The Minor Characters

REV. JOHN PAUL MITCHELL C’22, ARCHDIOCESE OF MILWAUKEE

The Bible is a story of minor characters. To plumb its depths, you have to look to the little ones. The same is true of the Eternal City. All of its true character is discovered in its anawim: its shopkeepers and taxi drivers and its poor.

As I studied for a doctorate in biblical theology at the Gregorian University, this dynamic came alive at every turn. It is, in fact, the wisdom of God, which the people of Israel learned by being hand-picked from the fray of humanity to become the most influential minor character the world has ever known. Chosen by God to come to know him closely, they were to reveal his glory to all peoples.

This powerfully subversive worldview in which God works as much through little ones—servants and shepherds and humble virgins—as through the mighty—kings and warriors and seers—translated into an equally subversive literary revolution, where the minor characters of Hebrew narrative serve not only to advance the plot, but to fill out the character- ization of the protagonists by way of comparison and contrast, and so bring home all the depth of its message and meaning.

In Rome, the mighty and the meek stand side by side. Kitty-corner to the Circus Maximus, one visits the basilica church of Saint Gregory the Great on the Caelian Hill, where Gregory’s marble cathedra is preserved, and where Pope Benedict XVI and Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury, jointly celebrated the 1,000th anniversary of the Camaldolese branch of the Benedictine Order. Major players. Important events.

Next door, one visits the simplest of convents imaginable, occupied by the Missionaries of Charity, where the frugal room Mother Teresa used during her visits to Rome is preserved. There they run a shelter for men, saving souls by the proclamation of God’s love with the care they provide. Minor players. Important events.

From the bartenders at Bibo’s coffee bar in the Piazza dei Sant’Apostoli filled with daily bluff and bluster, to the taxi driver who wants to be sure you recognize the magnificence of Rome’s network of spring-fed fountains, to the gypsy on the steps of the Gregorian who, caught up as he may be in a generational cycle of organized swindling, nonetheless grieves the loss of his murdered son, it is Rome’s “little ones” that give it all its character, and perhaps teach even doctoral students the most.

Get to know Ziba and Mephibosheth and you will get to know King David more fully. Get to know the little ones of Rome and you will get to know what Rome is all about. n