Gospel (28 page)

Father Creech directed her to shield out the light with her hands and peer through the library window: it was not quite dark at this latitude, the horizon an otherwordly band of sky with an eerie lightless blue, this spoil of daylight an unwilling northern prisoner. Lucy listened to the wind howl and whistle about the eaves. She saw the silhouette of a stone altar, a fragment of stone wall, an iron Celtic cross planted in the midst of the ruin. Beyond this were trees rocking in the relentless wind, twisted and flailing, revealing but a moment of their centuries of torment. Lucy felt terror at the desolation of this ruin. How did anyone ever survive in this harsh weather?

(St. Bartholomew of the 1100s went out into the North Sea on a rock island of the Farne Islands, bird-covered and storm-battered, but Aelwin could be glimpsed on the horizon. One day Aelwin waded over through the icy seas and told Bartholomew to leave, but he didn't. Aelwin sulked off to another miserable location. But then the prior Thomas came out on the islands to freeze and nearly die and he and Bartholomew had to divide the seaweed and bird's eggs; they spent years praying that the other one would disappear or be swept out to sea so that they could be alone again. Alone, like St. Drythelm of the 700s, who would stand in a river until it turned to ice around him, trapping his legs while he was lost in prayer. Alone, like St. Pyron of Wales who built his oratory every day anew on the soft tidal sand so that each day his hut would be destroyed by the tide, reminding him of the impermanence of Man's world.)

“It was somewhat warmer a millennium ago,” O'Hanrahan offered good-naturedly. “Greenland was Green, Newfoundland was called Vineland and she and England grew grapes for wine, the Shetlands and Orkneys were full of prehistoric peoples.”

The rabbi offered, “But surely the storms were always this bad.”

Then the lights went off.

The hum of the generator ceased.

The four of them stayed in place until their eyes adjusted to the coals in the fireplace while all about the house was the gale, shaking the rafters. The Father General's gaunt face looked ghastly and severe in the firelight.

“The Irish saved Christianity from extinction among the barbarian hordes,” he droned, holding a book in his lap. “Great Britain was civilized twice by Rome, first by the ancient Romans, then by the Celtic Roman Catholics.”

O'Hanrahan frowned at this too-tidy view. The Celtic Church and the modern Roman Catholic Church were worlds apart, the latter virtually wiping out the former at the Council of Whitby in 664.

Father Creech: “Even today, more than they will admit, England owes what humanity it has to the Celtic strain. They would have it the other way around, of course, but civilization spread from west to east. They claim that Patrick, evangel to the Irish, was British but this is a misreading. He was Breton, not British, and the Bretons are Celts.”

Lucy was untouched by this parade of Celtic virtue.

“That altar outside, my daughter, is all that's left from the original Church of the Holy Savior founded in 562 by St. Columkille, the saint who evangelized Britain in 564. Remnants of his churches are throughout the northern isles.”

Columkille, O'Hanrahan explained for Lucy's benefit, centered his ministry on the Holy Isle of Iona, off the island of Mull to the west of the Scottish highlands. “When he died,” O'Hanrahan concluded, “they put Columkille on a bier and floated him away from Iona and he found his way back to Ireland where the ground opened between the bodies of Patrick and Brigit and received him.”

But Father Creech looked sternly at O'Hanrahan, and O'Hanrahan quit in mid-legend.

“When the end of the world comes, and that will be soon,” sighed the Father General, examining his veinous, bony fingers by the red firelight, “the Valley of Columkille, we think, in Donegal, will according to prophecy escape harm. In this final conflagration with Antichrist, it was prophesied by Columkille that Ireland would be spared, for the waters would rise and cover her.” He uttered a mirthless laugh. “Already, with this global warming we read about the waters' rise. London puts up a barrier to hold back the ocean from rushing down the Thames.”

“The prophecies of St. Malachy,” added O'Hanrahan quietly.

“Signs of the End Times,” nodded Father Creech.

Lucy asked, “Dr. O'Hanra … Father O'Hanrahan, what exactly are the prophecies of St. Malachy?”

