An old friend, Fr Joseph Langan of the Archdiocese of Baltimore, sent us these photos of a new set of black vestments which he commissioned from the famous Gammarelli firm in Rome. The floral decoration is of a type called “lampas” in English, “lampasso” in Italian, in which flowers or other kinds of decorative element are sewn in bright material on a darker background. (See an example below.) The use of this floral motif on a Requiem vestment makes for a highly appropriate expression of the Christian understanding of death as something which ultimately leads to rebirth and reflourishing, as we say in the Requiem preface “For life is changed for Thy faithful, o Lord, not taken away.”
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| A 14th-century Italian lampasso with birds and flowers. (image from Italian wikipedia) |
