He had made the rounds, pauper, then altar boy, then seminarian, then priest, then bishop, then cardinal, then pope, then pauper, once more. He left a few personal items including his exercise equipment and two cockatiels. There was a pair of cut glass cruets which had been given to him by his mother on the day of his ordination. There were a few other gifts, plaques and medals he had received through the years. Yet, not so much as a single lira in a checking account. He had given all he had to the needy, this Pauper who would be Pope.
Baby Pigeons
Nevertheless, I have some answers for you here. Among them are baby pigeons. Yes, why there are no baby pigeons?
One knows dogs come from puppies and cats come from kittens and cows come from calves. But, just where do pigeons come from?
Perhaps you have never noticed? You never wondered why, in all of your life, you have never seen a baby pigeon? Go to Saint Peter’s Square in Rome or for that matter any of the grand piazzas of Europe or the great parks of America and you will see tens of thousands of pigeons and not a baby pigeon among them.
What’s that? You believe they must be somewhere else? Well, go and try and find them and you will find they are not there. For pigeons, among all of God’s creation, come from somewhere else.
So I have some answers for you here. Among them is the answer to the greatest mystery of all. Something that, like the baby pigeons, from day to day you could not see, yet, always assumed was there. As in the case of baby pigeons, I will prove it is not there.
Now, let us go back to that time, so very long ago, when I first visited the remote mountain province of Vittorio Veneto. Back to that time, when I first met this man called ‘Piccolo.’
1 ‘Leningrad kava Veteran 17 Oct 76
2 At the time Nikodim said this one in four police in the United States were in vice or moral squads invading bars and other establishments and even bedrooms.
3 Leningrad kava Veteran 17 Oct 76
4 L Osservatore Romano 6 Sep 78
5 Washington Post 6 Sep 78
6 Cyanide escapes from liquid just above room temperature, it is deadly in steaming coffee.
Its white crystals are easily concealed in sugar.
7 Swiss Guard Code
8 La Repubblica 6 Sep 78 9 Kommersant 6 Sep 78
9 La Stampa 6 Sep 78
Chapter 17
Milan
“Freedom without equality is not what it pretends to be, the diamond would be made of paste.”1
General George Patton
Spring
It was an exact point in time, the first day of spring, that day on which the sun rests directly over the equator; that day on which all over creation the sun rises due east and sets due west and day and night end in a dead heat in time.
The Boeing 707 rose slowly out of Kennedy over New York harbor before banking to the left headed in its intended direction. As it made its turn, I looked down at that grand lady who lifts her lamp by the golden door and wondered how she ever came about?
After all, we were a Christian nation, our forefathers; every one of them was a Christian. Of those who signed the Declaration of Independence, there wasn’t a single black, not a single Jew, not a single gay, not even a woman among them. At least I didn’t think so. It seemed to me a towering figure of Christ would be more appropriate at these gates to what was, indeed, the Promised Land.
In all of Europe I knew only one person. I probably knew others but I didn’t know where they were. This particular one I had kept in touch with. He had been my rival back in high school in my run for the roses, one of those people I had to beat out in life.
His name was Jack Champney.2 He was much smarter than I was. His problem was he didn’t know it. He thought I was much smarter than he was. He had gathered this from how well I had done in school; I could keep pace with him all the way down the stretch only to lose him at the wire. He had no idea how much harder I had to work for what I got than he did. For him winning the race was like Sinatra singing My Way, almost effortless.
He won the race going away. I was just another student in the crowd of several thousand when I watched him take the stand on graduation day. On this day, many years later, I couldn’t remember a single thing he had said. Vainly, I thought, “If it had been me, today, all that had been privileged to have listened would remember everything, every single word, I said.”
As the plane started to take down the time zones, I thought back to graduation day,
… that day they were all wearing blue blazers. Usually it was only me. Day after day, year after year, it had only been me. The others in sweaters, blue jeans, sneakers, whatever they laid their hands on when they got up in the morning. They used to call me ‘pretty boy’ - ‘momma’s boy.’ Then one day one of them called me a ‘pansy.’ That’s the day they found out my small fists could hit and my feet could kick. Sooner or later they learned my help with their homework made the difference between honors and failure. So, although I had made a run for it, I didn’t come in first or even second, but, nevertheless, when the wreaths were passed out I took home with me the ones labeled Catechism, Mathematics and History. What’s more, the yearbook caption alongside my picture read, “Most likely to become a cardinal of the Church.”
Well, I was never to become a cardinal of the Church. When the ‘V’ in the road came up, Jack took the path that said Christ and I took the one that said Money. I went off to the world of business where with him out of the way I would have less trouble reaping the roses.
He went on to attend Holy Cross where he once again took the honors and then began to work toward becoming a very special kind of priest. He took his doctorate in psychiatry at Johns Hopkins and registered as a licensed psychiatrist. His aim, made clear in his letters to me, was to become a member of the Catholic Church’s Commission on Spiritual Occurrences. The panel, overseen by a group of bishops, was the Vatican’s investigative panel for miracles, apparitions, exorcisms and other spiritual claims.
