Heloise

by Hager, Mandy

  She glances around the room at the constellation of familiar faces looking back in utter trust, so many bearing the scars of former cruelty or loss. She takes a deep breath. ‘Let us presume then He understood story’s intrinsic power, as did the poets and myth-makers of old; that through the telling of a person’s trials and epiphanies we see a reflection of ourselves, good or bad, from which to learn and grow.’

  She is relieved to spy so many nodding heads. ‘Therefore, let us accept that in the sharing we receive both reassurance through recognition of the many facets within ourselves, and a reminder that life, for all its hardships, is an unfolding lesson on how to live in order to find the peace God’s love endows.’

  Dear Agatha, in her earnestness, cries out, ‘Amen!’

  ‘I want to offer, accordingly, a new way with which to live here more authentically. Not by way of fasting or hair-shirts as favoured by our Cistercian brothers but, rather, as we are reminded in Proverbs: Death and life are in the power of the tongue: and they that love it shall eat the fruit thereof.’ She can feel the intensity in the room, as if all hold their breath. ‘I have no wish to impose upon you something you do not approach with gladness. Allow me to explain and then to put this to a show of hands and I will stand by your wisdom, no matter the way.’

  There is a general murmur of consent and so she carries on. ‘I propose that one evening a week we each take a turn to tell with utmost truth the story of our life with all its highs and lows, guilts and shames, with the intention to purge the weight of our pasts and seek instead a lightness through sharing and forgiveness. Beyond these walls we are silenced enough.’

  Her mind is charging so far ahead, her mouth can hardly keep up. ‘And let us honour each story and celebrate strength in our communion. We live in common and follow the apostles in their truest communal sense. As Mary offered her truths to Christ, so shall we and, as did she, discover within ourselves the same traits that softened His heart so as to embrace her within His everlasting love.’

  To Heloise’s surprise, they start to applaud, faces beaming. ‘If you will indulge me — especially those who have already heard me tell this tale — I would like to start with my own true story if I may. Our father, Peter Abelard, who gave us this haven, is much in need of our prayers and love. He fights a battle between the demons in his mind and the brilliance that also resides there. I would like to read you his letters, and seek your thoughts on how best we can preserve him. I also do so in the hope that, in the sharing of my troubles, you will find the strength to share your own, as a first step towards leaving behind our pasts in the quest for peace.’

  From those whose tragic lives she knows already, flow tears, and her heart sinks, thinking she has pushed too far. But from the back comes the voice of Ermelina, their first generous novice.

  ‘Mother, I for one welcome this move. Since I was a child, I have held onto injuries that nightly haunt me despite my prayers. To give them voice and to know others understand and judge me not would give me great solace.’

  ‘I, too,’ comes a voice.

  ‘And I,’ comes another.

  From Astrane’s mature alto to the bright soprano of their youngest Marie, one by one each woman in the room declares herself in accord.

  ‘I give my thanks,’ Heloise says. ‘Though I ask one favour more. Let us use our concerns for Abelard to feed our minds. I have asked him already to better attend our instruction as a means to focus his thoughts. Therefore, let us open with him a dialogue to consider the needs of the whole. Put your minds to your greatest doubts, the thoughts that threaten your soul, and we will seek from him his answers and, in the process, build a family where all are honoured and every grief is turned to higher good.’ She sweeps her gaze across them, holding each nun’s eye for a heartbeat to read her response. None look away. ‘Very well. Settle now, and I will tell my story from the start and read you his response to my latest letter.’

  This she does, enlivened by the outpouring of sympathy her telling provokes. At her reading’s end, they hold a solemn discussion about how best to bring some peace to Abelard’s mind. They agree he now be placed at the forefront of all their prayers, and ask that she use their time after every evening meal to acquaint them more thoroughly with his writings in order to stretch their minds. How these generous companions warm her heart.

