By Stephen Schmalhofer, First Things - When historian Henry Adams and his fellow Americans—including Augustus St. Gaudens, Dorothy Chanler, Willa Cather, and Edith Wharton—traveled from the New World to our old home in Europe, they found the Mother of the Word Incarnate waiting for them. As their lives demonstrate, the Virgin has influenced the art and culture of America—though the nation has never quite come home to her.