From the recording More Than Watchmen (1999)

2/7-15/97. I was reading Luther: Man Between God and the Devil (Heiko Oberman) when I wrote this song. Not necessarily an overly friendly view of the Protestant reformer, it was nonetheless intriguing.

I took great interest in the man who, despite his many problems and controversial statements, was instrumental in altering history. The Church was not in a healthy state during the Renaissance, and its Popes (Sixtus IV to Clement VII) notoriously abused their privileges, refusing to heed wisdom, thus seeking their own self-aggrandizement. It was this folly that led Luther, among others, to break from the Roman Church forever. "By grace alone we are saved, not by works.”

Lyrics

I went to the holy city: a sixteenth century Rome
The place that all roads led to was not what I had heard
I came to see the hallowed grounds of saints and martyrs
Stunned, I watch salvation bought, sold and bartered

Noisily we walk these streets: peasants, kings and harlots
I strolled in with onions and crawled out carrying garlic
To buy what cannot be bought, to work for what can’t be earned
To reach those reaching, to live what is learned

I must be a fool in Rome
I am a fool in Rome

People call me crazy, saying “the devil’s in the man”
But I walk along an empty beach and pick up lifeless sand
I must ask a thousand times, “Can this really be true?”
The devil wants us to believe that favor comes in all that we do

I must be a fool in Rome
I am a fool in Rome

So I leave this holy city, shake the dust and close the door
I leave a bit disgruntled and sad, but believe even more
That the way to God is not a maze, nor salvation by merit
It is by the bridge that mends are made, and burdens no longer carried

I must be a fool in Rome
I am a fool in Rome