  She sets in motion an open dialogue with Abelard through their letters, seeking his advice and thoughts on issues of theology and day-to-day practicalities. And with her nuns’ consent in the following week she instigates their story-telling cycle. The hairs on her neck often rise as they work through lives blighted with everything from intimidation and domination to abject abuse, each woman — often for the first time —sharing her truth as those around her act as witness and share her tears. It is gratifying to discover some untainted, joyfully gifting themselves to God to do some good, and others who have joined them solely for the opportunity to learn from Heloise.

  Through this process, an unfolding of profound forgiveness and compassion takes place, a bond that solidly ties them into one, and over the months she sees a cleansing of old wounds, cured by the warmth and simple kindness of her sisters’ care. At times it feels as if Mary herself hides in their midst, circulating Christ’s love with every beat of their collective heart. It is a significant gift; a communal coming-together treasured by all, which calls to her mind Aristotle’s shrewd words: knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom … and educating the mind without the heart is no education at all.

  But what she most celebrates is the change within herself. Through Abelard’s letters comes a return of his mind to hers, and this finally fills the hollow emptiness inside. Separated they may be, but now she knows she shares again the stimulation of his thoughts. It feels like coming home.

  Seventeen

  THE PARACLETE, 1133–1141

  Heloise’s nightly sharing of Abelard’s work further strengthens her community’s sense of kinship, and many a lecture flows over into Compline, where they focus prayers on their thankfulness for his wisdom and support. Even those most simple in their thinking over time come to a fuller understanding, and she observes again the mind’s great hunger to be fed. To see her sisters blossom and grow becomes one of her greatest joys.

  When a letter arrives while she is writing up a lesson one drizzly afternoon, she reaches for it expecting the latest response from Abelard, but the slant of the script is unknown to her. She scans it to identify the sender.

  To Paraclete’s Lady Heloise, my mother, she who gave me birth, from her unfamiliar and distant son, known only through earliest touch, your Astrolabe. Upon the receiving of your letters I sat and read my way from first to last at your request, filling me with sadness that your thoughts had been with me all this time and I was not aware. Of course I had known of you, often wondering why you remained so silent. My father told me you had found much peace in the Church and yet your letters tell a different story, one that has so shaken me it took many months before I felt the calm to write. I am very glad to hear from you …

  He tells her of his life, of his happy childhood shared with his many brothers and sisters sheltered under Denyse’s protective wing, and of his schooling through the local parish church until he went to Nantes to study at its cathedral school with his uncle, the Canon Porchaire.

  Her eyes fill with grateful tears as he agrees to continue their correspondence — although he makes it clear he will hear nothing against the good people who raised him, refusing to point his finger in either anger or regret. She is filled with wonder and pride at his maturity and honesty. The way he writes reminds her of herself at sixteen, perhaps in a way the happiest time of her life, with Gertrud’s inspiring tutelage, Fulbert warm and happy, and dear Jehanne a true and loving friend.

  She writes straight back and tells him of her joy to hear from him. Thus begins a slow building of their relationship, Heloise sharing her everyday news while Astrolabe seeks answers to the questions and frust
rations that arise in his.

  So invigorated is she by his reply and their ongoing contact, she spends her nights writing plays and songs suited to her abbey’s needs and dedicates them to the Magdalene and Mother Mary. Her most successful, she thinks, is an Easter play in which she includes her liturgical song Epithalamica, drawn from the Song of Songs. It is a work of daring, an allegory of the Lord’s resurrection told as romance, which first she shares with her sisters as a reading and then they sing as part of their Easter mass. It proves a popular choice, as does her inclusion of several more female saints to their calendar of celebration.

  Now I see what I had hoped for,

  now I clasp what I had loved;

  now I laugh at what I had so wept for,

  I rejoice more than I had grieved …

  Not long after this, Heloise falls so gravely ill, those tending her begin to fear her end. Life’s verve flows from her, fire licks head to toe and her joints ache. In her fevered state, she begins to dread God’s wrath and regrets she has not better used the means of Grace. She calls in Father Pelfort and asks his help to make her peace. Her unburdening brings relief, and now she feels her dead around her, her mother most especially. If this is the nature of dying, she finds it soothing, filled with love.

