The Burning Time (2 page)

Father Brendan could think of no diplomatic response to this, so he tactfully said nothing while attempting a sympathetic expression. The Bishop noted both the silence and the attempt.

“So, you are to advise me, eh? You have a priestly name fitting for this work—Brendan
and
Canice, both missionary saints; my Cathedral in Kilkenny is named for Saint Canice, you know. Well, my son, I need you to acquaint me with the strengths and vulnerabilities of your people in a way no
outsider could otherwise learn. You shall be my right arm, to aid me in bringing the Irish back to the Church from whence they eelishly slither away at every opportunity.”

“I shall do my best, but—candor warrants candor, my lord. The Irish … in truth, they may never come wholly to the Church,” the young priest said softly, “yet they cannot but come wholly to the love that is Christ’s message.”

The Bishop peered at the younger man, deliberating. When he replied, he had to raise his voice above the clamor surrounding them.

“That is all very well, Father,” he half shouted, “But I shall now venture beyond candor and be blunt. I do not intend to suffer another purgatorial year on your shores. I no longer
care
if these people come, wholly or partly, to Christ or Christ’s message. I care that they come to the
Church
, that they obey Church law. I care that His Holiness cease being plagued by outrageous reports from Ireland: parishioners prancing round maypoles under full moons like cats in heat, priests so permissive they refuse to destroy horn-headed carvings that heathen stonecutters have secretly mounted above the north doors of our own churches! And
denial
of all this! Pretended innocence! As well as
shocking
incompetence. Delay. Elaborate excuses. Faeries. Imps. Enough whimsy to make a sane man gag. Let me advise
you
, Father Brendan. It is neither wickedness nor evil that destroys the world, but
stupidity
and
incompetence
—and
the ceaselessness with which most of mankind practices both is awe-inspiring. But Ireland boasts an overabundance of practitioners. No one accepts responsibility for anything. Instead, there is rampant superstition. Superstition is the mother of chaos.”

“But surely my lord—”

“What I
care
about is
order
—the foundation for civilizing any country, including this absurd excuse for one. The only evidence of civilization in Ireland is what remains of Roman roads and aqueducts, legacies of what? An imperial
order
. The Roman Empire brought order to most of the world and then, astonishingly,
kept
it. With order comes peace. Not the Pax Romana: today that imperial role falls to our Holy Church. But we bring a broader, more beneficent order, governance temporal
and
spiritual. We teach people how to
exist
. And our influence has intensified during the decades the Papacy has been in France, allied with the French Court.
That
is what I care about, Father. An end to superstition. Respect for authority. People knowing their place. The world united under one efficient system, in secular and divine harmony.
Civilization
.”

The young priest frowned in confusion.

“But—my lord … surely the willing heart is brought to God by loving—”

“Father Brendan. Have I said anything about God? This is not about God.”

“But, sir, the Irish are a deeply spiritual people who—”

“—flout the Church every chance they get. Spiritual people do not inhabit the real world, Father. Here in the real world, I assure you, temptations are more subtle, blatant, and formidable than wicked banshees or ghostly apparitions. Religious people! The more devout they are, the more they dwell in poesy.”

Father Brendan beamed, having found, he thought, common ground.

“Ah, my lord, but who does not love poetry? Erin is the land of poets. Why, the
ollave
were Celtic bards who trained for twelve years to pass a test—the Seven Degrees of Wisdom—before being permitted to write or chant poetry. The
ollave
were powerful sorcerers, too. They could compose an
aer
, a cursing poem to drive a man mad. And the
seannachai
—the tale-spinners! I grew up listening to them. In Eire every village has its tale-spinner and its poet.”

“Well, the world could do with fewer poets and more administrators. Languedoc, Toulouse, Carcassonne—they were also full of poets, along with Cathar heretics. Please. Promise me that you are
not
going to be tediously defensive regarding your quaint local traditions. Your mission, Father, is to the contrary: to advise me on how most effectively papal supremacy can be definitively impressed upon these poor, troublesome, uneducated people.”