He had secured an assignment as an instructor in a seminary in northern Italy. The local bishop was a member of this commission, a nice stepping stone for Jack on his way to the top. The cathedral, together with the bishop’s residence, was located in the remote town of Vittorio Veneto in the foothills of the Italian Alps.
During that time, I witnessed the splendor of Christianity. As I crossed Europe, I must have set the world record for visiting churches, including most of Europe’s largest. Because it was too far out of my way, I had to skip Seville. But the others, all the others, from the majestic dome of St. Paul’s, the great stone claws grasping at Notre Dame, the magnificent leaded glass windows of Chartres, the ashen wedding cake towers of Cologne, and now, finally, the immense Duomo di Milano with its threatening weather-beaten gargoyles oxidized by time, guarding the great square which lay before it—Milan’s playground of princes and paupers. I marveled them all. I relished them all.
Yet it wasn’t these great edifices that impressed me the most. It was entirely something else, something I would find here in Milan, something I would stumble onto quite by accident. Something I would carry with me all of the days of my life.
Besides its great cathedral and its great square and its crystal galleria, Milan has a fourth great treasure—something most tourists never witness—the city’s great park of the dead. There you can see it all, every bit of yesterday.
The land of the dead
As I entered the cemetery, I became a part of it all. The only sound was my footsteps and the breath of a slight breeze. The sky was foreboding as if it were a good day for a funeral. Had there been a lake, and there was none, it would have held dark waters as there was not a thing in the sky to give it life. It seemed all of the living had forgotten all of the dead. I was alone—alone as one could be.
I found myself wandering in the world’s greatest metropolis of the departed—endless rows of mansions of stone. Some even with windows as to provide their silent tenants a view of their neighbors’ palatial abo
des. There seemed to be more marble and granite houses in this land of the dead than there were houses outside in the land of the living—each one different—each one commanding the attention of its own artist, its own architect, its own engineer.
Interspersed, here and there, were sculptures, mostly of marble and granite, yet, a few of precious metals, some even studded with jewels—each one frozen in common death echoing its individual message of life—each one befitting a prince—no, a king—no, a god. Collectively they echoed of immense wealth. “No wonder they lost the war, they had all their money tied up in monuments,” I thought.
Nowhere could a single flower be found, as if to ensure the beauty of God’s creation not overpower these great works of man. There was only the green grass which worked its way like a maze in and out and around and about these magnificent monuments and dwellings of the dead.
I proceeded down the main boulevard of this great city of death. Flanked on either side by mausoleums of superlative grandeur, some sealed up like the tombs they were and many others showing off their merchandise. Through ornate iron grates, I could glimpse the sarcophagi themselves—mostly of marble, some of bronze, a few of gold and even one of glass.
I listened. Not a sound. Silence, silence all about me, as not to wake those who were sleeping there. As I came to the end of the avenue, I turned the corner and suddenly stopped dead in my tracks. Not dead-dead, but dead in my tracks. There, to my left, a half dozen small white granite stones sat in a row on a blanket of green grass which lay before a matching manicured hedge of green shrubbery.3
The power of their simplicity eclipsed the grandeur of all that was about them. On each stone was carved a heart and within each heart an image of George Washington. “The Purple Heart,” I thought to myself. I thought something else, “Here is the real reason why they had lost the war.”
Approaching with all the solemnity the moment commanded, in my mind echoed the faint sound of the bugle, the hallowed roll of the drums and the distant roar of the cannon. A spot of light peeked down through the overcast sky as if to mark this precious moment in time. As to give one light to read,
Frank Phillips, Sergeant 1921-1944, 7th Army, 1st Battalion, Distinguished Service Cross
Richard Edwards, PFC 1925-1944, 7th Army, 1st Battalion, Bronze Star
Jerome Rose, 2nd Lt. 1919-1944, 7th Army, 4th Battalion, Silver Star
Brian Pickering, Pvt. 1924-1944, 7th Army, 3rd Battalion, Bronze Star
Anthony Jackson, Pvt. 1922-1944, 7th Army, 1st Battalion Bronze Star
Patricia Wilde, 1st Lt. 1919-1944, Army Medical Corps, Bronze Star
It didn’t say it, but I clearly heard it, “That they shall not have died in vain.” One of those things one calls tears, crept up out of my heart and ran from the corner of my eye and moved toward its lid. I looked first to the right, and then to the left, and then, again, to the right, and finally to the left, once more.
Holding the tear on the edge of the lid, I spoke as if I were a great orator on a world stage, “Not Thomas Paine with his pen, nor Patrick Henry with his eloquence, nor Paul Revere with his horse, nor Washington and Jefferson with all their courage, not even Lincoln at Gettysburg have spoken louder. For you have made more noise for freedom than all the others who have gone before you or have come after you. I pledge to you this day, to each and every one of you, that each and every one of you will not have died in vain.”
I have carried that pledge, that sacred duty with me all of my life. I have carried it every day, every hour, every moment of my life. I have carried it in my mind, and in my heart, and in my being, and in my very soul.
