Dolly Parton and Aspects of the Divine

When Dolly Parton passed away this week, I joined the people online celebrating what a special person she was. I thought I was being a little bit controversial by suggesting that looking at her life and the way she lived, it made me understand why Catholics want to bestow sainthood on exceptional human beings. “Controversial” only because I know how important her faith was to Dolly, and even after a long life as one of the most famous celebrities in the world, she had a steadfast devotion to her religion. She would famously joke about herself, and some of her self-effacing one-liners would become as closely associated with her as her hit songs. But I never saw her diminish or try to talk down her own talent, because she saw those as gifts from God. But it didn’t take long at all for me to see that my bold claim was neither that controversial nor that original, and there’s even a ton of “Saint Dolly” merchandise already available, with images of her from just about every stage of her…