He explained: Malachy was an Irishman who, starting with Pope Celestine II in 1143, began to compose Latin mottoes for all the popes until the end of the world. His third motto was
De rure albo
and sure enough, the third pope after Celestine, six years after Malachy's own death, was Nicholas Breakspear, the only English—Alban—pope, born near St. Alban's in fact. Gregory XII, Bishop of Nigripontis, was prophesied
Nauta de Ponte Nigro
(1406); the wicked Alexander VI, Bishop of Albano and Porto, was predicted
Bos Albanus in Porto
(1492); Benedict XV, pope through World War I, got
Religio Depopulata,
religion laid waste.…

(All in all a superb touch-up and con job by Cardinal Simoncelli and others through the centuries to make St. Malachy look good. However, despite the inapplicable mottoes, fraudulent alterations, and popes fashioning their coats of arms to include Malachy's motto so they would be more legitimate as Clement XI did in 1700, We have to admit there are some astounding coincidences.)

“And there are only two mottoes left,” said O'Hanrahan quietly. “Just two more until the end. Depending how you count the past popes. Depending if you count the month-long John Paul I.”

“The motto was
De Medietate Lunae,”
said Father Creech. “Of the half-moon. It could refer to John Paul I's brief reign, no longer than the phase of the moon … or it could refer to John Paul II who will surely do battle with the Crescent Moon of the Middle East: Islam.”

“After that?” asked Lucy, mildly despondent at the imminent apocalypse.

“
De Labore Solis,
from the toil of the sun,” said Father Creech. “The environmental cataclysm to come. This is the motto of the papacy that should see the final war between Antichrist and the elect. Followed by
Gloria Olivae.
”

“The glory of the olive,” translated Lucy.

“The reign of peace before Christ Himself returns to the throne held fast for him through the centuries by the One True Church.”

“Oh, brother,” the rabbi murmured under his breath.

“Finally,
Petrus Romanus,”
continued Father Creech. “Peter of Rome. The first and the last pope, who will return in glory to sit at the right hand of Jesus, Our Lord, as He judges this world of error.”

Rabbi Hersch, with a forced smile, stood and stretched. “Well. If you'll excuse me? I'd like to read a bit and then turn in.”

Father Creech did not wish the rabbi goodnight but rather replayed his pained smile and lifted an aged hand in some uncompleted, unfelt gesture. Then Father Creech returned to the book he had taken from the shelf. “Would you care to hear what befalls the English for their iniquities in the end, my daughter?”

Lucy took the rabbi's chair nearer the fire. This was like ghost stories at camp.

“Columkille from the 590s,” began the Father General, “in translation, of course.
The pure Gael will fly away into exile into both the eastern and western regions of the world; the scantiness of land and oppressive debts, without a falsehood, shall bring decay unto them.…
And so it is true, is it not? The Irish have spread throughout the world, west to America, east to Australia. The English
shall be harassed from every quarter, like a fawn surrounded by a pack of voracious hounds shall be the position of the Saxons amidst their enemies.
Already their colonial misdeeds haunt them on their own shores. The scourge of Islam…”

Lucy and O'Hanrahan exchanged glances. She wanted very much to talk to him alone without Father Doom-and-Gloom around.

“The Saxons afterwards shall dwindle down into a disreputable people, and every obstacle shall be opposed to their future prosperity; because they did not observe justice and rectitude, they shall be forever after deprived of power,
most of which is true now. Three English signs,” he went on, closing the book, “foretell the End Times, according to Blessed Columkille. The burning of the Tower of London, the burning of the dockyards—both have historically happened—and finally, the destruction of the Bank of England, which has not yet happened. But with the union of currencies with the European Community, well, then all the signs shall have been accomplished.”

“But if everybody's under water, it won't matter too much,” began Lucy, but she saw that Father Creech had no levity in him. “I think,” she said, standing to take her leave, “that I would like to read in my Bible a bit and I will see you tomorrow.”

She hoped O'Hanrahan would come see her to the door so they could talk, but he remained seated.

“Good night, Father,” she nodded to their host; “Father,” she nodded to O'Hanrahan.

“Good night, my daughter,” he said with a secret wink.

Lucy felt her way to the big oaken door and opened it. The hallway was lit by one votive candle under a Virgin statue in an alcove at the end of the hall. Outside the wind raked and strafed the roof and the shutters. She passed the icy Chapel of the Holy Savior where one red candle flickered in abysmal isolation, casting a shadow of the crucifix over the stone wall behind. Lucy, her hair standing up on end, felt like the End Times could begin now in this monastery, and she hurried away to her room. She fished in her pocket for the matches and struck one, then cupping the flame, walked briskly to her door and into her room. Looking up she saw the rabbi's face.

