Post #5.3, Thursday, February 6, 2020

Historical Setting, 562 C.E. Gaul

What if Colleta’s widower cousin would choose a troll for his wife? What if the “troll” of this “what if” is her own lonely sister-in-law who too lithely accepts these abuses of gossip? What if it becomes known that the scared and hurting target for ridicule from her sisters would turn out to be, neither a pagan nor a heretic but a God-beloved human being with the possibility to be her cousin’s bride?

         In truth our chat is not about pagans or curses or about the burning of the church or even about moralities of good and evil. It is that Colleta is simply afraid she will not be loved. She sees herself a possible target of gossip and she imagines she could find her own self isolated from family. Out here so far from her sisters she could fall under the same curse of loneliness that haunts Eve. Accepting Eve as family is not just Ezra’s duty or this father’s plea; it is a horror Colleta may have to face in her own mirror as the mundane shifts of time quietly take her from beautiful bride to some dreaded misshapen creature, victim of age and motherhood and whatever else are the ill-defined fears and curses distorting her once childish beauty. To compare oneself with another who was ridiculed, and then to find yourself wanting also — this is the odorous and greening meat of envy.

         Dear God, thank you for this clarity of vision. Help me answer with understanding. Amen.

         But how may I answer her now? She is awaiting a righteous patriarchal judgment or maybe an argument from me, or at least a verbose defense of trolls. But now I have vision enough to see that the rightful remedy is not winning the argument but offering her the fearlessness of a parent’s unconditional love.

         “So Papa Lazarus are you silenced by the curse? Or do you still want to defend my evil cousin?”

         “I was not silenced by any curse but by a more thoughtful perspective. Colleta, I can see that you are the cause of my son’s joy and you are even the driving force of his hopes and dreams. You share with him your wonders — the warm home and of course your amazing and thoughtful children. You are not a little girl bride anymore, but a great and essential peasant matriarch. It is that strong and wise Colleta to whom I beg the widening of your warm circle to include Eve. That is all I am asking, that she find refuge from loneliness within her family.”

(Continues Tuesday, February 11)

Post #5.2, Wednesday, February 5, 2020

Historical Setting, 562 C.E. Gaul

“So, Colleta, you fear I’m excusing evil by speaking a possibility that Jesse might not have burned down the church? In truth I’m simply withholding my judgment while I wonder at the possibility that the fire could’ve simply been carelessness. How can we choose a culprit and judge an act to be evil amid a reality that neither of us knows?”

         She knows. “When you don’t know what is true you still have to decide where to put your measure of justice. And you’ve never even met Jesse. So how can you guess he isn’t evil?”

         “I’m making no judgment of him at all. But it does seem unlikely it was a crime and not an accident. I mean, there are the thick walls and the people around and the terrible storm and Jesse also had other huge concerns that night. And besides how could someone keep a flame lit carrying it so far and into the church in wind and ice?”

         “He wouldn’t have to bring the flame. There were all those candles lit there left from the Mass.”

         “So, you are saying that the flame was already there and unattended? That seems to make it one more possibility that it was an accident.”

         “But what of Jesse?  He was cursing and threatening evil against Christ. My father heard him shouting at his wife’s father’s door! And what of the storm that came down just then to judge him?”

         “Was it Jesse who was judged by the storm? The rain falls on the just and the unjust alike. We can hardly use a storm as a window on holy retribution.”

         I can see my rational thoughts are distressing Colleta.

         “Papa Lazarus, why do you choose to side with Jesse? He’s my own cousin and I know he was looking to bring a curse down on all Christians. And what if his next wife is a troll?”

         The pain of this “what if” touches her more personally than any thoughts of an ashen church. Wisps of gossip and secrets of blame now take on a form of the actual personal fear. She harbors the fear of being replaced in her own family’s love by this … this one whom the rumors spun by her most trusted sources, her own sisters, call a troll. Colleta whimpers into sobs.

(Come again tomorrow)

Post #5.1, Tuesday, February 4, 2020

Historical Setting, 562 C.E. Gaul

I ask for Colleta’s latest gossip, “So, you know nothing of the fire except that you can guess what happened?”

