Journey into the Past

CHAPTER 4b:  IN WHICH MIRACLES RAN SHORT

Northern Exposure, Day 5:  Vilnius, Lithuania.  Today would be our primary day to explore Vilnius, Lithuania's medieval capital and largest city with a population just over half a million.  As we quickly discovered, having a car to explore this expansive city straddling the River Neris was not an advantage.  But the distances were too far to cover efficiently on foot, so we made the best of it and spent a good bit of time searching for places to park.

Despite more than a century of annual destructive raids by Crusaders, Lithuania was the last European country to convert to Christianity, receiving official papal recognition as a Roman Catholic state in 1387.  After withstanding the Reformation and the forced church closures during the Russian Empire period, Catholicism remains the religion of more than three-quarters of Lithuanians.  During the Soviet occupation, the church survived by supporting Lithuanian nationalism and inspiring defiance by issuing a series of publications chronicling the persecution of the Lithuanian people.

CHURCH OF STS. PETER AND PAUL

Vilnius is home to a large number of churches, and our first stop was the Church of Sts. Peter and Paul.  Located on a small hill near the River Neris, the church is part of a monastery complex.  Its exterior, attractive as it is, gives no hint of the baroque confection that lies within.  Stepping inside the sanctuary, one is overwhelmed by more than 2,000 stark white statues, frescoes, and reliefs, spread lavishly across the ceiling and spilling down onto the walls.
The church building was completed in 1676, but it took another 25 years for two of the most famous Italian artists of the day to execute the religious and mythological decorations that have earned Saints Peter and Paul Church the title of "the Baroque gem of Lithuania."  Thirteen ornate chapels surround the nave, all adorned only in white except for paintings.  In a 1901-05 restoration, the church gained a boat-shaped chandelier of brass and glass beads to commemorate Saint Peter's occupation as a fisherman.
The next stop on our list took us to the Gates of Dawn, the only remaining gate from the defensive wall built around the old city of Vilnius in the early 1500s.  In keeping with common practice of the day, an image of the Virgin Mary was installed above the gate in the hope she would protect the city and bless travelers passing through.
Some 200 years later, a special chapel was built over the gate to house a newer painting of the Madonna, which had been embellished with gold and silver.  The chapel was built so that the icon is visible from the street (see the window in the photo above).  A better view of the painting can be seen here.  According to local legend, the Lady came to the rescue of the Lithuanian people during an invasion by the Swedish army in 1702, causing the heavy iron city gate to fall at dawn, crushing enemy soldiers and turning the tide for the home forces.  Later the image was credited with additional miracles and continues to attract pilgrimages by both Catholic and Orthodox supplicants.
Thanks to its small signs, we could have used a miracle in our search for the Vilna Gaon State Jewish Museum, a national institution that collects and exhibits material related to the history of Lithuanian Jews.  Named for a renowned Torah scholar, the primary facility is housed in a former Jewish theater.  Over a period of ten centuries, Lithuania's Jewish population had emerged into a highly developed culture, exerting significant influence in both their country and in world Judaism.
Before World War II, Jews in Lithuania numbered 160,000—about 7 percent of the population.  Their influence was felt widely in Lithuanian society.  By the time Germany invaded Lithuania in July of 1941, the country's Jewish population had swelled to 250,000 due to an influx of refugees from German-occupied Poland.  Over the course of the next three years, the Third Reich's genocidal attacks ravaged this population, killing more than 95% of Jews in Lithuania.  This part of the museum houses a scant collection of religious objects salvaged from the country's once thriving Jewish community.
A few blocks away, the Green House museum documents in gut-wrenching detail the decimation of Lithuania's Jewish population.  In addition to the dozens of heartbreaking individual stories of highly respected Lithuanian scholars, lawmakers, teachers, scientists, and other citizens who were brutally murdered for their religious faith, exhibits demonstrate the shockingly dispassionate but meticulous record that Nazis documented of the killings they carried out.
Even deceased Jews could not escape the Nazi degradation and cruelty.  Jewish cemeteries were dismantled and tombstones given away to be used as construction materials.  Nazi sympathizers among the local population used grave markers for such purposes as whetstones.
Emotionally exhausted by the disturbing information we had taken in, we returned to our hotel reeling in shock at man's potential for inhumanity.

Tomorrow we plan to see a few more sites in Vilnius before moving on to Lithuania's second largest city, Kaunas.

FRIDAY, 28 JULY, 2017


    •   Size:  25,212 sq mi (slightly larger than West Virginia)
    •   Population:  2.9 million (about the same as Kansas)
    •   Language:  Lithuanian (38% speak English)
    •   Currency:  Euro
    •   Capital:  Vilnius
    •   Geographic center of Europe:  near village of Purnaškės
    •   History:  First mentioned in written sources in the year 1009
    •   Sports:  Basketball is favorite sport & men's team currently ranks fourth in the world.
    •   Independence:  First republic to declare its independence from the USSR

About Vilnius
    •   Founded:  1323
    •   Population:  543,000  (metro 805,000 - similar to Dayton, OH)
    •   Elevation:  367 ft.
    •   Latitude:  54.4° N.  (100 miles north of Edmonton, AB)
    •  Started in:  Vilnius, Lithuania
    •  Ended in:  Vilnius, Lithuania
    •  Miles driven: 15
    •  Miles walked:  4.55
    •  Weather:  62° to 75°, sunny
    •  Decorations at Sts. Peter & Paul Church:  212,563
    •  Times we passed the Jewish Museum before we found it:  6
    •  Times we passed the Green House before we found it:  5
    •  Available parking places where we needed them:  too few