La Famiglia Bianco

"This is the story of Joey Bianco, a bastard child brought into this world February 1943 by Sarifino Fucelli an eighteen year old unmarried Sicilian girl. Rose and Joe Fucelli her parents are proud Sicilians suffering the stigma, embarrassment, and humiliation their daughter visited on their family. Sarifino had the misfortune of bearing Joseph Joey Boy Carluchi son. Joey Boy is a married man with children he is also the brutal under boss of his father in-laws powerful Mafia Family. Sarifino is suffering severe abdominal pain after giving birth; Rose found her the following morning in a pool of blood dead. The neighborhood gossip accused Joey Boy of being the father he vehemently denied it. Absent love, compassion, or concern for the well being of his offspring he decided to remove the evidence. He sent his son to an orphanage in Washington DC thinking that will stop the gossip and calm his wife down. This story chronicles the anthology of Joey Bianco. Due to his indomitable spirit and tenacity he managed to overcome a Catholic orphanage and a snake pit the State calls an orphanage. Surviving brutal inhumane totatalarian treatment received in countless foster homes, told every day of his life he is not wanted, worthless, stupid, and will never amount to anything. He ran away at an early age embracing the street, his only options survive or die. He chose his destiny with a single minded purpose relentlessly perusing that destiny allowing nothing to stand in his way making no apologies for the path he chose. Apollo Dante"

Preliminary Material /Editors The Sacral Kingship -- Zum sakralen Königtum in der Forschung der letzten hundert Jahre /Carl-Martin Edsman -- Zur Dialektik des Gottkönigtums /Hans Heinz Holz -- Der religionspsychologische Aspekt des sakralen Königtums /Adolf Allwohn -- Le caractère sacré de la souveraineté à la lumière de la psychologie collective /Edmond Rochedieu -- The High God and the King as symbols of totality /K. A. H. Hidding -- The Sacred Kingship and the priesthood /E. O. James -- Volksreligiöse Herrschaftsformen /Gustav Mensching -- The Sacral Chief among the American Indians /Paul Radin -- La place du roi divin dans les cercles culturels d'Afrique Noire /V. Van Bulck -- Divine Kingship and its partiopation in Ashanti /Rev. Patrick Akoi -- Il sacrificio del vecchio re-mago nella Cina leggendaria /P. Benedetto Fedele -- Le Roi Sacré dans l'ancien Viet-Nam /Nguyen Tran Huan -- Hindu Doctrine of Divine Kingship /A. Basu -- The Sacred Character of Ancient Indian Kingship /J. Gonda -- Le caractère royal et divin du trône dans l'Inde ancienne /Jeannine Auboyer -- La regalità sacra nell'antico Tibet /G. Tucci -- The Notion of Divine Kingship in Tantric Buddhism /D. L. Snellgrove -- La personne sacrée du Roi dans la littérature populaire Cambodgienne /Solange Thierry -- L'origine céleste de la souveraineté dans les inscriptions Paléo-Torques de Mongolie et de Sibérie /Jean-Paul Roux -- The Sacral Kingship of Iran /Geo Widengren -- The Position of the Queen in Ancient Egypt /C. J. Bleeker -- Das Königtum im Mittleren Reich /Günter Lanczkowski -- General Oriental and Specific Israelite Elements in the Israelite Conception of the Sacral Kingdom /Sigmund Mowinckel -- King David and the Sons of Saul /Arvid S. Kapelrud -- Herrschaftsform und Ichbewusstsein /Johannes Hempel -- Das erste Buch des Psalters. Eine Thronbesteigungsfestliturgie /Miloš Bič -- Les apports du psaume CX (vulg. CIX) à l'idéologie royale Israélite /J. Coppens -- Hasidic Conceptions of Kingship in the Maccabean Period /M. A. Beek -- The Consecration in the eighth Chapter of Testamentum Levi /H. Ludin Jansen -- Was there a Sacral Kingship in Minoan Crete? /Arne Furumark -- The Evidence for Divine Kings in Greece /H. J. Rose -- Mission sociale et pouvoirs magiques du poète comparés à ceux du Roi dans le lyrisme de Pindare /Jacqueline Duchemin -- Alexanders Gottkönigsgedanke und die Bewusstseinslage der Griechen und Makedonen /Fritz Taeger -- Le rex et les flamines maiores /Georges Dumézil -- Prodromes sacerdotaux de la divinisation impériale /Jean Bayet -- The Idea of the Kingdom of God in the New Testament /Frederick C. Grant -- Théocratie et monarchie selon l'Évangile /H. Clavier -- Le Conflit entre Dieu et le Souverain divinisé dans l'Apocalypse de Jean /L. Cerfaux -- The Effect of the Destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70 on Primitive Christian Soteriology /S. G. F. Brandon -- L'idée de Dieu et la divinité du Roi (résumé) /H. I. Marrou -- Expressions of Cosmic Kingship in the Ancient World /H. P. L'Orange -- Der Abbau des Herrscherkultes im Zeitalter Konstantins /Kurt Aland.

