The Dedication of the Lateran Basilica
Feast
- Feast Day
- November 9
The Archbasilica of the Most Holy Savior and of Saints John the Baptist and John the Evangelist at the Lateran (commonly Saint John Lateran) is the cathedral church of the Diocese of Rome and the official seat of the Pope as Bishop of Rome. The basilica stands on the site of the palace of the Laterani family, confiscated by the Emperor Nero and later given by Constantine the Great to Pope Sylvester I, who consecrated the original basilica around the year 324. The inscription over its main entrance reads Sacrosancta Lateranensis ecclesia omnium urbis et orbis ecclesiarum mater et caput - the most holy Lateran Church, mother and head of all the churches of the city and of the world.
The current building has survived sack by Vandals, two earthquakes, and two fires; the principal restoration after the second fire was completed under Pope Innocent X with Francesco Borromini's interior of 1646-1650, and the eighteenth-century facade is by Alessandro Galilei. The feast of its dedication is celebrated as a Feast (rather than a Memorial) throughout the Latin Rite, signifying that this is the cathedral of the universal Church's chief see, the visible sign of communion of every local church with the See of Peter.
The feast is not about a building but about the Church: the cathedral is the visible sign of the Bishop and his particular Church, and the Lateran is the cathedral of the Pope and so the visible sign of the unity of all local Churches in communion with the See of Rome. Celebrating its dedication on a single day around the world is itself a profession of the Church's catholicity.
From The Dedication of the Lateran Basilica
"Mother and head of all the churches of the city and of the world."
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