“Jesus!”
she cried, dropping the match.

“I've been waiting for you in here—”

“You scared the
hell
out of me…” Lucy fumbled for her matches again.

“Sorry, I almost dozed off in here waiting for you. Cheery fellow, this Father Creech, huh? Why doesn't he just make a check out to the IRA and get it over with?”

Lucy, her heart still racing, sat on the bed and lit a new match. “He gives me the creeps. They all do.”

“Contriving to make the world kneel before Rome is serious work,” said the rabbi, rubbing his eyes.

Lucy lit the candle by her bedstand. “In fact, I thought Rome wasn't high on the Jesuits' hit parade this decade.” Lucy continued thinking aloud. “Father Arrupe, the last Father General in Rome, spent most of his time undermining John Paul II. And that's another thing. Remember the mail I delivered? Another envelope was addressed to the Father General, and all night long the priests were calling him that in Latin, Father General. Now, there's only one Jesuit Father General and he's supposed to be in Rome, and Father Creech isn't he. I'm not sure this is a breakaway group, Rabbi. I think these people think
they're
the real Jesuits and the modern Jesuits, the ones
we
acknowledge as Jesuits, are the breakaway group. These guys are what Catholics used to call Ultra-montanist.”

The rabbi sounded out the word: “Across the mountains?”

“Yes,” said Lucy, remembering her 19th-Century Church history. “The last century it was a term of derision for fanatical pro-papal clerics, movements and publications. Across the mountains, down in Rome and the Mediterranean, as opposed to Cismontanists, the progressive Northern European world.”

A roll of thunder boomed about them and it seemed to linger in the damp stones of the hostel, echoing into a sustained gravelly hum. Lucy felt a chill and scooped up the rough wool blanket to pull around her.

“My God,” said Lucy slowly, as rumors and gossip and years of hearsay fell into place. “He's … Creech is the Black Pope of the Ignatians.”

The rabbi looked at her uneasily.

Lucy rambled, thinking of the Roman numeral on the plate: “Of course, 1773! You hear rumors about things like this but…”

He touched her sleeve. “Sssshh, quietly. Tell me what you think is going on here.”

“And the motto in the chapel, ‘The reasons for this act We keep locked up in Our Own heart.'”

The rabbi put an impatient hand on her arm. “Would you tell me what you're talking about?”

She lowered her voice. “In 1773, Pope Clement the somethingth … 14th, I think…”

“Go on!”

“Pope Clement disbanded the Jesuit Order, saying the words engraved over the altar in the chapel, ‘The reasons for this act we keep locked in our own heart.' He banned them, it was thought, because the Jesuits were scheming too dangerously, maybe even scheming to replace him. But maybe that's not it.”

The rabbi sat expectantly.

“Maybe the pope just wished to clean house and purge most of the Jesuit order of the day. But secretly, so the rumor goes, perhaps Clement funded an elite cadre of Jesuits to keep the order alive throughout the ban. The Ignatians—well, that's what they're thought to be called.”

“The Ignatians.”

“Exactly. I mean, by the 1770s Jesuits weren't welcome anywhere in Europe, right? They had gone from being a secret intellectual police that controlled the fate of nations to this loathed band of corrupt monks—they were no longer effective in any conspiracy.”

“So they went underground, huh? And here they are, still to this day?”

“And in the 19th Century, when the Jesuits were allowed to form an order again, the Ignatians must have kept going, preferring to think of themselves as the true, purist sect, committed in the spirit of Ignatius Loyola to the furtherance of the pope's bidding. God knows the other, official Jesuits are anything but friendly to the Vatican today.”

(We'll say.)

Lucy listed some of the more notable Jesuit disobedience: fathers at American seminaries dismiss the pope's infallibility, Jesuits turn a blind eye to African magic and inclusion of lesser Hindu deities in the mass, James Carney, S.J., leads a guerrilla squad in Honduras, Jesuits were in the Sandinista cabinet, Jesuit influence was behind the jeering of John Paul II from a public mass in El Salvador in 1983, the radical Arthur McGovern, S.J., the Maoist-Christian movement led by Jesuits, the radical Karl Rahner, S.J., Jesuit calls for scrapping celibacy and the papal opposition to homosexuality, birth control.