The exhibition entitled “Papi in Posa,” i.e., “Papal Portraiture,” with the highly refined and historically significant Braschi Palace – home of the Museum of Rome – in 2004, and now in Washington, The John Paul II Center, is not offered only as an excellent exposition of masterpieces from major international museums – such as the Vatican Museums – and prestigious private collections, but stands out in particular because it is one of the most important expositions of portrait painting ever because of both the outstanding quality and the considerable number of paintings and sculptures offered – executed by Europe's leading artists from the last five centuries – and the great spiritual and social significance of the personages portrayed: the greatest Pontiffs who from the 16th century to the present have sat in the Chair of Saint Peter. It is suggestive to observe, as we scan the unique artistic itinerary offered by the curators of the exhibition, how through the succession of historical periods and particularly by virtue of the esthetic verve and inner sensitivity of the artists, the description of the human person was oriented, with extreme plastic ductility and acuity in their perception of their subjects' physiognomy, to represent not only the body lines of the subject being depicted but, in particular, the most intimate traits of the heart, the lively mobility of their thought, the innermost lines of the subject's character, in an intense dialogue of chiaroscuro observations from which the characterizing notes of complex personages are evinced – persons who appear completely clear and evident only to those who are capable of sublimating their outward appearance into an acute observation. From this prestigious gallery of portraits it emerges unmistakably how the anthropocentric path of human thought has manifestly reverberated within the bounds of the figurative arts through a progressive contextualization, which sees the subject represented unbound through a metatemporal aura of rarefied abstraction and placed, naturalistically, in a precise and well defined spatiotemporal sphere. At the same time, we witness a gradual definition of the personage portrayed as the bearer of a clear personal connotation – the self and the identity, which seem to be invisible and thus impossible to represent – no longer, hortatively, as an idealized and metaphoric emblem of absolute values in deference to a markedly ethical and pedagogical conception. The exhibited works, which rightfully range themselves among the most outstanding expressions of portraiture, reveal a deep spiritual harmony evocative of beauty and unleash a lively dialogue with the onlooker based on a real and inherent economy of the act of viewing, albeit freed from the exercise of a psychologism oriented toward uncontrollable wanderings. The reception of the meaning of the formal systems – thoughtful poses and attitudes – involves, to be sure, the active presence of the spectator in a sort of visual dialogue with the portrait that is not considered exclusively as a fixed commemorative system but rather as an interactive structure. In the perspective of the reception, the observer becomes a fundamental element for the construction of the meaning of the image that, from this very private perspective, undergoes obvious momentous transformations. Observer and image thus become integral parts of a fascinating system of visual exchange not unlike the mechanisms of verbal dialogue: both members of the “pair” take on contemporaneously the dual role of subject/object, restructuring the complex relational web established in a rapport between an “I” and a “you.” Beyond the temporal contingencies, each portrait is recounted and seduces us through the universal language of fame: this incarnates, deeply, the artist's attempt to describe the personality of the subjects portrayed, consigning the multiform essence of their nature to one attitude or to a single expression by resorting to a refined psychological introspection in an attempt to render visually the subject's inner world. It is owing to the above considerations that, while I applaud the felicitous initiative of giving life to such a culturally transcendent exhibition, I would wish that all those who will have the pleasure of visiting it or at least of perusing the pages of this catalogue will be able to perceive the portraits of the individual popes not as so many freestanding elements, but rather as integrated parts of a related set of men who, albeit struggling with the many and varied anxieties of everyday life, endeavored to serve Christ among their brothers, each one with a clear perception of himself as servo servorum Dei – the servant of God's servants! Through looks, attitudes and symbols committed by the artist in a well-constructed iconographic code to the pictorial or sculptural page, the discerning observer cannot help but grasp a veiled spiritual harmony that reflects the profound mystery of faith and propagates an echo of the ineffable beauty of God, revealing how, through art, man – pulled between the eternal and the transient – strives to draw close to his Creator. Francesco Cardinal Marchisano Vicar General of the Pope for the State of Vatican City

Buon appetito! Everyone loves Italian food. But how did the Italians come to eat so well? The answer lies amid the vibrant beauty of Italy's historic cities. For a thousand years, they have been magnets for everything that makes for great eating: ingredients, talent, money, and power. Italian food is city food. From the bustle of medieval Milan's marketplace to the banqueting halls of Renaissance Ferrara; from street stalls in the putrid alleyways of nineteenth-century Naples to the noisy trattorie of postwar Rome: in rich slices of urban life, historian and master storyteller John Dickie shows how taste, creativity, and civic pride blended with princely arrogance, political violence, and dark intrigue to create the world's favorite cuisine. Delizia! is much more than a history of Italian food. It is a history of Italy told through the flavors and character of its cities. A dynamic chronicle that is full of surprises, Delizia! draws back the curtain on much that was unknown about Italian food and exposes the long-held canards. It interprets the ancient Arabic map that tells of pasta's true origins, and shows that Marco Polo did not introduce spaghetti to the Italians, as is often thought, but did have a big influence on making pasta a part of the American diet. It seeks out the medieval recipes that reveal Italy's long love affair with exotic spices, and introduces the great Renaissance cookery writer who plotted to murder the Pope even as he detailed the aphrodisiac qualities of his ingredients. It moves from the opulent theater of a Renaissance wedding banquet, with its gargantuan ten-course menu comprising hundreds of separate dishes, to the thin soups and bland polentas that would eventually force millions to emigrate to the New World. It shows how early pizzas were disgusting and why Mussolini championed risotto. Most important, it explains the origins and growth of the world's greatest urban food culture. With its delectable mix of vivid storytelling, groundbreaking research, and shrewd analysis, Delizia! is as appetizing as the dishes it describes. This passionate account of Italy's civilization of the table will satisfy foodies, history buffs, Italophiles, travelers, students -- and anyone who loves a well-told tale.