Echoes of Ancient Rome:
The Catholic Pope interests me because he is the last vestige in the modern world of the Roman Empire, and I just got done yesterday finishing the first draft of my second novel about ancient Rome vs. the ancient Germans this year. For heaven’s sake, the Vatican even speaks Latin of all things! I once saw the Pope when I was thirteen years old and we arrived at the Vatican for a tour of Rome. We went inside and the Pope and cardinals were carrying on some sort of religious ceremony in full regalia. Don’t ask me what it was. It was in June. That is all I remember. The costumes alone made me feel that I was eavesdropping on the court of Augustus with all that purple and red! It was just amazing.
On the same visit to the Vatican I got to see La Pieta. I was very close to the statue. That was amazing, too. Any religion that can produce such artwork is amazing itself.