Novena of Saint Jerome
By Fr. Giuseppe Oddone.
Translated by Fr. Remo Zanatta and Fr.Julian Gerosa
- Somasca
We are in the holy year of mercy. We celebrate the mystery of God’s love for us and Jerome was here in Somasca a witness to this merciful love of the Father which must reach out to us and involve all of us.
The Jubilee of Mercy is demanding, because it requires us to leave our usual way of being Christian and shake off an atmosphere of mediocrity, spiritual quietism, and insensitivity to the suffering of our brothers and sisters. It is necessary to be converted from being good and tranquil in a context of spiritual worldliness, in order to invent a more coherent way of being Christian. It is a jubilee that here in Somasca constantly recalls the choices for God and for the poor made by Jerome.
Somasca is a unique place in the Church, because it is marked by an unrepeatable event, by the charity and holiness of Girolamo Miani, who spent here in holiness the years of his life (1534-1537) and died here. Here is his shrine, but I would say that all of Somasca is his village, his home, the environment of his life.
There is an anecdote that refers precisely to the basilica in which we are praying. It’s about Pope John XXIII. When, shortly after his election as Supreme Pontiff, in 1958, he granted this shrine the title of minor basilica, recalling that he had come to Somasca as a child and that it represented the spiritual landscape of his soul. Some of his collaborators pointed out to him that the church of Somasca was too small and that it did not deserve such a title. But Pope John XXIII, who knew the shrine well, the room where Jerome died, the “Valletta” (meaning “little valley”), the Holy Steps, the hermitage and the fortress, cut it short: “Somasca is all a basilica”. He repeated in some way what he had already said in his inaugural speech in Venice: “Somasca is the specus of St. Jerome”, that is, a sacred place – and not only a church – saturated with prayer, contemplation, and penance. Pope John XXIII knew well his shrine, his altar, the room where Jerome died, the way of the chapels, the Holy steps, the hermitage, the Valletta, the fortress, all places sanctified by the Saint’s prayer and charity.
It is wonderful to see how Pope John XXIII, who came here seven times as a pilgrim, always connects Somasca to his childhood, like a caress to be given to children, to the experience of God, to a sacred landscape that has for him the enchantment of an unforgettable sweetness. He came there when he was five years old accompanied by his older parents and sisters, and this event, this joy and this encounter with St. Jerome marked him for the rest of his life.
Somasca has always aroused deep emotions. It attracted saints, religious and faithful. It is truly a place marked by the presence of God, which arouses particular fervor.
Blessed Serafino Morazzone, from Chiuso, known to Manzoni, used to go up to Somasca twice a week because he had obtained physical healing from Jerome and wanted to imitate his humility and prayer and called our saint his “accomplice” in obtaining graces from God.
Blessed Luigi Biraghi, founder of the Sisters of St. Marcellina, celebrated the Eucharist at the altar of St. Jerome on the morning of September 18, 1840, while doing his spiritual exercises, and wrote: “I am full of spiritual consolation. I celebrated at the altar of St. Jerome and the Lord favored me with his loving visit to my heart. It is a beautiful chapel, very rich in ornaments, magnificent with its marble columns… I celebrated the Mass at the open urn. I would have liked the Mass to last a whole day…” And then he tells of Somasca, of the hermitage, of Valletta, of the castle with the great cross. And he concludes: “Beautiful places! Sanctified of beautiful holy memories. At this hermitage we (there are four of us) go up every day to the evening, and we feel an incredible spiritual pleasure, we kneel to greet him and adore him: “O Crux ave spes unica!
Blessed Caterina Cittadini obtained the privilege of making the Chapel of St. Jerome the place to take her students to pray; she assimilated its spirit and educational method.
St. Louis Guanella, a former student of the Collegio Gallio in Como, reworking his personal experience, in 1882 wrote a 38-page guide for the pilgrimage to Somasca entitled: “Visit to an illustrious personage. St. Jerome Emiliani in his hermitage of Somasca”. It is not a historical guide, but a spiritual one, all pervaded by a mystical inspiration, which explodes when the pilgrim enters the Shrine that contains the remains of the Saint: “Enter reverently into the Shrine, in which the body of the illustrious Venetian patrician appears glorious. It seems to you that you are smelling of paradise, you are placing yourselves without noticing a hand to your heart. A shiver of sacred terror rises from the heart to the eyes. Your face comes alive, your eyelashes become moist and two tears flow down, which like precious pearls will blush your cheeks… let out your heart fully… you have so many things to say for yourself, so many to ask for your relatives, for your country, for the whole world… Jerome looks at you from Heaven with ineffable complacency…”.
They are testimonies of Saints, one more beautiful than the other. Those who truly love St. Jerome also feel these feelings. Because coming to his shrine means precisely this: experiencing the merciful love of the Father and meeting Christ Crucified and Risen who transformed and marked all his life. It is only Jesus, the Lord, who is the door of life through which we too, as Jerome, must pass.