Faith & Evil

    Shouts of anger and rage reverberated between the pews, marble columns, and the eighteen altars of the Saint Francis of Assisi Cathedral. Had anyone been in the cathedral that evening, they would have clearly understood what was said and expected a fistfight to erupt at any moment.
    “Angus, you have put the Church at risk for the last time!” the older man bellowed.
    The two indignant men confronted each other face-to-face, one level below the main altar at the cathedral’s east end. Bishop Gabriel Rossi, seated across a table from Father Angus Blackwell, nearly exhausted, hesitated and spoke sternly, commanding, “And do you not realize the position you’ve put the church in?”
    Despite the late hour, both men were still dressed to serve God. Father Blackwell was wearing his long black cassock with its traditional black fascia. Around his neck, a grand six-inch-long solid gold cross hung by a similarly heavy gold chain. The priest’s white clerical collar was still in place but slightly askew from the agitation of his animated arms during the argument moments before. His cassock was bunched up under the table, corralled by his legs. Bishop Rossi had no such issue. He had already retired for the evening and had changed into his clerical suit of black pants, black belt, and shoes, caped with a black clerical shirt. The formal white tab collar was missing. Its absence reflected the sudden need to meet with the priest while he completed his late evening duties inside the sanctuary.
    “Yes, I understand, Your Excellency. But I still–” Father Blackwell now pleaded as opposed to shouting.
    Bishop Rossi held his hand up, “Enough!” His voice commanded, which is how the yelling began no more than three minutes earlier.
    From within the vestry where they sat, in company with the angry voices, a weak yellow glow of candlelight and sodium lamps escaped the stairwell up to the church crossing, casting a dim light on the vaulted ceiling above.
    Silence hung in the air for a few moments before Rossi continued. “I’ll be contacting His Excellency Archbishop D’Souza in the morning. I believe he will travel directly from Brussels to Antwerp to manage your situation. I expect a prompt and compelling response. This time you will experience a minimum suspension, or if His Excellency contacts His Holiness for guidance, you may even be subject to ex-communication. I suggest you prepare for both. For now, return to the rectory. And you are not the leave your chambers until advised. Do you understand?”
    For the second time that evening, Father Blackwell acknowledged his position. All he said was a simple “Yes.” His face turned from sour to remorseful.
    “I will arrange for food to be brought to your chambers. When His Excellency Archbishop D’Souza informs me of what will be done with you, I will contact you through Father Pastoré. Do not speak of this with any other member of the Church. Is that clear?”
    “Yes,” again.
    Absorbing the echoes of voices, the full grandeur of the Roman Catholic Church was on display. Fourteen massive marble-clad pillars corralled the pews, seven on each side leading forward to the crossroad of the church, the transept. On the east side of the nave, two more pairs of pillars framed the altar. Off to the right side of the altar, a choir chamber consisted of two rows of high-back thrones, the back row slightly higher than the first. Above, hugging the upper corners of the ceiling, carved marble figurines of angels flew as if circling the frescoes depicting God and his worshippers.
Behind the altar, a five-panel reredos drew your eyes to the figures inside the panels. Inside the oversized panels, perhaps twenty-foot square, a larger-than-life porcelain figure of Mother Mary held Jesus in her arms. While traditionally seen in blue, inside the St. Francis reredos, the Mother of God is dressed in gold. Flickering light from the three remaining altar candles glimmered off the gold giving the figures the appearance of movement.
    The total size of the reredos, as seen front the front, was a massive forty feet wide by twenty tall. The side panels were attached to the center by a lengthy and ancient hinge. With effort, the reredos could be folded up to resemble a large box. Today, all of this beauty sat as a silent witness to the contest of wills occurring below. As the votive candles dripped wax and self-extinguished, the echo of shouts diminished.
    “Very well then.” Bishop Rossi stood up.
    Respectfully, Father Blackwell stood as well.
    Rossi completed his turn toward the stairs to exit the room, and with his back to Father Blackwell, he calmly said, “Goodnight, Father.”
    The gesture did not go unnoticed by the man left behind. “Good night, Your Excellency.”
    Father Blackwell was left standing alone contemplating, heart still racing from his unexpected outburst and aggressive response to Bishop Rossi’s question, Do you not realize the position you’ve put the church in?

