AILSA CHANG, HOST:
In Nashville, murals of Dolly Parton are covered in flowers, cards and novena candles with Dolly's face where Mother Mary's face usually is. Some cards are calling her Saint Dolly. Since her passing, many in Nashville, where Parton lived for many years, have praised her as an example of how to live a Christian life. Marianna Bacallao of member station WPLN in Nashville reports from a church holding communion in Dolly's honor.
UNIDENTIFIED GROUP: (Singing) Now I know we had no money, but I was rich as I could be.
MARIANNA BACALLAO, BYLINE: In East Nashville, a historic church has been decked in pink flowers, the altar draped in a quilt of many colors to celebrate Dolly Parton's life as an artist, a philanthropist and as a Christian.
LIZA HAWKINS: Her faith informed everything that she did.
BACALLAO: That's Pastor Liza Hawkins of Riverside Commons, a ministry of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.
HAWKINS: She woke up every morning and prayed that God would guide her and lead her. And we as Tennesseans have seen all of the things that God guided her and led her to do.
BACALLAO: As part of the church's Dolly Communion, worshippers make clothespin butterflies.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Fold it like an accordion. Now pinch it in.
BACALLAO: Pastor Hawkins says butterflies are also a symbol in Christianity.
HAWKINS: And that was a lot of what Dolly loved about, you know - butterflies are a symbol for resurrection and also a symbol for the Holy Spirit.
BACALLAO: As part of her readings, Hawkins reads from a children's book's rendition of Dolly Parton's "Coat Of Many Colors."
HAWKINS: (Reading) Now, I know we had no money, but I was as rich as I could be in my coat of many colors my mama made for me.
BACALLAO: And Hawkins leaves her church with a lesson from Dolly Parton's "I Will Always Love You." She cites one of the song's most famous lines, showing how it echoes the Apostle Paul's words in the Bible.
HAWKINS: Above all this, I wish you love. These three things remain - faith, hope and love, and the greatest of these is love.
UNIDENTIFIED GROUP: (Singing) Oh.
BACALLAO: And when it's time to take up the collection, Hawkins passes around a pink cowgirl hat as the offering plate.
UNIDENTIFIED GROUP: (Singing) Oh. Heaven let your light shine on.
BACALLAO: For NPR news, I'm Marianna Bacallao in Nashville. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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