Papal Decree

by Luís Miguel Rocha

  Two agents escorted Sarah to the car. Garvis put on his jacket and saw Gavache sit down next to Ben Isaac. ‘Aren’t you coming?’ Garvis asked.

  ‘Jean-Paul’s going to escort the woman. I’ll come later.’

  ‘As soon as I have Sarah sitting in the plane, it’s your problem.’

  ‘Don’t worry. Everything’s under control. Thanks, Garvis.’ Gavache looked at the defeated Ben Isaac. ‘Now I want to hear that incredible story that was interrupted by the phone call. Tell me about Jesus Christ.’

  51

  The conversation had reached a pause. Robin excused himself, his full bladder urging him. Rafael felt uncomfortable, and the Jesuit noticed it.

  ‘It’s out there to the left,’ Robin pointed to a door down the corridor. ‘You’ll see it. Relax. No one’s going to do anything … unless I give the order.’

  Robin went into the second door on the left and didn’t take much time. Two minutes later there was a flush, followed by the priest washing his hands. He came out with his hands dripping and dried them on a towel hanging behind the office door.

  ‘Still afraid of germs?’ Rafael joked.

  ‘Laugh away. You have no idea of the pests that surround us. If we’re not careful, they’ll do us in,’ Robin said with conviction.

  ‘We have bigger things to worry about now.’

  ‘Do you know it was a Jesuit who discovered the microbes invisible to the naked eye that are responsible for the black plague and other diseases?’ Robin asked, assuming a professorial tone.

  ‘Athanasius Kircher.’ Rafael sounded like a student who thought he knew it all. ‘The master of a hundred arts. He was one of the first people to observe microbes through a microscope in the seventeenth century. German by birth, he was considered the ultimate Renaissance man. He was the author of innumerable treatises, not only on medicine but also on geology, magnetism, and even music. A true Da Vinci, this Jesuit.’

  Robin looked at him with mock disdain before sitting down. ‘Now, where were we?’

  ‘You know very well where we left things. Keep going.’

  Robin crossed his legs and licked his lips. ‘What do you know about Jesus?’

  ‘He was born in Bethlehem and crucified at thirty-three …’

  ‘Okay, I see you know nothing,’ Robin scolded him.

  ‘That’s what they taught us in catechism and at the seminary,’ Rafael argued.

  ‘Is that still taught in seminary? No wonder the society is so far ahead. How curious that they teach you to think better than most people and invest years and years in your moral, philosophical, and religious education, yet so often you fail to see the obvious.’

  ‘And you do?’ Rafael challenged, fed up with Robin’s know-it-all attitude.

  ‘What did the Jews in the first century call Him?’

  ‘I have no idea.’

  ‘By his first name, followed by the name of his father or place of birth. Yeshua ben Joseph; Jesus, son of Joseph; or Yeshua Ha’Notzri, Jesus of Nazareth. I never heard of anyone calling him Jesus of Bethlehem.’

  Rafael had never thought of that, but he wasn’t going to give Robin the pleasure of knowing it. He played it down. ‘Okay. He was Jesus of Nazareth, and not Jesus of Bethlehem. There goes business for the Church of the Nativity,’ he joked again.

  ‘If the church was mistaken or, more accurately, gave misleading information about the birth of Christ, don’t you think it would do the same with other events in His life?’

  As a matter of fact, yes, Rafael thought. He himself was living proof that the church defended herself by hiding, eliminating, and getting around every obstacle. He wasn’t the person to ask about the Holy See’s good intentions. He, better than anyone, knew they didn’t exist.

  ‘Look at me, Robin. I’m the guy ready to blow your brains out. Do you think I believe in the holiness of the church?’

  ‘Why do you, then?’ Robin wanted to know.

  That was a question Rafael avoided asking himself, but more and more frequently occurred to him. Why did he believe? Because others had believed before him? Because life carried him in that direction? Why? Because, despite all the errors and injustices, the church was still the institution that prevented the world from falling into chaos. He still believed that, and perhaps that was the only reason, the one that made him get out of bed without knowing if he would do so the next day, not knowing if he would sleep that night, if he survived, where he would be, what the next step would be, in what direction it would take him. Every day, hour, minute, and second were unknown to fate. He only thanked God for the time He gave him.

