There’s Something About Mary - Turning Tuscan: A Step-by-Step Guide to Going Native - page 53

to offer flowers. Paintings and statues of Mary are everywhere throughout urban neigh-
borhoods as well. Until the late 18 th century, the Florentines actually used a calendar that
began the year on March 25, the day of the angel Gabriel's Annunciation to Mary. And,
even today, the day that Mary was assumed into heaven remains the anchor for everyone's
most important and extensive vacation of the year.
Interestingly enough, Catholic theology has slowly begun to incline itself toward popular
belief. Although he kept a low profile and tried, preposterously, to remain “neutral” during
theHolocaust,PopePiusXIIwasapassionateandoutspokenchampionoftheMadonna.In
1950 he declared Mary's physical assumption into heaven to be an article of dogma and a
part of orthodox belief. After centuries of questionable green-card status, Mary was finally
confirmed by the Church as a bona fide inhabitant of the celestial realms—body and soul.
Carl Jung was one of the few commentators to grasp the profound significance of the
Pope's gesture, both as a validation of perennial popular belief and as a harbinger of things
to come. In his Answer to Job Jung described the Pope's act as the most significant theo-
logical event since the Reformation. Jung saw it as evidence of the return of the Sacred
Feminine, of its rising and renewal in our collective awareness. If the feminist movement
and the popular rediscovery of “the Goddess” are any indication, he was certainly on to
something.
Morerecently,Mary'sbannerwascarriedproudlybyPopeJohnPaulII.Ifyouwereamong
the millions who watched his funeral on TV, you might have noticed the small letter “M”
that was placed, at his request, under the right arm of the Cross on his coffin. Yes, it was an
“M” for “Mary”.
***
While theology offers certain insights into our relation with the sacred, common vulgarity
offers others that are no less interesting. In Tuscany everyone invokes Mary when they
swear and blaspheme. “Porca Madonna”, “Madonna Putana”, “Madonna Maiale”—these
are commonplace utterances typically reserved for special occasions, like finding a parking
ticket on your windshield, or locking yourself out of the house, or knocking over your wine
glass onto the tablecloth and into your lap.
Well-mannered folk who know better than to swear substitute the euphemism,
“Maremma”, in place of “Madonna”. The Maremma is a region in south-western Tuscany
that produces lots of milk and beef and has nothing to do with the Madonna except that
the word has the same number of syllables along with the same accent on the penultimate