A HILL TOP CHURCH

This is a country church perched in a prime position on a hillside, as are so many others that dot the countryside. The outward sloping foundations give a hint to its construction date in the 14th or 15th Century.

In its heyday the contadini (peasants) would have walked up the hill to it, or down, more than once each week. The priest would have been a very powerful person.

Now, this church is barred, has iron doors and is empty. The church, as a whole, in Italy is shrinking. Fewer young men want to go into the priesthood and fewer people want to attend mass. They do go to church for: weddings, baptisms, confirmations, funerals, Christmas and Easter.

All around this church are the villas of landowners and the houses of farmers and farm workers. After the war the contadini, peasants, fled the hills of subsistence living and went to the towns and cities. Their dwellings were not occupied for decades. Then, one by one, the broken houses were bought by foreigners or by Italians who wanted to live in the country again. There are now tidy gardens but no chickens. Rural areas can become suburbia and this is what happened in this case.

Our area had a priest of its own until quite recently. He was young, frail and sincere and his name was Don Vincenzo. His parents were ill, however, as was he and his dreams of rebuilding a congregation failed. It, as with most of the churches in the hills and hill towns, are served by what I call "circuit riding priests." They hold masses in as many as four churches every Sunday. Even the old and devout will not go to mass if they do not like the priest on any given Sunday. This further reduces congregations.

The priest's house for this church is attached to it. For all that, it was sold, restored and you can just see the tidy lawn with a cherry tree to the right of the picture.

This is the bell tower of the church, taken from below. It is a favourite road of cyclists who labour up it and whiz down it in the very footsteps of the faithful of centuries past. BELL TOWER And, waste not, want not, this was taken from the petrol station, snow-capped Apuan Alps in the distance: APUAN ALPS