    Father Blackwell had been with the Church for over twenty years after beginning his journey at the Leicester Cathedral in the UK city of the same name. Now at fifty-one, he had moved through four Catholic Churches, including two in Spain and one in Poland, before landing at St. Francis in Antwerp. Tonight, he feared his service to the Church would come to an end.
    Both the bishop and priest had served the church in Antwerp for more than five years. Bishop Rossi had a slight edge having pastoral governance over St. Francis for six years, and he knew precisely how Father Blackwell came to be at the church. That was the underlying context of the argument that night. What occupied their time was neither church finances nor operations. It was more disturbing.

    At seventy-three, Archbishop William D’Souza had been the longest-serving archbishop in Brussels. He was appointed by the Congregation for Bishops in the Roman Curia and by Pope St. John Paul II in 1987. D’Souza was a young forty-one years old at the time. Bishop Rossi had contacted D’Souza requesting guidance on how best to handle Father Blackwell. The Pope and those managing Catholic affairs from the Vatican did not directly involve themselves in matters local to a given parish or church. Instead, they provided general guidance to the archbishops under which the affected churches fell if warranted. Regarding Father Blackwell, Archbishop D’Souza would investigate, review, and have the final say. He deemed the Vatican was not to be involved.
    Five days after the altercation in the vestry, Father Blackwell heard a knock. The interruption was different than meal times when a visitor outside his chambers rang a bell. Father Blackwell approached the door. Angus lifted a metal flap at head height on the door and spoke through a small fist-sized hole containing a half-dozen iron bars. He asked for a few minutes. He knew this was a sentencing of sorts and insisted he had time to dress appropriately.
    Father Blackwell chose to wear his sacred garments, usually reserved for Mass. He felt this would better represent who he was and what he stood for regardless of his past actions. He began by slipping his white alb over his head and letting it drape over him like a flat blanket, slowly fluttering to the floor. The long garment reached his ankles. Next, he unfolded his eighty-inch stole from its resting place on his dresser, lined up the two broad ends, looped it around the back of his neck, and adjusted it to rest high on his shoulders. The ivory white stole featured six half-inch bands of gold-colored thread that ran its entire length but reached only halfway across. The other half simmered like polished white porcelain. Wearing the stole signified that the priest was serving in his official liturgical role. To keep the stole and alb close to his body, Father Blackwell pulled a thick white but soft rope-like belt known as a cincture around his waist. He flipped it over itself, then draped one end back, letting both ends fall to his right side; it symbolized virtue and continence. At the tips of the cincture, woven knots shimmered with gold. The last vestment added, the chasuble, was the most visible.
    The poncho-like garment, when worn, hung down to about knee height. Father Blackwell thought of its significance: charity and love. Before donning the chasuble, he combed his hair and added a bit of cream to stop it from frizzing outwards as a subtle static charge developed in his clothing as he moved about. After his green chasuble had settled, the stole and cincture ends remained visible below the bottom edge. Lastly, the priest capped his shoulders with his amice. The broad collar of the ensemble hung down and over his chest, appearing as a V. Before leaving his temporary prison to presumably meet with Archbishop D’Souza, he added his jewelry. Father Blackwell had finally finished dressing.
    When he stepped out, Father Julio Pastoré was waiting patiently. The man was dressed the same but lacked the jewelry. The priest had served at St. Francis for more than fifteen years and had known Father Blackwell since he arrived from Spain. He was a good friend.
    “Are you ready?” Pastoré asked.
    “I believe so, but I’m feeling a bit gutted. Where are we going?” Father Blackwell answered and asked. It had been days since he spoke with anyone.
    “We’ll be heading to the residence, Angus. How are you feeling?”
    Father Blackwell answered in a quiet voice, “I’m concerned. I made a bit of a cock-up, and I don’t know what to expect.”
    Father Pastoré felt obliged to answer the rhetorical question as the two men started walking. “You and I have known each other for a long time, Angus, and from what I can tell, the Vatican has directed His Excellency to find a solution. And you know this is serious. Children are involved and,” he paused for a breath resulting in accidental emphasis, “you are culpable.”
    Trying to reason out the future, Father Pastoré speculated. “I don’t see ex-communication as an option, but some form of censure is coming. That could take the form of penance, but honestly, I don’t see that as sufficient from the Vatican’s point of view. Demotion is possible, or they could force you back to seminary school. I’m not sure. If it was a demotion, I could see them transferring you to a seminary school as a teacher after five or ten years, then allowing you back into the Church. Archbishop D’Souza could take the step of suspension. You could lose the right to wear a stole and be released from your ordination vows.
