Have you ever been in a place where you could feel a the sensation of peace and serenity, of a harmony, that you were in a place where everything is just? This is the sensation that you can feel here, in this beautiful stone town, which is solitary and remote. It's San Pietro della Ienca.
San Pietro della Ienca is a small village, near L'Aquila City (Italy), not far from the towns of Assergi and Camarda.
Dozens of stone houses surrond a small mountain church, simple and beautiful, as much as only the simplicity can give. Many shepherds have found refuge inside during their long lonely walks, with their only sheep. And only God knows how many Christmases have been celebrated inside it since the ancient times, when just the warm light of dancing torches illuminated the snowy night and soft girls' songs rose to God. And all around, just silence.
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| The fountain of San Pietro della Ienca |
Each stone of these houses, each stone of this small church tells
ancient stories, which can live again in the passerbyer's imagination. They are
stories of a distant time, when one rejoiced over a smile or a kiss, snatched
behind branches of a blooming almond tree; when the valleys resounded with
industrious farmers' songs and the cobblestones paths filled up with laughter
of the young shepherds guiding their cows to pasture.
And while the black and white swallows are weaving melodious
embroideries, the old fountain sings its ancient and continuous singsong,
crystalline as much as the water roaring with its bubblings. It seems to see the
many women in front of it, who are waiting to fill their bronze bowls, which
they hold on their heads. And all around, there is peace.
I keep walking on the path which leads to the lower side of San
Pietro della Ienca and there I can find an ancient oven, from which the warm
perfume of homemade bread arose in the past.
Down here in the valley, between green oaks, I can spot a
small cowshed, with red roof and a stone wall. It was restored and it's now a
house. When I get close to it, I open the old wood door and wonder. I walk past
the marvelous stone fireplace and I see a cave: a cave in a house! Inside
there, I think, the old shepherd preserved his homemade cheese, lending the
perfume of green and flourishing grass of these pastures.
San Pietro della Ienca is a
place where a person can find himself. Here, I stopped and here, for the first
time, I heard the mellifluous harmony of existence. Here, John Paul II,
Pope Wojtyla, stopped and here he heard God's voice. These stones, these
houses, the stone San Pietro della Ienca is his Sanctuary.