         “Yes Papa Lazarus. You alone should hear my suspicion because I can’t tell Enola and Ezra thinks it isn’t important. But it were my sisters told me their thoughts of this and they would know it well.”

         Even in the everyday poverty of these times Colleta wears the pink plump of privilege. She maintains her stake in a miniature social order of her own sisters’ designs by keeping a close ear to gossip so that she may always be the teller and never the topic. I expect her “secret” which she is only glad to reveal is meat for rumor and not about fact.

         “So what guesses are among your sisters as to the cause of the fire?”

         “It were our own cousin Jesse!”

         “The widower and new father?”

         “Indeed. The storm came down on us all to punish him no doubt. Early that evening he slammed on his wife’s family’s door shouting and cursing. My own father from next door heard the ruckus and came out to tell him it were the Christ Mass and he should go to the church. Just then the storm dropped down on earth on a wicked breath of wind, hissing and clacking then into full roar as Jesse cursed the Christians for their church and threatened to bring the pagan curses down on them all! So wouldn’t you suppose it were Jesse who took a flaming torch and crept into the church late after all had left so no one would notice? He set the flame that brought down the whole of that old Roman building.”

         “Surely some monks or the priest would have noticed.”

         “Everyone was off to sleeping places as it were so late.”

         “Since Jesse would have been coming from outside the city it seems he would have had to go through the crowds on the road leaving the sanctuary and surely some of the monks would’ve stayed there the night so not to cross the river in the darkness. I mean he would have had to enter right through the only door in the city wall. It’s fortified against an army. It would be hard to get in unseen with a torch. The huge wall of the city and the church are built together of solid stone. It seems a stretch to blame Jesse.”

         “Of course, he went right into the door with no one noticing. Papa Lazarus, how can you call yourself Christian when you make excuses for these works of demons against God?”

(Continues tomorrow)

Post #4.14, Thursday, January 30, 2020

Historical Setting, 562 C.E. Gaul

“Colleta, tie on your cape; We will walk in this winter’s sunshine. We can just go down the lane but I need to have a personal chat with you. Eve came with me to watch the children so we can talk.”

         Eve says nothing. Probably her teary eyes lead Colleta to believe I’m intruding my will between these sisters-in-law. Maybe I am but it is not to chastise Colleta as she may suppose.

         “Colleta, I plan to leave my comfortable quarters in the loft over the donkey’s stall and move to Tours. That will mean that Eve will be alone again and without your thoughtfulness the only people she will speak to would be those who come for help from suffering. She was, as you noticed, distraught this morning when I told her of my plans. That’s why I’m begging your kindness. I know it has been hard for you to get accustomed to seeing her scars but now I’m asking that you accept her invitations to eat at her table. You may even find it helpful to have another prepare the meal now and then for your family. And I ask that you send the children to visit her often.  I hope this is the best for both you and Eve, but it will call for your intentional consideration to include her with family.”

         “Is that your big secret? Of course we can be family to her.”

         “Thank you Colleta. I’d hoped you’d understand. It’s important.”

         “So, Papa Lazarus, what will you find to do in Tours?”

         “Maybe I can work as a scribe in the scriptorium of the monastery. I’ve done that kind of work before needing no holy orders — just many years of practice with inks.”

         “Probably you didn’t hear of this. I have a guess why Ezra didn’t tell you but you should surely be warned. The St. Maurice Church was burned to the ground on the very night of the Christ Mass.”

         “Really? I’ve heard nothing of that! Do you mean that old Roman sanctuary laid right into the ancient wall? It was there even when St. Martin was abbot?”

         “Yes. It was really old.”

         “Were people there? Was there tragedy to life?”

         “I have no idea.  I know nothing at all of it, except I have a guess at what happened and I would not repeat my suspicions except that you should know.”

(What “suspicions?” the next chapter begins Tuesday, February 4)

Post #4.13, Tuesday, January 29, 2020

Historical Setting, 562 C.E. Gaul

“Ezra, if I could help, I would stay.”

         “Papa, we could build another cottage so you won’t have to sleep in the donkey’s loft.”

