Giornale 3 at the Santa Maria della Concezione dei Cappuccini aka the Capuchin Crypt (5/30)

For my third Giornale, I went with Kristin, Kevin, Emily, Sarah and a few others to the church of the capuchin monks.  As we were taking the metro over, Sarah mentioned how scared she had been of this place when she was younger.  I thought this was interesting.  Churches don't usually inspire fear.  I asked what was so scary about it and was told that it was a surprise.  So I stopped asking and resolved to go into this blind.  We got off the train but were a bit too early, so we went across the street to get gelato.  After waiting a bit for everyone to show up, we entered the museum.  As we bought our tickets, I was warned not to look at the book open next to the cash register, and I didn't peek.  Tickets in hand, we entered the museum.  I looked at a lot of stuff, but didn't read much so as not to spoil the surprise.  I saw brown robes of Franciscan friars in a glass case.  I walked a bit more and saw a picture of a friar holding a bloody hook on a chain.  I read enough to learn that he was hung from the hook for three days over a fire.  I turned around from the painting to see a very bloody drawing of Jesus on the cross.  It looked like a macabre doodle some schoolboy made to liven up his day.  It wasn’t very detailed, but the body of Jesus was completely red and large droplets were coming off of him.  I started to think that this order of friars was a bit strange.  Sarah then called to me and asked if I saw the pocket watches, so I went back to look at a small collection of very cool watches behind glass.  I then continued to make my way through the small museum until I turned a corner and read a sign informing me that I was approaching the crypt.  I could see the bottom of an arching ceiling through the doorway I was standing behind.  It looked like there was bone on the ceiling.  I stepped though the doorway and yep, it was definitely bone.  I have never been so amazed, repulsed, and drawn in, all at the same time.  The room was full of bones.  They were very artistically arranged, which made it much more disturbing.   Two robed bodies were lying under an archway made of bones over a bed also made of bones.  Two other robed bodies were standing under archways made of bones on the wall opposite to me.  I looked up to see a small skeleton attached to the ceiling in the center of a design of decorative ribs.  There were three more rooms like this.  The next room was predominantly filled with skulls with some robed bodies among them.  The room after that was mostly decorated with pelvises.  Then we got a break and there was only a coffin.  The last room was particularly disturbing because the faces of the bodies hadn’t quite finished decaying.  We reached the gift shop and took a minute to recover before heading up to the church itself.  The church was one of the darkest I’ve ever been to.  There wasn’t a lot of light, but there was also a lot of dark wood used in its construction.  The paintings on the side walls were all of friars in brown robes.  But what really made me feel uneasy was the music.  I have never heard such dissonant church music.  The only real light part of the church was a beautiful painting of Mary above the altar with a crown of actual gold stars. I sat in a pew for a bit taking it all in before leaving.  Definitely one of the more interesting churches I’ve ever seen.