    “Angus, I don’t know all the details of what happened and the ramifications. All my information comes via gossip, the worst kind of information. Therefore, I’m just guessing. You must have a better sense of the seriousness of your situation. You had a few days to think about it after all.”
    “I did, Father. I gave it great thought,” Father Blackwell calmly replied. “And honestly, I’m not going to be a prat and try and predict what was discussed between Archbishop D’Souza and Bishop Rossi. However, I ask for your support when I come out of my audience. Will you be nearby?”
    “I can be. I’ll not sit outside the door. Come find me in the library.”
    “Thanks, Brother. You’re a good mate.”
    The two men left the rectory and quietly walked past the well-manicured lawn and garden toward the bishop’s manor. The simple building reflected the church’s slow migration to less opulent living quarters for high-ranking church elders. At only two stories tall, the sandstone brick and 2,500 square-foot building was one of the smaller service homes seen on other cathedral or church grounds.
    Pastoré and Blackwell recalled opulent homes of bishops such as Bishop Franz-Peter Tebartz-van Elst. In that case, Pope Francis suspended the bishop after he spent $43 Million to remodel his home in Limburg, Germany. Tebartz-van Elst later resigned. They likewise knew of similar properties in the United States worth tens of millions of dollars.
    Knocking alone at the door, Father Blackwell was greeted by the bishop’s secretary and asked to come in and step into the Library Room. “His Excellency will be with you shortly.”
    Father Blackwell sat there in minor awe. He’d never been inside the home of the bishop. Despite its modest exterior and size, the interior looked like that of a grand cathedral in its own right. Directly in front of him, three walls were lined with rugged bookshelves trimmed with delicately carved patterns of swirls and florets. He studied the carvings, never seeing any full-size flowers amid the florets. Instead, the florets that lined the spar between the compartments and along the top edge near the ceiling had an alternating gold leaf and green pattern. The rich colors worked well against the dark stained walnut wood that made up the entire bookshelf. The gold florets appeared as if they were illuminated.
    He scanned from left to right and counted twenty-seven bibles amongst reference and historical books. One bible, in particular, caught his gaze. The faded text on the reddish-brown spine read, “BIBLIA SACRA”. The binding was tattered leather and about five inches wide. It was seventeen inches tall, and while Father Blackwell never pulled it from the shelf to look, he guessed it must have weighed better than thirty pounds. The bible looked like the kind of artifact that would better find a home in a museum, as it must have been five hundred years old. He surmised it had been printed not long after Gutenberg conceived the printing press in 1450. He could not come to think that this was an original 42-line Bible, otherwise known as a Gutenberg Bible.
    The utter silence in the home was alarming or peaceful, depending on your mood. Father Blackwell resigned to being peaceful and found himself daydreaming rather than thinking about why he was in that room then. He waited for twenty minutes, not moving from the chair where he first sat. He returned to the now when he heard footsteps on the stairway. Bishop Rossi entered the library first, with the archbishop following just a few seconds behind.
    Rossi spoke first. “Father Blackwell, may I introduce Archbishop William D’Souza?”
    The man’s stature struck Father Blackwell as he stood from the chair. At six foot four, D’Souza towered over Father Blackwell by an entire foot. The archbishop wore a crisp red and black uniform which would be considered flamboyant had it been street clothing. In this setting, however, Father Blackwell suspected it was to portray a demonstration of power. He didn’t see it as such; he considered it pompous. The archbishop’s black cassock looked immaculate, the bottom edge skimming the floor as he walked. Red piping trimmed every edge save for the cuffs. The forward seam was held closed by thirty-three red buttons squeezed into similarly red-trimmed buttonholes reaching from the collar to the ground. D’Souza was not wearing a traditional stole. Instead, he wore a broad ten-inch-wide red cincture band placed high and around his waistline; an ankle-length ferraiolo covered most of it. Underneath his ferraiolo, a black mozzetta peaked out, looking like an elbow-length cape. Upon his head, a red zucchetto completed his ensemble. His visible jewelry consisted of a lone gold chain long enough to reach his navel. Tied to the fourth button from the collar, it hung in two loops to frame a ruby-tipped, gold cross suspended from the fifth button.