Father Brendan soldiered on. “Poor, yes sir. And troublesome, aye—even with open pride, I fear. But uneducated—is that not unduly harsh, my lord? You must know that as far back as the eighth century, Irish scholars were held in the highest repute across Europe. T’was to honour that tradition I first went to my studies at Kells—where surely you must visit, sir! Erin’s treasures, Erin’s greatest books, the illumined masterpieces of—”

“—the
past
, my son. This is the fourteenth century, not the eighth. Ireland has slipped backward into a mire of pagan idolatry. Your precious Erin—by the by, which
is
it? Erin or Eire? You people seem to use both interchangeably.”

“They are interchangeable.” Then, wryly, “Why, I am ashamed you could have spent a year here, and no one hospitable enough to teach you that, my lord? Eire is the name in Erse—Erse is Old Irish, early Gaelic. Eire is the older name of the island. But Erin, the poets’ name for our land—after Eryn, one of the Celtic Goddess’s names?—has itself been around for more than a few centuries.” The blue eyes sparkled with amusement. “Of course, you could go back even further, soon after the Great Flood, when the Irish were called The Tuatha de Danaan, the People of Dana—that was another name for the Goddess, you see. Or you could—”

“I could call it
Ireland
. As shall you, in my presence,” snapped the Bishop. He might as well discourage this long-winded
scholar from such lectures right from the first, or they would never accomplish anything. He had no use for legends. He needed facts. And information on how the local people perceived those facts, strategic information he could
use
. But the young priest babbled on, trying to ingratiate himself and getting it all pathetically wrong.

“Indeed, my lord Bishop, with your gift for languages, you might consider studying Gaelic. A lyrical, rich tongue it is.”

“And a minor one. Also too guttural, which is why I never liked German. No
music
. Whereas French or Italian … no no, none of your Gaelic. You must do the translating—of words and customs both—for me.”

Father Brendan studied his bishop for a moment, then bowed a deferential head. When he looked up, his face seemed almost boyish.

“My lord Bishop,” he said, gently but urgently, “My vows bind me to aid you in every manner that I can, and I am grateful for the chance to do so, and will strive to serve you with a glad heart. So I might, if you will permit, explain some of our ways, that you might be more … as you say … effective. You see, my people truly mean no insult in keeping the seasonal feasts that our ancestors were celebrating even before Christ’s great sacrifice for mankind. This is an ancient people, descended from the Celts, related to the Picts, cousins of the Druids. We have a great culture. We—
They
simply want
to … 
mingle
different paths to the Sacred, each path of which they genuinely love—including the newer path offered them by the Church—enriching
each
faith. Nor is this true only of Ireland, but much of Britain. Why, t’is barely twenty years since the Bishop of Coventry openly admitted to being an observer of the Old Religion! So while some of them might—as you note, sir, with wit—sing at the moon, most of them attend Mass as well, and fairly often. The one worship feeds the other. Where is the harm?”

“
‘As well’?
They ‘fairly often’ attend Mass
‘as well’
? This is what strict doctrinal obedience now means? My God! The Church is not the savory onion in a stew pot of turnips, Father Brendan! It is not one choice, or even the best choice. It is the
only
choice. Inside the Church, salvation. Outside, perdition.”

Father Brendan tried a different approach.

“Perhaps, sir, if you could be mild with them, then? And display some humour? The Irish greatly admire—”

“It is not their admiration I seek, Father, but their obedience, their adherence to doctrine. I am not here to entertain. I am here to educate—and chastise, if need be. For your edification, I
have
tried what you call ‘mildness.’ For most of last year I exhausted myself. I spent months untangling bishopric finances. I distributed alms. At Christmas and Easter, I knelt and washed the reeking, pustulating feet of beggars. I spent endless hours of what passes for social life with the Irish gentry in Ossary,
since most of the English landholders sensibly remain abroad, and I felt my intellect atrophy in the presence of these impressively ignorant gentlemen. I performed baptisms, christenings, and ordinations, celebrated hundreds of Masses, preached scores of homilies, visited every church, abbey, and convent in the entire bishopric!”

“Indeed, my lord, at Kells we heard that you were a model of activity—and I grant some of the gentry
are
uneducated. But not all. There are a few who—”

“Yet
still
blasphemy and debauchery abounded. Peasants would defiantly leave wilting, stinking
salads
—‘bouquets of herbs,’ they claimed—at the foot of Saint Brigid’s statue. The abbesses openly flouted my stiffer rules for their novices. Your precious monks in the scriptorium at Kells continued to insinuate pagan images into the illuminated letters of holy Christian books. Some of my own diocesan
priests
would wink when fires were lit on the heath—with Satan himself knowing what obscene rites were taking place out there!” He paused for a breath. “Perhaps you do not know, Father, that I am English by birth.”