Now it is time to carry out that solemn promise, to answer that fervent prayer. To carry it out for each and every one of them; that what they dreamed of, those things they willed to be, will come to be, for each of them, and for me, and for you, and for all humanity.
1 Affria Italiani 31 Mar 44. General Patton at the grave of gay soldier
2 Except for ‘Jack Champney’—to protect the privacy of his family, all names in this book are real ‘Jack’ was on assignment by the Archdiocese of Boston to the Diocese of Vittorio Veneto
3 In July 2005, the bodies were exhumed and moved to the American military cemetery at Maastricht
Chapter 18
Vittorio Veneto
“Blessed are the poor in sprit…”
Jesus Christ
The next morning I took the train to Venice. It was from there I took the train to Mestre and from there to Vittorio Veneto. I nodded to the young man who took the seat behind me on the way to Vittorio Veneto as he had been the same one who had sat astride me on the short trip from Venice to Mestre.
En route, protestors, mostly in their teens and twenties, lined either side as the train passed through the stations. The tone of their demands sounded more like revolution than the ‘Equal Pay for Equal Work’ their signs displayed.
I had found the situation in Milan worse. I wondered how things could have gotten so far out of hand in a country ruled by the pulpit.
Exiting the station at Vittorio Veneto, I pushed my way through an angry mob. I did what Jack had told me to do. I took the first right, and then the first left, and, again, the first right, and finally, the first left, once more.
I stood in front of what appeared to be an old southern hotel—a southern hotel in the most northern part of Italy. It was surrounded by an aging wall eight or nine feet high. It was of the same shade of amber stucco as was the rest of the town. It was topped off by one of those orange terracotta roofs that sprawl over all Italian villages.
I pounded with both fists as loud on the great wooden door as I could. I heard footsteps on wooden steps. They reached firmness for a time, then again on wooden steps, then firmness, once more.
There was the juggling and clattering of the unlocking of the door and standing before me was a little old lady who looked as if she had just stepped out of an Italian motion picture.
“You must be Lucien. Jack has told me all about you. We have a special place for you.” I followed her into a reception area where I scratched out a registration card and surrendered my passport. I asked for directions to the bishop’s castle as she led me to my room which overlooked a canal that ran behind the hotel. I freshened up a bit and headed back out onto the street.
Soon I passed over an ancient stone bridge and was channeled down a long narrow street hemmed in on both sides by row houses, everyone of amber stucco and in a general state of disrepair.
It was as if I was to see a green house, or a blue house, or a yellow house, I would remember it all of my days. As I looked up I could see the edges of the roofs framing the blue sky, every one of deep orange terracotta tile. On the town’s edge I entered a tunnel that had been carved into an ancient fortress. At the tunnel’s end I stepped out into medieval times, an ancient twelfth century plaza. I sensed Romeo and Juliet might be sleeping nearby.
Unlike the town, where stucco had been the tradesman’s craft, here the buildings were entirely built of stone and the tatter and torn of the ages had gone unrepaired. The cathedral overpowered the plaza which lay before it. Partway up a mountain, was what I rightly presumed to be the castle—a medieval group of turret-topped towers, only the tallest had survived intact.
I passed an old stone trough with lions and gargoyles strewing water in a pool. There were statues set into arched niches in the ancient walls, a few of which had lost their original inhabitants.
Jagged cliffs engulfed the town like a giant horseshoe—a bit of the medieval ages trapped in a rocky gorge.
Suddenly, a man came running toward me wearing a ‘Minnie Mouse’ tank top. He smiled and waved as he passed. I judged he must have been about fifty. I was surprised the recent jogging fad in the states had reached this remote part of the world.
At the same instant, great bells rang out. Not in a rhythmic sort of way, but in a clanging sort of way, as if they did not want anyone to know what they had to say. The old church was
of the identical washed-out color of its surroundings. Its nave was out of balance with its tower, as if they had run out of money in the middle ages, when I guessed the building had been built.
I started my ascent up a narrow cobblestone road hemmed in by ten-foot walls which ran up the side of the mountain to the castle.
I entered through what was the original castle entrance into a courtyard. It centered on a fountain not unlike others I had passed on the way. Water was splashing out over its edges onto the courtyard floor and was running down and around me and out of the castle arches. A gardener was trimming hedges off to one side. Off to the other side was an old car of forties vintage.
The house was of beige stucco and was set within the castle ruins. Its focal point was a grand symmetrical staircase, one set of stairs leading up to a landing from the left and another leading up to the same landing from the right. Jack stood there smiling. I decided to take the stairs on the left.
We got the usual “hellos” and the “Boy, you don’t look a day older,” out of the way quickly. “I see you don’t have an age limit on runners here. I almost got run over down there.” I mentioned the man in the church plaza.
Jack replied, “That was the boss, he turns in a few miles every morning. If you had shown up a month from now, he would have taken you up a mountain or two with him. The six mounds in the forefront of his coat-of-arms depict the six peaks for which he holds the record in Italy.
“When he comes back, I’ll introduce you, but you won’t see much of him until dinnertime. He goes to Venice today. Come, I’ll show you my little corner of the world.”
Murder in the Vatican Page 20