We profess the same Father and Son, the same God and Man, the same Mother and Virgin; we for whom and for whose salvation it was said, after the question about love had been asked thrice: “Peter, feed the sacred fold” […] Rome to which, after the pomp of so many triumphs, Christ by word and deed granted the empire of the world; Rome, which Peter, and Paul — the Apostle to the Gentiles — consecrated as the Apostolic See by the shedding of their own blood.

Dante Alighieri (1265-1321)
Poet

“For him the Roman Church is “The Most Tender Mother”, “Bride of Christ Crucified” […] While we admire the greatness and keenness of his genius, we have to recognize, too, the measure in which he drew inspiration from the Divine Faith by means of which he could beautify his immortal poems with all the lights of revealed truths as well as with the splendours of art. […] Thus, as he based the whole structure of his poem on these sound religious principles, no wonder that we find in it a treasure of Catholic teaching […] that is, the essence of Christian philosophy and theology. […] Indeed, while there is no lack of great Catholic poets who combine the useful with the enjoyable, Dante has the singular merit that while he fascinates the reader with wonderful variety of pictures, with marvellously lifelike colouring, with supreme expression and thought, he draws him also to the love of Christian knowledge, and all know how he said openly that he composed his poem to bring to all “vital nourishment.” And we know now too how, through God’s grace, even in recent times, many who were far from, though not averse to Jesus Christ, and studied with affection the Divina Commedia, began by admiring the truths of the Catholic Faith and finished by throwing themselves with enthusiasm into the arms of the Church. […] No need to recall Alighieri’s great reverence for the authority of the Catholic Church, the account in which he holds the power of the Roman Pontiff as the base of every law and institution of that Church.”

Benedict XV (1854-1922)
Pope