  ‘I believe because I want to,’ he said.

  ‘Whether you want to or not, you do it for mistaken reasons,’ Robin warned him.

  ‘And I presume you do so for all the right ones.’

  ‘You can believe I’m not going around deceived,’ Robin admonished, irritated.

  ‘So, set me straight. Why do they say He was born in Bethlehem, when he was actually born in Nazareth? Let’s begin there,’ Rafael asked, losing patience with the argument.

  Robin also seemed willing to move on and began an explanation in the professorial tone of one who has always known the truth, and not some deluded version made up for gullible believers.

  Jesus Christ was not born in Bethlehem or in Nazareth, but first saw the light of day somewhere in the outskirts of Jerusalem in 5 B.C., according to the Gregorian and Julian calendars. The reason for this strange date had to do with the calculation of the calendars. Agreements and disagreements about counting made it possible, according to theory, for Jesus to have been born five years before Himself, that is, the year 5 B.C. Herod the Great reigned until the year 4 B.C., and since the heir of David had to flee the insanity of that lunatic king, according to Robin, He had to have been born before the death of Herod.

  ‘Forget everything you know or thought you knew about Jesus,’ Robin said.

  Jesus’s father was never a carpenter. Joseph had royal blood, descended from Jacob, Solomon, Abraham, and Isaac, and his son was therefore of royal lineage, too.

  ‘According to Matthew,’ Rafael interrupted. ‘Luke traces Him back to Adam and God.’

  ‘Whoever tells a story …’ Robin returned to his account. ‘Why was it necessary that Jesus be born in Bethlehem, and not in Jerusalem, or Nazareth, if you prefer to fall into this error?’ Robin asked rhetorically. ‘Because the prophet Micah foretold: And thou Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, art not the least among the princes of Judah, for out of thee shall come a governor that shall rule my people of Israel.’

  Rafael recognized the words of Matthew.

  ‘There’s more. Let’s begin with the birth of Jesus, who was conceived’ – Robin sketched quotation marks in the air – ‘by the power of the Holy Spirit. Why? To fulfill what the Lord spoke through His prophet Isaiah: Behold a virgin will conceive and bring forth a son, and they will call him Emanuel, which means God be with us. Either Matthew had a great propensity to make things up or was a poor reader with a bad memory, because, as you very well know, Isaiah never said such a thing.

  ‘A young woman with child will bring forth a son,’ Rafael quoted.

  Robin nodded in agreement.

  ‘Then Herod secretly called on the magi to set out for Bethlehem’ – more quotation marks in the air – ‘to discover the hiding place of the child, who, in the meantime, would flee to Egypt, since God appeared to Joseph in dreams and ordered him to go there and stay until he received new direction.’ Robin got up and assumed a dramatic pose: ‘As announced through the mouth of the prophet Hosea: Out of Egypt I shall call my son.’

  The deceived Herod then ordered every male child under the age of two to be killed, fulfilling the prophesy of Jeremiah: A voice is heard in Ramah, a lamentation and loud cry: it is Rachel weeping for her sons and refusing consolation because they no longer are alive.

  Herod died, and an angel of the Lord appeared again in Joseph’s dreams, ordering him to return to I
srael. Since Arquelaus, the son of Herod the Great, was the tetrarch of Judea, Joseph decided to settle in Galilee, specifically in Nazareth, where the tetrarch was Arquelaus’s brother, Herod Antipas, fulfilling another prophesy: He will be called the Nazarene.

  Here Robin stopped and sighed. He was tired from so much talking, and his mouth was dry. He sat down again heavily. ‘I don’t know what prophesy Matthew is alluding to. In the Old Testament there is no mention of a Nazarene or Nazareth. Presumably he confused the name or didn’t interpret it correctly. Probably it wasn’t Nazareth but Nazarite, like John the Baptist, someone consecrated by God –’

  ‘Where are you going with all this?’ Rafael interrupted, fed up with all of it.

  ‘Can’t you see your hand in front of your own face?’ Robin complained. ‘You’re an idiot.’

  Rafael didn’t bother to reply. He saw nothing.

  ‘Do you think Jesus and his family didn’t read the Bible?’ Robin asked suddenly.

