Make your way to your local airport, where you will board your overnight flight(s). Meals will be served on board.

Welcome to Rome, also known as “The Eternal City.” Upon landing at Rome airport, claim your baggage and proceed to the Arrivals Hall, where your tour guide and/or driver will greet you. Following check-in at the hotel, enjoy some free time to unpack, relax, or explore Rome on your own. Your tour escort may suggest places to visit. Later this afternoon, your group will meet in the hotel lobby for a meet and greet and you will depart together for Mass. Following Mass, you will attend a welcome dinner. After dinner, you have to opportunity to join in a walk to St. Peter’s Square for the Rosary (optional).

This morning, you will have some free time to explore the area on your own. After, we attend the Papal Angelus in St. Peter’s Square or at the Audience Hall. The Angelus is celebrated each Sunday by His Holiness, Pope Francis (pending the papal schedule). Continue to visit to Trastevere which in the first century was a Jewish area of Rome. It is believed that Trastevere is where saints Peter and Paul preached in the synagogues of Rome. St. Cecilia Church was originally a house church. St. Cecilia was martyred in her home by Romans in the 3rd century AD. In honor of her martyrdom, a church was built on the site of her home. This afternoon, visit the oldest of the four major Basilicas in Rome, the Archbasilica of St. John the Lateran, the cathedral church, and the seat of the Bishop of Rome. Cross the street to the very steps that lead up to the praetorium of Pontius Pilate in Jerusalem which Jesus climbed on His way to trial during his Passion. Holy Mass will be celebrated by our priest at the Basilica of St. Mary Major, dedicated to Our Blessed Mother. Dinner and overnight.

Today we tour St. Peter’s Basilica, built on the site where St. Peter the Apostle was martyred. Here, you’ll have the opportunity to pray at the tomb of St. John Paul II and view Michelangelo’s Pieta sculpture. Next you will visit the Vatican Museum, where you can see the Tapestry Gallery, Raphael Rooms, and Sistine Chapel. After lunch, continue down the Appian Way, one of the earliest roads built in ancient Rome to the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls and the Catacombs. Dinner and overnight in Rome.

* Fr Sean Smith Mass Concelebration on Epiphany with the Pope (pending confirmation)

This morning, you will board the bus and enjoy the scenic route to the Abbey of Monte Cassino, the principal monastery of the Benedictine Order, founded by St. Benedict around 530 A.D. Continue to San Giovanni Rotondo, where St. Pio of Pietrelcina (St. Padre Pio) lived for many decades and where thousands of people have flocked to be closer to this great saint and Our Lord. Dinner and overnight in San Giovanni Rotondo.

Visit the Old Church of Our Lady of Grace, and see the confessional from where St. Pio spent an innumerable number of hours listening to confessions. Next, you will board the bus and travel along the beautiful Gargano Peninsula to the Grotto of St. Michael the Archangel. Return for dinner and overnight in San Giovanni Rotondo.

*Candlelight Procession – Between May and October, attend the weekly candlelight procession at the Sanctuary of St. Pio after dinner, at 9:00 pm.

After breakfast, you leave for Assisi. On the way, we stop in Lanciano for private Mass at the Church of St. Longinus- the site of a Eucharistic Miracle that occurred in the eighth century. At the time of the miracle, there was a Basilian monk, who struggled with the belief in the Real Presence in the Eucharist. During the time of Mass, the monk, with doubt in his voice, said the words of consecration, and the bread and wine transformed into physical flesh and blood. Leave for the Marian shrine of Loreto to visit the Holy House of Nazareth and the beautiful Madonna of Loreto. Tradition holds that this is the house in which Mary first prayed the Magnificat, in which Jesus grew to manhood, and in which the Holy Family lived, before it was transported several times by angels, to its current location. End the day in Assisi, hometown of St. Francis and St. Clare, with dinner and overnight at your hotel.

Tour of the Basilica of St. Francis, where you will see the tomb of St. Francis, and have the opportunity to view a series of frescoes depicting his life, along with a few of the saint’s possessions. Next, you will visit the Santuario Della Spogliazione where Blessed Carlo Acutis’ tomb is, the first millennial to be declared Blessed. Continue the tour by walking through this picturesque town, where St. Francis and St. Clare both followed God’s call to rebuild his church. Enjoy some free time – for additional prayer, shopping, and lunch. After lunch, board the bus, which will take you outside of the walls of Assisi, to the Basilica of St. Mary of the Angels. This Basilica is made up of two structures, both of which you will visit. The first structure is the “Porziuncola” and the second is the “Capella del Transito” which is the place where St. Francis died. Return to the hotel for dinner and a restful overnight.

This morning, you will ride through the beautiful Umbrian mountains to Orvieto. This incredible town sits on a volcanic high rock formation. Here we visit one of the most beautiful and renowned Cathedrals in Italy. Because of its strategic location, its Christian history officially started in 1004, but Orvieto was built over preexisting Etruscan-era cave tunnels dating back 2,500 years, which some historians believe Christians used to celebrate Mass when Christianity was forbidden. Return to Assisi for dinner and overnight.

Following breakfast at your hotel transfer to Rome Airport for your return flights home.

*206 Tours Disclaimer:
Occasionally local religious and national holidays, weather, traffic conditions and other events may necessitate changes in the sequence of events or the missing of certain events/places. Though every effort will be made to follow the itinerary, it should be considered as an indication, rather than a contract of events and places to be visited.