I’m not necessarily religious. Organizing systems of belief and ritualizing behaviors and faith never held much for me. There’s more of God in the veins of a leaf than in a hymn for me, and more of his design too.

And I have to confess (now that’s a funny way to put it) I haven’t much followed the pope. But as the news is telling me, he is the only pope I’ve known.

There is perhaps nothing as pure in its beauty as force of conviction. Well, especially if that conviction is aimed in a happy and loving direction. It’s not a secret that the history of papacy, as with the history of everything, has its spoiled spots. And for a non-Catholic, the pope means almost about as much to me as the goings-on of the royal family.

Still, he’s the only pope I’ve known. And he’s probably as good at it as anybody could be. And I have to respect a man who knows so many languages. And, as I said, I revel in the beauty of the force of his convictions. Not so many of us hold our convictions so closely. Not so many of us are so robust and so steadfast in our understanding of self and everything.

SS