Among all the basilicas in the city of Rome, there is none more akin to Midwest Catholic churches in America than Saint Mary Major as both have a long history of seeing snow fall at the most inappropriate times of the year.
So writes Diocese of Lansing seminarian Joseph Kelly, pictured, who hails from the parish of Saint John the Baptist in Ypsilanti, and currently studies at the North American College in Rome. Joseph writes upon the Feast of the Dedication of the Basilica of Saint Mary Major, August 5, one of Rome's four papal basilicas. He continues:
Founded after a miraculous snowfall in midsummer of 358 AD, Saint Mary Major houses the original wood of the manger in which Jesus was laid two thousand years ago.
Seven seminarians and I from the Midwest had the opportunity to serve Christmas Eve Mass at the basilica in 2023, during which the manger was exposed. That experience shifted the way I viewed the events of Christmas, as the life of Jesus and the Eucharist were synthesized and animated in my heart in a new way. I realized that the Child laid in that finite manger is the infinite Son of God. The Child laid in the wood of that manger is the very Man laid on the wood of the Cross. The Body in that feeding trough is the very Body which becomes miraculously present on the Altar.
Both the Church celebrated on August 5, and the manger it houses, miraculously shatter man’s expectations and reveal the power both of God and the humble "yes" of Mary.