    D’Souza strolled into the center of the library, not because of his seventy-three years; he moved deliberately, forcing Father Blackwell to observe him. While he had seen pictures of the Archbishop, Father Blackwell had never met him, and now standing before him, he noticed D’Souza looked much younger than expected. Yet, D’Souza was only two years away from when tradition dictated he must offer his resignation from office to the Supreme Pontiff.
    Archbishop William D’Souza raised his right hand, revealing another piece of jewelry. On his right hand, the third finger rested a heavy gold ring, three-quarter inches wide by one-inch long. Its oval face contained an image of a cross. The embossed image was off-center, allowing for the presence of a pair of small hands in prayer on the other side. The inside of the band held the words PAX, SERVITUS, SPES. Those fluent in Latin would see them as Peace, Service, Hope.
    Father Blackwell took the hand, kissed the ring, and said, “Your Excellency.” No, It’s a pleasure to meet you; no, Have you enjoyed your stay?; no, What brings you to Antwerp? He knew the answer. After turning his attention away from the ring, Father Blackwell raised his eyes to meet the gaze of the archbishop. He felt as if Archbishop D’Souza was looking for his soul. It made him uncomfortable enough to turn away. Father Blackwell had never felt so small in his life.
    Bishop Rossi spoke, “Please, sit.”
    Rossi continued when the three had taken their seats, speaking calmly but forcefully.
    “Father Blackwell,” to garner his full attention, “I have invited Archbishop D’Souza to consider your position in the Church. Your actions continue to have troubling repercussions for our Diocese, the Church, and the children involved. The Church has already compensated the families affected here in Antwerp, as we had the families in the UK, Spain, and Poland. We are now at a crossroads and must determine your future with the Church. We have made every effort to correct your disturbing behavior through personal support and relocation. We’re simply unsure that any further effort by the Church will be of any benefit. The Archbishop and I have spoken at length and have consulted with a tribunal under the guidance of the Roman Curia. We have not informed His Holiness.”
    Father Blackwell listened furtively and stared blindly at the wall behind Bishop Rossi.
    “There are several options available to the Church, all involving penance. Having you stay in the Church will allow you to continue to serve God and His Holiness. However, we have tried that before. Yet, you breached our trust, the trust of the bishop, the trust of the Church, the trust of His Holiness, and the trust of the families. You have been relocated twice in the past; as a result, therefore, the Church feels this is no longer sufficient. Therefore, the Church believes that censure in the form of suspension of your liturgical duties, suspension of salary, and the suspension of housing allowances for one year is required. During that time, you will continue to work for the church fulfilling the role of Lay Brother and teaching at the Holy Rosary seminary in Antwerp. You will not hear confession. Rather, you will confess your sins weekly for the duration. During your months of suspension, you will begin preparation to relocate a final time to Seattle. You will assemble for the Liturgy of the Word a collection of homilies that focus on the value of children to families and the Church. When you return to Mass in Seattle, you will read these homilies and prepare more for no less than two years. Bishop Michael Ravini will oversee your performance at Mass and the Church. Lastly, should the Church need to intervene once more on your behalf, you will be defrocked by the Roman Catholic Church and released. Do you understand?”
    Father Blackwell had kept his focus on Bishop Rossi as he spoke. When the Bishop asked the question, Father Blackwell nodded and agreed, then followed with, “Yes, I understand. When will the suspension commence?” He knew better than to try and argue his way out of the declared restitution.
    “Your suspension begins now. You will return to your residence and remove your vestiges, exchanging them for the simple robe we have placed there. Father Pastoré dropped them off as we were speaking. Once you change, you are free to walk the church property. However, we require you to stay on churchyard grounds unless accompanied by another clergy member. Father Pastoré will provide you with further details and work assignments. We will be speaking with him this afternoon. You may now go.”
    Archbishop D’Souza never said a word during the short meeting. Angus Father Blackwell could not tell if this was deliberate to portray the power of the Church further or if the archbishop’s disappointment was so overwhelming, he preferred not to speak. Obliged, he kissed the archbishop’s ring again before walking out.
    Walking away, not looking back, Father Blackwell quietly fumed. He stayed calm during his reprimand, but now alone and out of earshot from all staff and visitors alike, he let out a barely audible, “Bloody hell.”

    Father Pastoré knocked on the door. There was no answer. He tried again. Still no response. Before opening the door, his mind quickly raced through the possibility of Father Blackwell having committed suicide.