Father Brendan bit his lip and raised his eyebrows, hoping to convey surprise.

“Well, I am. It may be impossible for you, who have lived your entire life on this small backwater of an island, to imagine what sacrifice it is for a widely traveled Englishman, educated
by Franciscan monks in Italy and France, to demean himself by accepting as his cross the assignment of securing this ghastly quagmire of a country for the Church. When I was recalled to the Papal Court last October, I tell you plainly: I
rejoiced
. I thought I was being rescued. I assumed it was a permanent recall. That, I now realize, was yet another naivete on my part.” The Bishop seemed unaware of the bitterness leaking through his words. “The Church Merciful may have sent me to Ireland in the first place, but it was the Church Militant that received me back at Court. There I was reminded that my ‘mildness’ had worked abysmally. There I was also reminded that the Church has embarked on a great task: bringing Europe to submission—with a firm hand, undeterred by false pity—for the salvation of man.”

Father Brendan’s rosy face turned pale.

“Oh really. You need not look so terrified. These are merely
inquiries
. Why do people become so emotional about being asked a few questions? When persons suspected of committing heresy are invited to clear their names, what is to be feared? They should be grateful! Indeed, why
are
they afraid—unless of course they have done something wrong? And if they are guilty, it is long past time to scourge the filth from their souls, or else to purge their lives from the community of the faithful. Never forget:
If men do not fear evil, there is no need for them to do good
. In some regions, Church law is now strong enough to overrule degenerate secular courts.
So is the Continent being cleansed of the infestation polluting it—Albigensians, Templars, Kabbalists and other Jews, Moors, witches, sorcerers, all the foul heretics and apostates who prey on Christian souls.”

“Aye, my lord, aye.… But Eire—Eire
-land
, Ireland—is a special case. No one here has
ever
been prosecuted for observing The Old Ways, which are so deeply—”

“ ‘The
Old
Ways?’ You forget yourself, Father. You would do well to remember it is only a few weeks since I was given instructions by His Holiness Pope John XXII, in a
personal
audience. You are addressing his Emissary, sent with orders to see that the Irish are brought to heel. No more mildness. This time I return not to bring peace but, if Ireland requires it, the sword. Do you understand?”

“Yes, my lord,” the younger man replied. His voice held the music of persuasion, but his eyes had darkened to the colour of the waves gently rocking their ship. Serving this Richard de Ledrede looked as if it would be a true spiritual mortification. But somehow he must do it and do it gracefully, winning his release back to the glory of Kells. If he plied sufficient skill, he might yet soften the Bishop’s stand for the good of all … but he must keep his distance. He decidedly must not regard this man as his father confessor.

“How came you to the cloth?” de Ledrede asked, gruffly changing the subject. Father Brendan’s reveries returned to the conversation with a rush.

“I fear I can claim neither visitation nor early vocation, my lord. It was books. Education.… You see, I come of peasant stock. But I had the good fortune of learning to read—a long tale, that—and loving it, ah,
loving
it. And as I grew older, the great libraries at Kells seemed to me—”

“—paradise pure, on earth,” de Ledrede murmured.

Father Brendan was taken aback.

“I feared you might find my story lacking in … religious fervor, my lord. Although surely
since
I have been ordained, my devotion to Christ—”

“You thought I would be distressed because you were drawn to the Church as the greatest institution of learning on earth, in all history? Rather than your crawling to it as some wounded creature, or out of habit, or because of some ‘mystical moment,’ or simply from not knowing what else to do in life?” To Father Brendan’s further surprise, the Bishop smiled. “To the contrary,” de Ledrede continued, “you perfectly demonstrate my point. The Church is the sole structure in the world wherein even a peasant can rise. Oh, to be sure, we never lack sons who come to us from the aristocracy or the military, or … the mercantile class. But nowhere else, not even in the finest army, can a lowly man rise from his class so high as in the Church. How? By
merit
, my son! Hard work, intelligence, a healthy ambition. And most of all, obedience.”