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Posted: June 22
(Rome) Father Jerry Martinson is back in Rome for his third visit since last December. I am always happy to see him since he is a good friend and also keeps me up to date on communication news from Asia, since he works at Kuangchi Program Service in Taipei. His current visit finds him doing pre-production research for a new documentary that a main-land China television network is preparing on the life of Xu Guangqi, after whom Kuangchi Program Service is named. Guangqi was an important figure in the court of Chongzhen, the 16th and last emperor of the Ming Dynasty who ruled from 1611 to 1644. Guangqi was his Grand Secretary, what we would now call prime minister. He was also a Catholic and a good friend of Father Matteo Ricci, the Italian Jesuit missionary who led one of the greatest missionary endeavors the Church has seen.
On Saturday I took Jerry to the church of St. Ignatius. He had already visited there, of course, since it is an obvious highlight of anyone’s tour of Jesuit Rome. But Jerry did not know about the old novitiate rooms on the top floor of what used to be the Roman College. So we went together and first looked up Father Ferruccio Romanin, the church’s rector. Despite his name and the Italian roots that are clear in his face, Ferruccio is Australian, as his unmistakeable accent immediately reveals. As does his great hospitality. He dropped what he was doing and took us back into the sacristy to fetch a key to the rooms and open up the elevator that is somewhat hidden, but does take one slowly up to the top floor. You exit near a balcony that overlooking the inner courtyard of the old college where Ricci studied philosophy, along with generations of other Jesuits, many of whom also went off to the missions.
On the far side of the courtyard, a door leads up to the rooms that once housed the novitiate. They are empty now, but the ancient floor tiles, worn and irregular yet polished by hundreds of years of footsteps, carry a powerful sense of history. Jerry took out his small video camera and began shooting different angles and scenes to show the director back in China what they could do when they come to Rome this September to do the actual shooting. It is a great location and will look wonderful in the documentary. The rooms now focus on St. Luigi Gonzaga, the young Jesuit who died will still studying philosophy here. He is buried in the main church, not far from St. Roberto Bellarmino, who taught both Gonzaga and Ricci.
It is a rich history and I was content to just stand back and watch Jerry getting caught up in it as he filmed. I hope the saints who are buried here will bless the project because it has such great potential. Jiangsu Broadcasting Corporation in Nanjing is producing the multi-part program which will be beamed next year by satellite all over China. The show will introduce an important Catholic layman who was a partner with Ricci in the pioneering effort to introduce Christianity to China in a way that respected the great traditions of that country and made sense to its people. Xu Guangqi and Ricci were far ahead of their own time in the mutual dialogue in which engaged and they offer us a model that challenges the diviseness of our own times. The project should also demonstrate the power of media to reach people who would otherwise never learn about the Church and the Chinese hero who discovered how to balance an ancient culture and a new faith.
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