  When her body starts to heal, it is the comfort of her husband’s words she craves. In the quiet, bedridden days of recovery, she reads all his letters again from the very first and is struck by the periods of agitation and how they calm when his mind is well occupied. He is the only one alive who understands her mind’s great need. She, too, requires occupation to prevent her falling into despair; she realises they are not so very different after all. For the sake of both his calming and her own, she collates the questions of faith her nuns have raised and preludes them with a letter seeking his help, not confessing that many of the most testing queries are hers alone.

  … You told us that reading without understanding is like holding up a mirror before the blind. My sisters and I have taken this to heart and have acted in obedience to your words as fully as we could, until we have completely fallen in love with the learning about which Jerome said, ‘Love knowledge of the scriptures and you will hate sins of the flesh.’

  But now we are disturbed by many questions slowing down our reading. We cannot love what we do not understand, and as we labour in this field, it does not seem that we can make more progress on our own. We send our humble questions on to you — your students to their teacher, your daughters to their father — and we ask and we implore you, we implore you and we ask, that you do not think it beneath your dignity to address yourself to answering them for us …

  Despite the questions’ trespass into theology, she no longer feels the need to interrogate her faith. In coming so close to God in the worst days of her illness, she has found a way to accommodate all those she loves with God as well. Always before, the love for her husband and son occupied all the space in her heart and, if ever she tried to reduce their hold, panic would set in. But now she sees that, rather than diminish her love for them, her heart can grow around this love, allowing God to cup the whole.

  She is convinced now God reads her thoughts and knows with omnipotent certainty that what she feels for Abelard and Astrolabe is pure. To renounce them for fear of offending Him would be a belittling of love’s truth. If she seeks sincerity in every act — and her every act is based solely on love — then how can the Lord not continue to forgive her if she pursues with faithfulness His loving path?

  This most recent dispatch to Abelard inspires him to write with real purpose for the Paraclete. Once he begins, he sends her such a wealth in his replies they soon are blessed not only with his books and letters, but also with a prodigious outpouring of bespoke prayers and songs, which she adds to their borrowed Cistercian offerings. She asks him, too, to consider how the Rule of St Benedict could be better adapted to suit the needs of women and take into account such frailties as their monthly flows.

  Abelard replies to this with eagerness, suggesting everything from what they are to wear to what they must not eat. In truth, she puts aside the more austere of his suggestions; he clearly has no understanding of their bodily needs. But it is a useful thought process that leaves her ever more convinced that love, not law, and inner virtue, rather than outer show, are the ultimate objectives of a well-lived spiritual life. This is not, in fact, too far from Bernard’s new Cistercian way, merely lacking his pointing finger and claims of moral superiority.

  In consultation with her sisters, Heloise settles on a host of rules that better express their instinct for simplicity — while allowing herself the freedoms she needs to run their increasing estates. To counter any possible criticisms, she embraces a policy of utmost charm and modesty, a tactic she implements so effectively it helps to strengthen the Paraclete’s community support.

  But while Abelard’s letters are profuse in their advice, they offer nothing of his personal news, and Garlande’s return to favour leaves him little time to write. When Matilda next visits, Heloise implores her to tell all she knows.

  ‘You must know by now that Stephen has returned to Paris and sits again beside the king? With his newly reclaimed privilege, he has just appointed Peter as master of the school of Mont St Genevieve.’

  ‘I knew of Garlande’s return but not of Abelard’s. That is indeed most welcome news! How does he fare?’

  ‘He works hard to please, and Stephen says he shows again his desire to be the best of monks. And he writes, a work on ethics he titles Know Yourself.’

  An ironic title given his own lack of self-awareness, Heloise thinks. ‘Praise God! Writing has always strengthened his grip on the world.’

