Michelangelo Buys Figs. parts 1859 - 1862

1859. I don’t need to tell you how perfect the coffee was, if you have ever had coffee prepared by a four hundred year old church you know quite well what I am talking about. As for the Anisette Toast, it was just the same as my Grandmother always had on hand: slightly stale so that it became the perfect texture when dipped into the coffee.

1860. While the church was in the kitchen of her church I began to think about all that she had said about the fate of the small churches, and the vagaries of the tourist trade. I am actually of the opinion that it is not the actual objects of art that are so important to the tourist traffic as the anecdotal stories attached to those objects that really matter to the average tourist.

1861. For example, I once came across an especially large and impressive church in Rome called the Lateran Basilica. On the steps was a person addressing a throng of people. He was talking about how the foundations of that church dated from Roman times and that it had been continuously revised and rebuilt. He explained in detail how a certain architect was asked to submit plans to the Pope for a reconstruction and that his plans were rejected.

1862. But the rejected architect was undaunted; he so believed in his plans that he argued with the Pope. He had the audacity to argue with the Pope! He won the argument and the Pope accepted his plans. From that story I understood something important. We must all go and argue with the Pope, and we must win our argument. I never even bothered to enter the church; I didn’t want to disturb that feeling. I walked away saying to myself, “I want to have an argument with the Pope, right away.”

Richard Britell