Today commemorates the burning of Lori’s ancestor, Giordano Bruno, Italian philosopher, mathematician, and astronomer. Here’s a message from Lori this morning:
“On February 8, 1600, my ancestor, Giordano Bruno, was brought from the Tor di Nona to stand before the inquisitional court in Rome.
A sentence was pronounced upon him by ten cardinals of that unholy inquisition that he should be burned alive for heresy. His heresy was this: To live in truth and not foster a lie.
He looked at them with their pronunciation of this dreaded sentence and with resolution said: “You who give me this sentence of death do so with greater fear than I who receive it.”
Prior to the sentence being carried out, he was imprisoned in the dungeon at Castel San Angelo in Rome for 8 horrible years. Yet, during this time, he walked with strength and stood up straight in front of them. He was not bent over.
This is why the Bruno family does not foster cowards, nor ascribe to cowardly behavior. The coward was the forerunner of the betrayer. Leo Martello said, “The coward finds a way out. The strong find a way.” Today those words came to me.
This week marks the most terrible week in the memory of the Bruno family. Yet, it is also the greatest and most powerful week, because it proves one thing: Those who did his murder are forgotten, but Giordano Bruno lives on in the hearts of the free women and men who fight for that justice to speak and to create a better world.
And so we see, on Feb 11, 2013, that St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome was stuck by two bolts of lightning. After that morning, Pope Benedict the 16th announced his retirement. This week has been very newsworthy.
Giordano Bruno believed in the vastness of the cosmos. Infinite space. Infinite universes. And why shouldn’t lightning strike the very top of that basilica, whose forerunners condemned him to death. It is the hand of the universal God and Goddess who see the truth and the universal force of light. Light is light and darkness is darkness. We do not believe in the darkness.
There are many beings in the universe. There is a multiplicity of universes. Each star is a sun. And each sun has its own solar system. We are not alone. December 21, 2012 was not the end of the world. It was the end of the world of bigotry and ignorance.
This morning, Feb 17, 2013, I ate bread with almonds and peaches, and had a glass of Marcella wine, and toasted the memory of Giordano Bruno.
Why this drink and bread?
Because Giordano Bruno was given the traditional last meal of Marcella wine and almond biscuits. I added the peaches to it because the peaches are a symbol of longevity. Giordano Bruno has never died, and he never will die as long as there are those people out there that seek justice, freedom, and dignity.
I leave you, my dear friends, with these words: Avanti! Move forward. The past is the prologue to the future of light. May you be blessed wherever you are in this world—and out of this world, all beings of the universe.
Hail Giordano!”
—Lori Bruno, February 17, 2013