Three couples in our group departed for the States after our last boat stop in Passau, Germany. They flew home via Munich. Two friends and I had added a bonus to our river cruising--a four day/three night tour of Prague, in the Czech Republic. We boarded a modern bus for the four hour journey through the mountains to Prague.
One moment of that boring trip stays with me. While my friends snoozed across the aisle, our Viking guide got on the PA system and asked us to note the wide swath of cut trees to our left, as we descended a gentle valley. Twenty-five years ago, this was a genuine flash point in the Cold War between the Soviet Union and the West. The cut trees marked the border between West Germany (free and democratic) and Czechoslovakia (under Communist rule). Our guide pointed out a window-less two-story concrete structure, a guard post. The wide flat areas between the forests were, back then, divided by high fencing, razor wire, and sometimes, land mines. All to discourage or prevent any Czechs seeking freedom to pass from their country into West Germany.
Today the concrete building is abandoned, not even noted by signage for its historical significance. In the new Europe, we didn't even have to stop to have our passports looked at. It was just like when I drive over to Boardman, Ohio, to go shopping or enjoy Chipolte, and don't even think when I cross the Pennsylvania-Ohio line.
One reason we three wanted to see Prague was that we heard and read that it was a vibrant, alive, contemporary city. It was all that and more. But my reason was more personal. I wanted to see the OTHER St. Vitus church in the world.
I may be wrong, but I think I am the pastor of one of the two St. Vitus churches. Who knew that the Italian church in New Castle, PA, USA, could be linked with the grand Bohemian cathedral in Prague, Czech Republic?
St. Vitus is not the only important worship site in Prague. There are St. Nicholas Church and the Virgin Mary of Tyn Church in Old Square, Loretto Sanctuary, St. Salvator Church, even a working Jewish synagogue which dates to the 12th century. But St. Vitus towers over them all. From its pinnacle over the Vltava River it is visible throughout the city and the region.
Christianity came to this region in the 900s, through the missionaries and brothers Saints Cyril and Methodius. A chapel dedicated to Mary was first built on the hill about 920. Later a St. Vitus rotunda was added to the chapel.
(It is a puzzle to me, never explained by our guides or by the guidebooks I read, how a 3rd century Italian boy who was martyred became the patron of this church in the 9th century, and later the cathedral.)
Prague became a bishopric in 973, and hence designated this church as its cathedral. As with so many of the great churches in this region, it has a roller-coaster history. Later, in 1344, Emperor Charles IV commissioned a new cathedral. One hundred years later it was occupied by Hussites. The cathedral as designed was only completed in the middle of the 19th century. After World War II new stained glass windows were commissioned in the rear of the church, which sit glowingly next to more solemn windows centuries old.
I would love to tell you in personal detail about how beautiful, how gorgeous St. Vitus Cathedral is, as well as the surrounding Prague Castle, but truth to tell, we were with a group on a five-hour whirlwind tour of the entire city, and had a mere 20 minutes to look around. Not even the whole church, just a small section of the rear of the nave. We three resolved, on the next day, to go back and visit it with the time it deserved. But, the best laid plans, and so on. The next day, a free day for us, we took the city trolley up the hill, only to find the cathedral surrounded by TV trucks and large numbers of police. It was closed. St. Vitus Cathedral was hosting a civic commemoration of the 70th anniversary of the close of World War II. We were not allowed even to peak inside.
So, here are some photographs of the exterior and a couple of interior shots. Maybe another time I'll see more of St. Vitus Cathedral in Prague.
And just for humor, a couple of its ancient gargoyles.
A post-script. We were bummed out by not being able to see St. Vitus Cathedral. So we got back on the trolley for the trip down the hill and back to our hotel. But my friends were hungry, so we hopped off and found a literal hole-in-the-wall restaurant for lunch. As I was looking across the street, what did I see, but the Infant of Prague Church. Yes, that Infant of Prague, a statue ubiquitous in churches and convents and certain homes in our country. We walked across the street, enjoyed the relative spare (for a 17th century Baroque-style) church, with its modest statue of the Infant on a side altar. Next to the altar was a large photograph of Pope Benedict XVI, who visited the church in 2009.
And on two other (smaller) side altars, there were images of Our Lady of Guadalupe and Our Lady of Africa. We are a Catholic Church after all.
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