Rom Jubiläums 2025 Tour: Eine Erforschung des frühen Christentums

Gracelyn was a wonderfully affable and knowledgeable guide to the history of The churches we visited. Very much the highlight of our time to Rome

Only tour in my life where we had to look up Wikipedia DURING the tour. My Italian friend recommended this agency because we are Catholic, coming for the Jubilee and wanted a religion-centered tour - Jubilee/Early Christianity. The other people on our tour were also devout Catholic. I believe the tour was done by Maria Lazara. We do not know her name because she did not bother to introduce herself, nor did she ask our names (aside from checking our family name off). We met at the statue and then without any introduction to our tour, nor introduction to the St John of Laterna Church, she marched off in front of us to the Church's portico. It was a bad start. That's the main complaint: she gave no introduction to the tour or any site, she gave no church or historic context on how things came to be or how they evolved. She gave no Catholic perspective. A tour guide needs to be a storyteller! And I expected a guide well-versed in church history, both religious and urban! Instead, it was a bunch of random historic facts. She primarily spent her time pointing out symbolism in the paintings and mosaics. Clearly, she majored in art history, and the history of Christianity was a boring sideline to her. She liked pointing out that Laterna was populated early, while most of Rome was countryside - but why? How did that change? Where did Catholics live and why did they move? Why were these churches chosen for their Holy Doors? Why only 4 doors? She told us the Laterna Holy Door was an original bronze and a couple more facts and then we marched through as it were nothing. Nothing about why it is special that they are open, how Catholics view this moment, etc. IT IS SPECIAL. In speaking about the Jubilee, the only thing she said was that the Pope first started it once every 100 years, and since the Roman townspeople made money on tourism from the incoming pilgrims, they moved it to every 33 years or when they wanted. That's it - Jubilees were about making tourism dollars. End of her story. None of our group of 3 heard that the Sacred Steps were brought from Jerusalem and why, and where they were placed originally. All she did was say "it is not a hard job to move stairs." THEY ARE SPECIAL. She just said: you can up if you want, I'll wait here on my phone. Again, her specialty seemed to be art history not Catholic traditions or history, and 75% of the time, she spoke about symbolism. The blue and yellow of Mary, the keys of St. Peter. That's fine but there was no narrative, no church history. The tour ended exactly at 12 p.m. Clearly, she was glad to be out of there. Another note - yes, her English vocabulary was good, but she spoke sing-song Italian style and it was hard to follow her. She does not have the cadence of an English speaker. Very disappointed in Eternity Tours' guide. Aside: I really enjoyed Eternity Tours newsletter mailings.

Jubilee 2025 Tour: An Exploration of Early Christianity with Eugenia D'Andrea. Eugenia is a great guide, very knowledgeable and flexible too. The web site of Through Eternity Tours is full of useful tips for exploring Rome; whoever manages it deserves a medal!

Excellent tour with our guide helping us understand the interesting history of both Italy, Papal succession and Christianity.

Excellent! Ms D’Andrea was personable, knowledgeable & reverent throughout all aspects of the tour. This was by far my favorite tour in Rome and I would do it again if available. Highly recommended !

We had an outstanding small group tour of St. John Lateran and Santa Maria Maggiore, led by Aurelia. Aurelia gave a wonderful tour and was extremely well-informed about the both the churches and the history of early Christianity. We could not have had a better experience, and the tour was one of the highlights of our trip to Rome.

My sister and I are of Italian heritage and have been to Rome many times before. This time we came for the Jubilee. Francesco ,our tour guide, was excellent! He was full of knowledge.We learned a lot about Christianity through these Basilicas and had a chance to go through the Holy Doors. He took his time answering all our questions and gave us time to pray or view. We never felt rushed with Francesco. He had a fun personality so the tour was never boring. He taught us about a Roman Coffee (espresso and zabaglione) which was something new for us. My sister and I highly recommend this tour and Francesco Reo!