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| St. Peter's Basilica |
The crowd surged forward and I was swept along with them,
physically and emotionally. We were heading towards a railing, guarded by
police, soldiers: men in uniforms of all varieties. The crush of people would
have been overwhelming in any other circumstance but it felt so natural, so
expected and almost as though it belonged. The fixation upon a single human
being was what I would have expected from a rock concert or a political rally. Yet
the celebrations here did not carry the same overtones, it was a victory, of
that I was sure, yet not of a human endeavor. This victory was so much more
powerful than any election that changed the rule of a single nation for 4 or 5
years, or the short found success of commercial industry. This was an eternal
victory. The man we all pressed towards, with a charisma that was undeniable,
though whether it radiated from his person or from the crowd it was impossible
to tell, was no ordinary celebrity. He was a 70-something man, with thin white
balding hair, fragile glasses placed over his narrow nose, the slight
pudgy-ness that men so often develop in their waning years and a smile that
spoke of quiet amusement through the expression of his face, but more strongly
in his eyes, when you could catch a glimpse of them. He traveled in an open-air
vehicle, not a convertible per se, since he needed a railing to hang onto. His
security flanked him, but he seemed unfazed by them, focusing on the crowd. He
didn’t use stage banter to warm them up, instead he spoke little, and when he
did it was quiet words, written for him, spoken slowly and with emphasis, in a language
that I mostly understood, but through which I could still sense the passion. He
wore white from head to toe and jewelry, though nothing as flashy as I
expected. I didn’t know what to say when he went past. I cannot recall if anything
came out of my mouth. I put my hands into the air as a salute to this man, the
representation of our victory, the center and focus of the energy of more than
150,000 people, packed into a square blazing with the light of a spring morning
in Italy. He emerged from a balcony, and set forth his vision of the world, one
that is utopic in its goals, and yet that morning, it all seemed possible. I
had seen this man before, but never truly in the flesh, almost near enough to
touch.
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| The Stations of the Cross on Good Friday |
The first time I had experienced the ferocity of emotion
attached to this man and what he symbolized, I was running late and a little lost.
In the forefront was the coliseum, the premier symbol of an ancient and illustrious
society. That night it took center stage to represent the underbelly of that
society, how with immense power often comes immense cruelty and the desire to
control every emerging force in the world. People gathered at its foot to
huddle, some holding candles, others bathed only in the orange light of the
monument. On the hill opposite, almost facing off with the symbol of Rome was a
cross blazing with light. It looked so insubstantial as compared to the stone
and arches of its opponent, and yet the state of the latter spoke about the
strength of the former. Because Rome failed to control one force that emerged
during its reign. The force took over, working beneath the currents of society,
in its shadows before a man of privilege elevated it along with himself. It came
to survive and endure while the creations of men crumbled, and were left for
scrap, to be scavenged over for future building projects and disappear into the
mists of legend. Those mists hung over the scene. In languages from all over the world, voices
both male and female recited words that were admittedly foreign to me and yet immensely
familiar. Slowly but surely, a journey emerged, one written in 14 parts, The
Stations of the Cross and I choked back the tears at the end of each stanza,
when the crowd came together as one to speak words that are recognizable in any
language, beginning with a plea, “Our Father…”. Why they struck such a deep
chord, I can’t say. I don’t know. I speak these words every day of my life;
have known them by heart since I was a child. Yet the presence of so many,
sharing this experience, remembering the suffering of a man, at a site that
represented suffering for the sake of glory, suffering for the amusement of
others, and for the truest proof of their domination of the known world, hit
me. The journey ended on that Friday night, and the man in white spoke,
remembering his family all around the world. It was a solemn occasion, one of
contemplation and grief and yet I still experienced elation by being there. The
tears were of genuine sorrow, but they were held back by the knowledge that joy
had arrived.
I don’t know that I have ever experienced so much visceral beauty
in such a short space of time. Some of it reached my eyes, in the form of
painting, sculpture and architecture. The ruins of Rome inspire every budding
artist who encounters them, from Brunelleschi forwards. I found myself marveling
at the sheer grandeur of the spaces 2000 years later, the effrontery and arrogance
of the people who ordered, designed and built these masterpieces and the talent
they possessed to pull it off. After all the disgraces, the plundering looting
destruction wars famines turmoil and uncertainty the structures still stand,
perhaps not as proudly as they once must have done, but still magnificent. I
saw works of art that left my chin on the floor, with museums name-dropping
right and left, tearing my eyes away from a Raphael to be confronted with a
Botticelli, every piece so replete with depth and emotion that even looking was
overwhelming. To experience art is to run a full gamut of human perception and feeling,
looking over the faces, the bodies, the postures, and the surroundings of every
member of a group, looking for both the plain and the subtle meaning for each brushstroke.
But the mind will never comprehend the way the heart can and so I find myself
rooted in place, staring and trying to take it in, letting my eyes wander and
fall when my soul trembles. Sometimes it is the great works, the famous and
infamous; the grandiose in scale or subject. And sometimes I fall for the unloved,
the pieces that everyone overlooks and yet I cannot continue on from. I don’t know
that any other place can wreak the kind of emotional exhaustion on me that an
art museum can. The smells of incense, food and human beings assaulted me, and
the sounds of church bells, something I never would have thought of missing,
but do, washed over me.
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| The School of Athens by Raphael |
Yet for all of the tactility of Rome, its sights and sounds
and yes, tastes (those were also quite good), it was the untouchable and
unreachable that touched and reached me. My mind and my words lack poetry and
so I find it impossible to truly describe the emotions of the crowd, the way
that the pain from standing on cobblestones for 3 hours drained of significance,
the guttural sobs that emerged from my throat at intervals and yet never truly
blossomed into actual tears. I can’t explain to you why a small man dressed in
white, riding on the back of a makeshift pickup truck has the power to command
silence from a joyful mob and keep their rapt attention on him while he speaks.
I don’t understand why this man can have such appeal, why I even cared that I
got so close to him, since I’m not even a Catholic. I can’t tell you why I felt
such contentment and rejuvenation from a weekend of tearing around a city at
breakneck pace, going to bed late and getting up early, of trying desperately
to understand a language I speak 0 words of, and being bombarded by some of the
most beautiful things I have ever witnessed to the point of oblivion. I cannot explain many things in this world.
But I can tell you that I felt an immense power from the people who gathered in
St. Peter’s Square on Easter morning to hear a small man named Francis
celebrate with us the resurrection of Christ. It was a weekend I will never
forget, and which I feel so grateful to have experienced.
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| Pope Francis |
