Monday, October 27, 2008
PAPAL DOCUMENT FASCINATES MASONS
The Crusades, Templars, Charges of heresy. What do they have to do with a little Western New York town?
At the Great Valley Masonic Lodge Thursday night, plenty.
The facility hosted a piece of history that has been making its way through the state. A reproduction of a 700-year-old papal document, entitled Processus Contra Templarios (Trial against the Templars), made an evening visit with its caretakers, Thomas Savini, director of the Chancellor Robert R. Livingston Masonic Library of the Great Lodge in New York City; and William Thomas, library trustee.
The document is believed to be the official transcript of the trial of the Templars as well as Pope Clemente V’s verdict in 1308....
The reproduction of the papal work is number 355 of 799 numbered copies made by the Vatican’s publishing house, Scrinium. A total of 800 copies were produced, mold impressions, water stains and all. The last copy, unnumbered was presented to Pope Benedict XVI.
Of the 799 sets sold by the Holy See, only three reside in the United States. Cornell University and the House of the Temple in Washington D.C.
The collection is complete with reproductions of the three wax seals found on the original documentation.
The sets were sold for $8,375 in 2007, six years after their rediscovery, when the Vatican announced the find and released it to the world.
Read the whole story here...
