A Masonic Italian Journey BY CHARBEL T. FAHED, GRAND MASTER
Masonry is travelling (as we all know), and I have had many opportunities to undertake journeys as Grand Master, including to Lebanon, the Philippines, and Italy. I would like to share my experiences in Italy, one of the most enriching travel experiences I have had in a very long time. Accompanied by our Grand Secretary, MWB Jeffrey Russell and his partner Jeanne, I was given a royal treatment by our brothers over there. Especially Worshipful Brother Alessandro Pessini, a very warm and cultured brother, who accompanied us wherever we went, and he was very enthusiastic in leading us to various sites of great interest. WB Carmelo, known as “Mello,” is the Worshipful Master of Italia lodge No. 2001, and was also traveling with us, and introduced us to key figures in various cities. Much of the Classical, Renaissance, and Baroque architecture we associate with Masonry is associated with the Italian Peninsula. Indeed, the first European country which triggered the Renaissance was Italy, namely, in the romantic and glamorous city of Florence. From there, the Renaissance spread throughout Europe, making Italy an important font of European culture. Our Grand Lodge group from Washington deeply enriched our minds with the most valuable jewels of the Renaissance. We arrived
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in Rome’s Leonardo Da Vinci Airport and started our travels in Rome. “Rome is a world,” wrote our Masonic Bro. Goethe in his Italian Journey, “and one must spend years before one can become at all acquainted with it.” Nonetheless, our all-too-short visit to the ruins of the ancient Roman Coliseum and our subsequent viewing the colonnade and elaborations of St. Peter’s sculpted by Bernini in the Baroque era were reminders of how swiftly the sands of time run for man and his creations, from century to century, from millennium to millennium. Yet these wonderful expressions of architecture crafted by operative Masons transcend history and are truly monuments to the greatness of the human spirit, from generation to generation. From Rome, we drove about five hours to Rimini, a gorgeous city lying on a Mediterranean white sand beach which stretches very long in the north and in the south and attracts people from all over the world. Here the thoughtful traveler may ruminate in the midst of such natural beauty at the seashore of the fragile state of man against the powerful forces of nature. Again, turning to Br. Goethe’s Italian Journey: “In the upper provinces, Rimini… has suffered. The earth has strange humours, and people talk of earthquakes here just as we do of wind and weather.” One cannot think of Roman Pompei without remembering its ancient destruction at the whims of a volcano. This is ever a reminder that
