St. Paul of Rome

It's almost impossible for me not to think of Rome when I think of St. Peter. After all, the head of the apostles was the first bishop of Rome. It is for this reason that his successor bishops of Rome, the popes, have led the Church.

St. Peter was also martyred at Rome, crucified upside down. The magnificent St. Peter's Basilica was built atop his bones. They remain there today, far below the high altar, where visitors on the Scavi Tour can see them.

So St. Peter and Rome are inextricably connected. But on this Feast of the Conversion of St. Paul, I'm think of how linked to Rome the apostle to the Gentiles was as well.

Saul, the rabbi, was from Tarsus, in what is now Turkey. He was converted on the road to Damascus, then eventually visited many other places on his missionary journeys. One of his greatest letters was written to the Christians at Rome, the heart of the empire into which Christianity was born.

Like St. Peter, he later was imprisoned in Rome -- in a stone jail that exists to this day -- and executed there. He was beheaded, not crucified, because he was a citizen of Rome. And today a great basilica, St. Paul Outside the Walls, holds his sarcophagus.

St. Peter and St. Paul make me proud to be Roman Catholic.

What a Saint Looks Like

Ann and I were close to Pope John Paul II on two occasions -- once in St. Peter's Square and a few years later at his tomb.

In 2004, when we attended one of his audiences, the great Polish pontiff had been on the throne of St. Peter for 25 years and everyone knew that he could not be there much longer. It was, in fact, slightly less than a year before his death.

And yet he still thrilled and inspired. Despite slurring his words so that they were hard to understand, his voice was strong, especially while singing. He spent nearly an hour after the audience greeting individuals and groups. Included was a long line of people in wheel chairs, young and old, and a host of recent brides and grooms.

An enthusiastic Italian woman near us, perhaps in her 30s, yelled enthusiastically, "Viva il Papa! Grazie! Sei grande!" Some much younger American girls chimed in with the familiar, "JP Two, we love you!" They didn't want him to leave.

Eleven months later, April 2, 2005, he went home to God.

On our next trip to the Vatican, in 2008, we began our tour of St. Peter's Basilica downstairs where the tombs of many popes are on display. As we walked along we unexpectedly encountered a group of pilgrim nuns and others praying in front of one of the tombs, many on their knees. There was a great silence, one that was never achieved in the Sistine Chapel despite the repeated pleas for silenzio. More than silence, there was a holy stillness.

Here was the tomb of Pope John Paul II. And I thought to myself, "This is how people proclaim a saint."

The Sistine Chapel in Two Acts

Context is everything. Really.

On my first trip to Rome, in 2004, I sat on a marble bench on one side of the Sistine Chapel and marveled at what Michelangelo had wrought. The tourists were noisy, but not enough to distract me from the wonder of the masterpiece above me -- and something else.

Pope John Paul II was a old and frail. I looked around and realized with tears in my eyes that it could not be long before this sacred space would be the site of a conclave to elect a new pope.

A few days later, as Ann and I were standing outside the Coliseum, I overheard a tourist say, "That's the most impressive thing I've seen in Rome." I was much more impressed by the Sistine Chapel, both the vision of the grand plan and the execution of the individual elements.

By our next visit, four years later, the expected election had taken place and Pope Benedict XVI sat on the Chair of Peter. This time the Chapel was packed with lots of tour groups. The noise level was almost deafening and the guards had to yell "Silenzio!" and "No pictures!" every few minutes. (We obeyed, which is why the photo above by best friend and traveling companion extraordinaire Steve Winter, is not from inside the Sistine Chapel.)

Later on that same trip, we visited the Cenacolo in Milan to see Leonardo's "The Last Supper." The contrast in setting was stunning. Here there was no crowd and no noise. The couple of dozen or so visitors appreciated the genius of Leonardo's work in almost total silence.

Although part of a church, the huge wall on which "The Last Supper" is painted was in a refectory -- a dining room. At one time in its long life, that room housed horses. During World War II, it had no roof and was exposed to the elements. In no way does the Cenacolo have the dignity of the famous chapel in which popes are elected . . . and yet, viewing Leonardo's masterwork there was much more of a spiritual experience for us than our second visit to the Sistine Chapel.

What a difference silence makes in the spiritual life.

St. Peter's Square

As a city boy, I like city squares.

Ever since I first started working in downtown Cincinnati in 1969 I have regarded Fountain Square as the heart of the city. With great satisfaction, I have watched it undergo two renovations to bring it up to its current glorious state.

But to me no square can match Piazza San Pietro -- St. Peter's Square in Vatican City. The first time I saw it -- after a missed plane, misdirected luggage, and a cab drivers' strike that forced us to walk a memorable distance from the train station to our hotel -- the size of the square and the magnificence of the Bernini colonnades took my breath away. Photos just don't do it justice.

But scope and beauty are not the only attractions for me. I love to look at the Egyptian obelisk at the center of the square and reflect that it was already almost two thousand years old when the Emperor Caligula installed it in his circus in 37 B.C. It has only been at its current location since Pope Sixtus V moved it there in 1586.

If you work in the Vatican and you look at that monument with some frequency, it has to have some impact on your definition of words such words "immediate," "urgent," "timely" and even "important"!

I love to cross the piazza anytime, but especially in the evening with the lights illuminating the two fountains. And I never fail to look up at the Apostolic Palace to see the lights there, the ones burning in the windows of the papal apartments. I find them a comforting sight.