  ‘They read the Old Testament,’ Rafael responded, remembering Jacopo’s lecture to Gavache the night before in the Church of Saint-Paul–Saint-Louis.

  ‘Exactly – that is, they knew all the steps they had to take to present the heir of David, the Messiah, to the world.’

  No carpenter in the first century in Israel would have the resources to make a journey to Jerusalem every year to celebrate the Passover. Nor was it necessary, according to Robin’s vivid account, to consult apocryphal texts to know that Jesus’s family went every year, as was the custom of those who could afford it. Some of these journeys are described in Holy Scripture.

  Jesus continued to make them as an adult with his disciples.

  ‘He even died during Passover, if we choose to believe this.’

  ‘Don’t tell me that’s not true,’ Rafael grumbled uncomfortably.

  Robin got up suddenly. It was not something he could say sitting down. He was visibly upset. ‘We still don’t know.’

  ‘Then who does know?’ Rafael asked impatiently.

  Robin looked up at the angry Italian priest, who was acting like a petulant child.

  ‘You don’t have any idea what’s happening, do you?’

  Rafael shook his head no, as if he didn’t know and didn’t care.

  ‘Remember the manuscripts that mention manuscripts that mention bones?’ Robin reminded him.

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘We’re talking about the bones of Christ.’

  ‘What? Repeat that.’ Rafael was astonished.

  ‘We’re talking about the bones of Christ,’ the Englishman repeated.

  It was Rafael’s turn to get up. What the hell was he talking about? He could only be joking. Rafael shivered from nervousness. Had Loyola gone to look for those bones in Jerusalem? ‘Are you kidding, Robin?’

  ‘I wish.’ He smiled slightly. ‘For nearly five hundred years the Society of Jesus has been guarding these relics with their lives, under constant threat, inside and outside the church.’

  Rafael was not feeling well. This went against everything he’d been taught. The Gospel of Mary Magdalene mentioned the place where Jesus was buried. This discredited everything. Everything he had learned, for which he’d fought, was based on a lie? He wasn’t in shock, but he had difficulty breathing. Then there was the so-called Gospel of Jesus. What confusion.

  ‘Tell me, my friend, how can you hope to save the church if they don’t even tell you the truth?’ Robin continued, twisting the knife.

  Rafael sat down again, let himself sweat, opened his collar and took a deep breath to regain control.

  ‘Have these bones been tested?’ Rafael asked.

  ‘Obviously. Science indicates that the bones belong to someone who lived in 1 A.D. or B.C. They were excavated from a tomb, no longer accessible today, carved into the rock of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. They were in an undecorated urn with only one inscription, Yeshua ben Joseph.’

  Rafael closed his eyes. He didn’t want to hear this. Every word out of Robin’s mouth was like a knife stabbing him.

  ‘Of course, Yeshua and Joseph were common names in the first century,’ Robin continued. ‘Like Mary, Magdalene, Martha, Peter, James, and Andrew.’

  ‘Are you trying to give an excuse to the historians paid by the church to refute the idea?’ Rafael accused him.

  ‘But it’s true. That recent discovery was featured among all the international media on the Discovery Channel with that documentary directed by James Cameron. The tomb of Talpiot underscores the idea that they were common names.’

  What was the probability of having two tombs with the same name in different places in Jerusalem? There was a Jesus, a Joseph, and another that could be Mary, Magdalene, or Mary and Magdalene in the same urn, or it could be neither the one nor the other, but Martha, another common name, which also could mean Mary or be Martha herself. The doubts were too many, and the answers too few. The only difference was a tomb no one had heard about, while the tomb of Talpiot …

  ‘Do you mean that the bones that Loyola found in Jerusalem might not be His?’ Rafael asked. He preferred doubt, mystery, to an irrefutable certainty.

  ‘In spite of being found in the exact place the Gospel of Mary Magdalene indicated, that’s exactly what I’m telling you. At that time secrecy was extremely important. The Jews were experts at hiding things and giving misleading directions. The Church of the Holy Sepulchre may mark the place where he was buried … or not,’ Robin said distastefully. ‘And don’t forget we have the question of Ben Isaac, who guarded the Gospel of Jesus, supposedly written by Him in Rome in A.D. 45.’

