Well, my whirlwind journey through Italy ended today on a high note - literally. Yesterday I spent the morning in the marvel of Vatican City and spoke with a charming, thoughtful, and intelligent miracle seeker. Being a miracle seeker is actually his job. He is a Jesuit Priest and one of the members for the Congregation for the Causes of the Saints. They review purported miracles to decide whether the Church will authenticate them and Canonize the person responsible for said miracles as a Saint.
The process is vigorous and involves medical and scientific examinations, anecdotal evidence, witnesses, and most importantly evaluating the effects the miracles have had and the way the person lived their life. They also consider the person's ability to provide positive intercessory power even in death. The way I see it is that a person who is deemed a Saint is someone who above all lived an exemplary life and since nothing is ever a sure thing one the Church can say is "approved" with moral certitude. A human being, because only God can perform miracles according to the church, but a human being that can be looked upon as a model for behavior and a friend you can go to for advice and help.
The Father, Profesor, and Doctor (when I interviewed him I had a funny moment where I met him and could not figure out which title to use) told me that ordinary people have the capacity for the miraculous; if in their goodness, they allow God to work through them in extraordinary ways. That as much as the process uses countless more objective parameters he noted is the beginning stage. Much like a dog can sniff out a good person so can one know when there is one person who is more special than the others, one person who is in the inner circle if you will of God because they have been a good friend to Him. Between smiles and wiping of his brow (which was sweating under the hot Roman sun) he quoted Mother Theresa, one of the great saints of our time, as saying "I hold the pencil, but it is God who writes."
As I bid a grateful and fond "arrividerchi", we drove from the glory of Vatican City, with St Peter's majestic dome still in the rearview mirrors of our van, I heard the most magical music. At first I thought maybe it was only in my head, some score for the unfathomable age and splendor of my surroundings. But as St. Peters gave way to dense city streets and gladiatorial traffic, that glorious music continued. It was holy music, maybe a mass, I knew that for sure. The divine soprano voice soared over a bed of strings and orchestra and sounded each phrase of Italian like some church bell high in a tower echoing over the countryside. I turned to our well-coiffed Italian driver, Bruno, who was a onetime actor cum Roman tour guide par excellence (whoops, I'll save the French for later), and I asked him what was this incredible music emanating from the van's speakers. He told me with a proud grin, as the Italians always do when boasting one of their own, that it was Alessandro Scarlatti.
"Bella, no?" he continued, and the look on my face must have betrayed my awe. I had heard the name Scarlatti before, but I'm really a novice when it comes to my knowledge of classical music. The heavies of Bach, Beethoven and Mozart each take up a baroque share of megabytes on my I-Pod, but aside from them, I'm kinda in the dark.
My first order of business on our next stop was to hit the internet for some more information on the man who had produced such beauty.
Turns out Scarlatti, who I had only heard of vaguely, was a contemporary of the better-known Mozart and Bach, and much like Bach had begotten sons who became famous composers in their own right (in this case, Dominic Scarlatti).
The elder Scarlatti, Alessandro, had been the "Maestro di Capella" for the viceroy of Naples, essentially the same role as a court painter for a composer. Just having been in Naples, this struck a chord with me and I thought I could hear some of the vibrant colors and sun-drenched optimism of Naples in his music. The particular piece we were listening to was not from Scarlatti's Neopolitan Days though.
It's been nothing shy of supernatural how the hand of fate has dealt its cards on this trip so far. The famous psychoanalyst, C.G. Jung called it Synchronicity when the thoughts in a person's mind, their concerns or fixations, seem to bring about a corresponding reality in events. Well what happened next was definitely a synchronicity.
Scarlatti mainly wrote operas, but this beautiful piece we listened to, even with its octave-climbing vocals, was not one of those - it was a holy vespers for St. Cecilia, Italy's patron saint of music! This was too weird. Here I was at the Vatican, investigating how a saint earns their stripes, what miracles they need to perform to be elevated to that holy designation, and the random soundtrack to my experience was dedicated to the Roman Catholic Church's very own Saint of Music? Maybe while waiting in the van right in the heart of Vatican City, Bruno got in a saintly mood and picked it out or maybe it was my little miracle for the day.