gaetano Villani are organizing a celebration to take place on a Sunday in September or October to mark these happy events in the history of Manoppello.

Photos from Feast of Transfiguration

Thanks to Paul Badde for the two photos of the Holy Face posted above which he took during the feast of the Transfiguration several weeks ago in Manoppello.

May the Face of Jesus Shine in the Church Throughout the World

From the preface of the Feast of the Transfiguration

"He revealed his glory to the disciples to strengthen them for the scandal of the cross. His glory shone from a body like our own, to show that the Church, which is the body of Christ, would one day share his glory".


The feast of the Transfiguration each year is a special day of celebration and prayer in Manoppello and at the Shrine of the Holy Face.

We Thank You O Lord For the Vision of Your Mercy and for the Blessings of Your Bounty

Many thanks to Dorothea Link who took this photo of the Holy Face of Manoppello for allowing me to post it on my blog, and to Paul Badde for pointing it to me. It is the most wonderful I have seen and shows the great generosity of Jesus in His loving plan, the wonders he has performed now and in time to come, for each and every one. I can only think of the marvelous psalm of David's thanksgiving as I sit "at the ends of the earth" where the farthest east and west seem to meet.

Psalm 65

"To you we owe our hymn of praise, O God, in Zion; To you must vows be fulfilled, you who hear prayers. To you all flesh must come because of wicked deeds. We are overcome by our sins; it is you who pardon them. Happy is the man you choose, and bring to dwell in your courts. May we be filled with the good things of your house, the holy things of your temple!

With awe-inspiring deeds of justice you answer us, O God our savior, the hope of all the ends of the earth and of the distant seas. You set the mountains in place by your power, you who are girt with might; You still the roaring of the seas, the roaring of their waves and the tumult of the peoples. And the dwellers at the earth's ends are in fear at your marvels; the farthest east and west you make resound with joy.

You have visited the land and watered it; greatly have you enriched it. God's watercourses are filled; you have prepared the grain. Thus have you prepared the land, drenching its furrows, breaking up its clods. Softening it with showers, blessing its yield. You have crowned the year with your bounty, and your paths overflow with a rich harvest; The untilled meadows overflow with it, and rejoicing clothes the hills. The fields are garmented with flocks and the valleys blanketed with grain. They shout and sing for joy."

A Window of the Holy Face from Stiepel Cistercian Monastery in Germany

Thanks to Kerstin for allowing me to show this photograph of a stained glass window featuring the Holy Face of Manoppello in the Cistercian Monastery in Stiepel, Bochum, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany.

Videos of Holy Face of Manoppello

I have always thought of this blog as a resource of english language sources for the Holy Face of Manoppello. However from time to time I have included other language sources. At this time I feel the need to include several videos produced in Italian which are quite helpful for their visualization of the pilgrimage experience to the Shrine of the Holy Face. The first is a video produced by a pilgrim last year which gives a kind of "you are there" footage of the shrine. It includes some popular music which can be muted if desired. The second is a program produced in May of this year by the Italian national television network RAI2 on the occasion of the visit of Pope Benedict XVI to the Holy Shroud of Turin. It is a segment of the weekly program Sulla Via di Damasco (On the Road to Damascus) hosted by Monsignor Giovanni D'Ercole which has beautiful footage of the interior of the Shrine and of the Holy Face itself as well as of the Holy Shroud of Turin. Monsignor D'Ercole interviews Fr. Carmine Cucinelli, O.F.M., Cap, rector of the shrine of the Holy Face and also Saverio Gaeta, editor of the Italian national Catholic weekly magazine Famiglia Cristiana and author of several books on the Holy Face. I have set up a list of videos which are now included on the home page of this blog which includes these videos as well as those of Fr. Josef Laufer and also a video of the annual festival of the Holy Face from 2003.

YouTube - Volto Santo Manoppello

http://www.rai.tv/dl/RaiTV/programmi/media/ContentItem-c9cf8317-57ff-40c5-959d-81a5c0e842a4.html?p=0