Published: 28 December 2018
Last updated: 4 March 2024
THE COMPASSION WITH which Peter Falk imbued his character Columbo is one of the iconic homicide detective's best traits. When Columbo catches murderous evangelical singer Tommy Brown red-handed, for example, the latter (Johnny Cash) wonders aloud why Columbo isn't afraid to apprehend him alone.
Columbo responds that the killer isn't pure evil. Turning one of Brown's songs on in the car, Columbo adds, "Any man that can sing like that can't be all bad."
That's a generous posture, albeit a fictive one from a television show, that I draw upon when I think what may be gleaned for the Catholic Church from its very rich cultural history during these exceedingly trying times. This is a subject that's personal to me, but not in an expected way.
On a weeklong trip to Rome earlier this year, I attended nine Masses, including at St. Peter's Basilica. I visited so many churches that week that I only realised I'd repeated visits when I scrolled through my photos.
I've walked in a late-night, silent Catholic pilgrimage in Amsterdam; knelt before the bench said to have held Jesus' body in the Aedicule at Jerusalem's Church of the Holy Sepulchre; attended midnight Mass at Madrid's Almudena cathedral; visited the Catholic church Regina Mundi in Johannesburg's Soweto township to see its "black Madonna"; and I go to Latin Mass occasionally near my home in Washington, DC I also often listen to Gregorian chants while I write or walk through museums.
FULL STORY Art and beauty can carve a path through a fallen world (NCR Online)
Photo: Altar view of Sainte-Chappelle Cathedral, Paris (Wikimedia Commons/Jean-Christophe Benoist)