  Rafael snorted. This was too much.

  ‘That’s what Ben Isaac guarded for more than a half century. He had an agreement with the church, the Status Quo. They say he paid a lot for the church to let him keep possession of the documents.’ Robin sighed deeply. He was tired.

  When the agreement was renewed in 1985, Peter, the superior general of the society, demanded that Wojtyla not sign an extension, but the Pole wouldn’t listen to him. He wanted to get rid of the hot potato as quickly as possible. Robin agreed with the superior general at the time. It was a mistake. Probably in exchange for millions of dollars.

  ‘Now you don’t want to run the risk of Pope Ratzinger doing the same,’ Rafael concluded.

  ‘We can’t, Santini!’ Robin shouted. ‘One of the reasons you’re hearing this story for the first time is because of us,’ he said, striking his chest with his hand. ‘If it were up to me, nothing would be known about it at all.’

  ‘Ben Isaac and the church have done a good job of hiding it, too.’

  ‘How much longer?’ Robin complained. ‘This proves that the pope doesn’t trust us, Rafael.’

  Rafael sighed. The priests of the Society of Jesus were stubborn, and it wasn’t worth arguing about.

  ‘Do you think it’s worth killing people over this?’

  ‘Don’t you understand the seriousness of what I just told you?’ Robin answered.

  ‘You don’t even know if the bones are His. With respect to the Gospel of Jesus, anyone could have written it. You know perfectly well that the authorship of the gospels, apocryphal or canonical, has never been established definitively. The writing of the Pentateuch was attributed to Moses, in which he narrates his own death. Damn. Everything is uncertain. No one knows anything.’

  Robin tapped his foot on the floor nervously.

  ‘However serious it might be, it’s not worth four deaths, Robin.’

  ‘I am not involved with these strategic decisions.’ The English Jesuit sounded defensive, as if washing his hands of it.

  ‘I understand, but nothing in all this justifies kidnapping Ben Isaac’s son. I really hope he’s not going to be victim number five.’

  Robin looked at him, astonished. ‘We didn’t kidnap Ben Isaac’s son.’

  ‘Robin, don’t fuck with me,’ Rafael cursed. ‘You murdered four men and kidnapped Ben Isaac’s son. There’s no point in denying it, after all yo
u’ve told me.’

  ‘Rafael, I give you my word we had nothing to do with the kidnapping. At least as far as I know, and I usually do.’

  Robin seemed sincere. Whether he was or not, only he knew, since no one has found a way to discover if someone is lying; even the lie detectors can be fooled.

  Rafael got up. He still felt hot, and his heart was racing. He looked at his watch and saw it was twelve thirty. ‘I think that’s enough for today.’

  ‘It’s always a pleasure to serve an envoy from the Supreme Pontiff, even one pointing a gun at my head,’ Robin said sarcastically.

  ‘How’s this all going to end?’ Rafael asked.

  ‘Do you want to know what I’ve discovered in all my years of experience?’ Robin paused to get Rafael’s attention. ‘The end makes everything clear.’

  Rafael walked to the door. ‘I hope so.’

  ‘It’ll be easy for you to predict,’ Robin offered, going to the desk and picking up the phone. ‘After everything I told you, you don’t expect to leave here with your life, do you?’ Someone answered the phone. ‘We have an escape attempt. Code red,’ Robin said.

  52

  It wasn’t a pretty sight, and none of the three men would have been there to witness it if they could have helped it. It would not have been humane or pious to let Ursino leave such a sacred place without a moment of prayer and expiation for the services he so diligently performed for His Holiness, four of them, always taking into consideration the greater interest of the Holy Mother Church, submissive to the dogma and teachings of our Lord.

  The paramedics had placed the body on a stretcher. A white sheet covered him to the chest and left his face visible. The fibula was still stuck in his eye, shocking the three men of God who observed him in silence. His face was black on the side with the wound, striped with dried blood. His mouth and chin were white as chalk. Ursino looked at peace, the kind of quiet that emanates only from the dead, who know a greater truth, their mission accomplished here on earth, problems resolved or left for others to deal with … What better reason to be at peace, with no debt collector to hassle them, the worries of borrowing a car, marriage disputes, loneliness, loss behind them. Death can be good.