Expectations and Galileo

Just across Piazza della Reppublica is stunning Santa Maria degli Angeli. My expectations were to find a rustic church inside, judging from the outside. How wrong was I! In some way I was pleasantly surprised, but also I had caught myself offside with my expectations.

Central Altar at SMDA.                                                                    Lateral Altar at SMDA.

Exiting SMDA.

Not only that: at this huge basilica, there was an art exhibit on Galileo Galilei (“Galilei: Divine Man”). There were pendulums and a few modern sculptures. The pendulums called my attention, particularly one huge modern version, that instead of having a regular ball at the end, had the world, and instead of having just a string attached to it, had a hand joining the world and the cord. People could go and make the earth swing, or turn, together with the hand, and an electronic device would tell the seconds it took the earth to swing from one extreme to the other.

For some reason yet unknown to me, I was ecstatic watching such a simple and old invention. Galilei’s words got me thinking, as did this modern version of his invention.

Modern Pendulum.