  ‘Thibaud says he looks as old as time, his hair thinned to almost nothing, flesh hanging loose from his bones, and his hands shake like those of a man of four score years.’

  ‘His letters speak much of death.’

  ‘The word also falls heavy from many lips at Paris. Louis’s kingship is waning, his enormous girth taking a toll on his health. The second son is never without the company of Suger — and it is said they scheme while awaiting his father’s crown now his older brother is dead.’

  Matilda’s words turn out to be prophetic. Barely months later, Louis the Fat is dead, less than a year after he married off his son to Aquitaine’s daughter, a match most think unsuited except for the grab of her father’s lands. This son, Louis also, is quickly crowned, and upon his ascension Garlande’s tenure as royal chancellor, along with all his other offices, comes to an abrupt and enduring end. Politics takes no prisoners; it is only ever forgiving of those who at the time hold power.

  Heloise is relieved when Garlande writes to assure her of his resignation to his fate, and adds that Abelard’s increased writing has helped to pacify her husband’s mind. The letter is well timed, allowing respite from worry as Heloise embarks on planning to extend the Paraclete.

  Their numbers continue to rise sharply after a council in 1139 called by Pope Innocent, at last alone on his papal throne after the unexpected death of Anacletus. At the gathering in Rome, attended by nearly a thousand, the churchmen pass laws to increase repression and condemn all nuns who practise any rule other than those advocated by the Church. Fear of false accusations forces Heloise to keep her institutional changes quiet as the new laws are enacted, including a ban on any act that gratifies the body — even among those clergy already married — and strict celibacy is now imposed on all male clerics. Gregory’s long-suggested reforms are finally ratified into law. They cut the nuns entirely from any decision-making, the rift so wide they are no longer even allowed to sing in the same choir as men.

  Once again come reports of the routing of women from their abbeys. Once again they live in fear of catching the wrong eye, just as their need for sister houses grows urgent. It seems that soon, too, no scholarly school will accept any woman as either student or staff, and Heloise finds ever more recruits come knocking to take advantage of her teachin
g.

  The daily lessons take place in the refectory, where Heloise paces before the assembled novices and nuns as once she observed Abelard lecturing his students. When she has drilled them hard to perfect their Latin, calling upon the rote techniques of Saris and Gertrud, she draws breath and begins the true daily stretching of their minds.

  ‘Now, let us follow on from yesterday and hear first from Saint Augustine on the difference between virtue and its display.’ Heloise picks up a manuscript and begins to read. ‘Self-restraint is not a virtue of the body but of the soul. There are times when the virtues of the heart are evident in the actions, and times when they lie hidden in the propensities of character, as the virtue of the martyrs became apparent in the way they endured suffering …’On she reads, pausing now and then to emphasise a point or draw out a meaning.

  Her students scribble notes onto their tablets, the most engaged raising questions as a thought occurs. Heloise welcomes these interruptions as evidence of questing minds.

  ‘So,’ she says, at the reading’s end, ‘the inference is that virtue alone wins merit in the eyes of God: those who are equal in virtue will win equal merit, though they may be unequal in their actions. Why is this?’

  One of the newcomers, a lively widow from Nogent-sur-Seine, raises her hand. ‘Is it because true Christians are concerned entirely with the inward man — adorning him with virtue and keeping him clean from vice? And therefore the actions of the outward man are of less concern?’

  Heloise beams. ‘Exactly! Nicely elucidated!’ She scans the room, seeing several furrowed brows, and laughs. ‘I know, it seems strange, does it not? But think how the Lord cared little for propriety and reverence: his apostles could strip grain and eat it in the fields without reproach from Him, and did not bother to wash their hands before their meals as was the custom.’

  ‘Then why are we taught these things are uncouth and not fit for good Christians … and therefore a sin?’ This, from one of the youngest who, though clever enough, has little faith in her own judgement.