I have been there as a kid. I might have been too young to process the experience like something related to death, but I recall I didn't feel anything in particular; it left me with absolutely nothing but thinking "why on earth would someone cover a place with skeletons?". It probably contributed much later to my aversion to horror movies.
Roman church decorated with 4k skeletons
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Re: Roman church decorated with 4k skeletons
#182Catholics believe in "incorruptibility" as a sign of potential sainthood. This is where the body does not decompose. You can see the bodies on display https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incorruptibility Catholics also believe in demonic possession, hell, and exorcism. Not the first things a priest will tell you though :)
Would that make Lenin a saint? I mean his body has been around wearing away clothes for good while.
Incorruptible bodies are not proof of sainthood. Also, I assume Lenin's body had something done to it?
Re: Roman church decorated with 4k skeletons
#183A great many people are incredibly uncomfortable with the idea of death, and installations like this, and similar works of art, are a great antidote. Accepting death as the price of life might be a bit difficult for people raised in a culture that worships perpetual youth and which dreams of immortality, perhaps in the form of a digital silicon upload, but it's really a sign of maturity. Taking a minute or so out of…
I don't know about you but seeing a big pile of skeletons in a basement mainly serves to confirm the ideas about death that I already had. It's also kind of misleading because they're not complaining but dying is actually pretty awful unless you're really, really lucky.
It sounds like you're entirely missing GP's point.
Re: Roman church decorated with 4k skeletons
#18446. Keep death daily before your eyes. Rule of St Benedict https://gutenberg.org/cache/epub/50040/pg50040-images.html#c...
Why is it a different number in the Sqlite Code of Ethics?
Re: Roman church decorated with 4k skeletons
#185Re: Roman church decorated with 4k skeletons
#186The Paris catacombs, while lacking the Catholic aspect really resonated with me. There is something so incredibly humbling in looking at literally million of skulls and realizing that we are ultimately as insignificant as they were.
Not being able to comprehend their significance is not the same as them being insignificant.
That’s an optimistic take, in reality it’s proof of the fundamental truth that we don’t actually matter and that nothing we do will ultimately matter.
You couldn't even know the name of a person who had one of the skulls, much less know anything they ever did. Their lives were, like ours, completely irrelevant long term. This has to be one of the hardest things for a living human to accept.
Re: Roman church decorated with 4k skeletons
#187I would encourage everyone to visit here or one of the similar places mentioned in this thread. I visited the Sedlec Ossuary a couple of years ago and it was the most visceral personal emotional reaction I have ever had to seeing something. There is something mind-shifting about seeing thousands of human skulls in a pile ala Terminator that I cannot describe with words. I can only relate it to visiting the Vietnam Wa…
The Sedlec Ossuary is, or probably should be a great VR experience if you can't go in person (I have). The shock wears off and then you realize how human the place is. We whisk our dead out of sight, having the bones of your dead relatives be so visible, would be like having a time compass directing the path of the rest of your life.
Agreed. I wanted to keep my post brief so I didn't elucidate. Once that feeling had passed, I didn't posses the sombre semse of mortality that others expressed in this thread. My thoughts were not carpe diem. I didn't update my bucket list.
Rather it gave me a stronger awareness of human connectedness. These are the bones of relatively few people in the grand scheme collected over several hundred years. This is just the tip of an iceberg of all human remains, most chucked into the ground and eventually forgotten but at the same time not without consequence. Because every moment of today is stamped indelibly by these peoples' existence. The crops they grew and things they built and lessons they taught marked the generations after them. It is a permanent mark in the continuity of human culture.
For lack of a better term, it brought me a deep sense of solidarity as a human. It was somewhat radicalizing.
Re: Roman church decorated with 4k skeletons
#188Beautiful place. The crypt includes a quote that really resonates with you - translated to English - "you are what we were; you will be what we are"
I've heard a perhaps more poetic version: as you are, so was I; as I am, so will you.
Re: Roman church decorated with 4k skeletons
#189Earlier quoted context omitted.
The crypts under Stefans Dom in Vienna are well worth a visit. To cite a kid during my visit: "Is grand pa looking like thatvas well now?" Also, there are the Parus catacombs.
Paris, I hope. There's a bag at the exit for visitors to return "souvenirs" if they change their mind.
Of course Paris... my fat fingering seems to get worse with age...