It's also nice to be back visiting in France -- the last time I was in the south of France -- or the first time, rather, was as a college student, and I've never forgotten the extraordinary hospitality of the French people and the extraordinary views that are available here.
To the eyes of the Christian east, the western Madonna often seems to be rather a shallow and sentimental figure because her theological role as agent and locus of the Incarnation has been forgotten or blurred.