Disfigured by Light (Creative Writing Assignment #12

The Church of S. Maria Cosemedin is unique in that it is the only church in Rome that is protected by a living wall. To reach it, one must push through the damp bodies of weary tourists, who wait for a chance to have their photograph taken with their hand tentatively placed in the mouth of that Hollywood empowered lion that rests outside the doors. If only he would crush just one liar’s hand between his worn and tired stone jaws, then there would be no confused and annoyed glances from those people whose vacation consists of creating physical proof that they were on vacation. Then one might simply walk into the church, passing through nothing but the soft Roman air.

But until the lion tests his bite, the church will be obscured behind money belts and wagging tour guide flags. Pushing past these one enters the church. Here, within the simple medieval walls, one might expect to find a place where everyday sunlight has been harnessed to transport the viewer to a realm of the spirit, far from the concerns of tomorrow’s writing assignment or the impatient stomach. Here, daylight might become the light of God shining through the shadows of ignorance and fear to illuminate what had previously been a crudely worked wooden Christ now metamorphosed into the image of suffering for the world. And such would you find in S. Maria Cosemedin, but for the fluorescent lights that line the walls along the central nave.

These fluorescent lamps plow through the darkness and shadows and overbear the passive sunlight. They tactlessly show corners of the church that should have remained hidden. The darkness that once must have expanded it, stretching inky corners into vast corridors, has been exposed as a forger of space. Observing the shape of the walls, the number of windows, one may imagine what the church might have looked like before these unwelcome illuminators arrived.

Remnants can still be seen of what must have been the dominating light source. Scratches of sunlight, the product of thick, hazy windows, curl about the ceiling above the central walkway. Standing in the dim church, this light would be intensified until it seemed that without the roof, in the terrible brightness, one’s skin might become as translucent as a cave salamander. The eyes are drawn upward to see the brightness that comes from God’s presence just out of sight above the roof. But through the windows the bleary sunlight would shine down here comfortably. It would redirect all attention to the pathway toward the altar. All directions but this one, would pass on into shadow. Behind the altar are three sets of windows, collections of fist-sized, golden portals. With their frayed edges, they resemble a small galaxy of suns, each casting its own light toward the altar. So standing there at the threshold of the church, one would see the light of the heavens above and the light of the golden altar framed before.

But instead all receive the indiscriminate light of the alien fluorescent bulbs, so careless that they might have been the illumination of another tourist’s flash. The light-trail toward the altar is no longer the clear option; one might meander off toward a chapel. The pathway has been lost. But maybe there is an hour during the summer when the church closes before the sun has set. Then there would be a divine moment when the fluorescent bulbs would be silenced, retired for the evening, when the last rays of the setting sun might again be the master of the church. They might again be able to, through their straight and unerring course inward, engineer the path to salvation.