         “That’s thoughtful Ezra, but you would have more taxes and less land for tilling. Please hear me out. I was thinking of going to the monastery at Tours because I believe they have a scriptorium and I could work copying scriptures and as I have done before. I have long done the work of taking scriptures to Christians still meeting in secret. Once Christians hid from the Romans, now they hide from other Christians.  In Tours I would be near enough to return in the seasons when you need a hand with planting and harvest and maybe I could even help pruning vines if you allowed a novice.”

         “You’re doing fine with this work Papa. You’re learning. And if you were to leave us my sister will go back to calling herself ‘Enola’ again, so alone with no papa eating at her table.”

         “So, I guess I will need to have a talk with Colleta.”

         “Colleta? You’re going to tell her what I told you of her terrible jealous rage?”

          “Of course I won’t mention that. I just need to be the one to beg family of her to save Eve from always being alone.  I would hope that while I’m gone all of you, you and Colleta and your children will have some meals with Eve at her new table. But begging Eve’s acceptance shouldn’t be a task left for you or for Eve. I need to speak with Colleta.”

         “So you aren’t even going to let it slip into your chat that Jesse thinks Eve is wondrous?

         “I won’t mention any of what you told me, I promise. I’m asking Colleta a favor. I’m not trying to beat her up. And really, it might be that Colleta is ready to include Eve from time to time. Eve no longer hides in bee nets and no one seems to mind. I’ve seen them talking face-to-face with hardly a notice of the scars. It doesn’t seem impossible for these two women to discover they are family together and that’s a good thing for both of them. Let me talk with each of them.”

         Like Jacob leaving Laban, the prayer for stacking the stones is simple. Watch between us while we are gone from each other. Amen.

(Continues tomorrow)

Post #4.12, Tuesday, January 28, 2020

Historical Setting, 562 C.E. Gaul

Ezra asks, “So maybe this Jesus whose teachings grow as we grow has something new to say about taxes?”

         “Sure. You already noticed Joseph in the creche who only seemed there to bring the Jewish tradition and pay the Roman tax.”

         “Yes, Papa, and I’ve also heard about Jesus answering the tricky query about paying taxes by turning the question and asking whose face is on the coin? I know it was clear; we should pay taxes. But I hoped to hear something different in the new of now.”

         “You remember the stories well, Ezra — new, or maybe old. Ancient Jewish tradition teaches that the earth belongs to God who created it. People may use the land as stewards or tenants but it is God’s earth. So when you give to God what’s God’s only a meager coin remains to give to Caesar.”

         I see my son thinking — laying thought to words in answer.

         “To make sense of God who owns the earth you would have to believe there is a Creator God, not just an imperial invention of a god in human form. And you know Papa, there are still some around in these times who believe a person can own land. I bought into that and paid off the tax debt on these lands after they were idled by the wars and plague. I even believed myself to be the landowner so I planted this vineyard. Then the next year when taxes were due I noticed the taxes went to a landlord and not to Rome, as though I were only tenant on my own land. Now it seems with no one but our Frankish king in power each lesser lord is taking our taxes for himself and paying a portion to a lesser lord, and on it goes, leaving me, the farmer, paying all the taxes, doing all the work and getting nothing but the use of God’s good earth which I thought was my inheritance anyway.”

         “Ezra, as I see it, from the nothing I left here you have turned it to good and used God’s earth to provide for your wife and children and sister also. And perhaps we should talk about my use to you so that I am not a burden living here as I do.”

         “Oh, Papa I didn’t mean to say…”

         “Ezra, if I could make your work easier and not just your tax greater, I would stay.”

(Continues tomorrow)

Post #4.11, Thursday, January 23, 2020

Historical Setting, 562 C.E. Gaul

         A winter’s day — a clean page — The task is to prune the vineyard. When he first took on this land Ezra planted this vineyard between the river and the cottage where I once grew wheat. Now Ezra, whom I instructed only yesterday on thatch is telling me how to prune vines. I thought I knew.

         “I thought you knew how to do this, Papa? You told it in a Jesus story.”

         “Clearly that was a metaphor about relationship together with God and not really about vines. Jesus said, ‘I am the true vine and you are the branches, those who abide in me and I in them will bear much fruit.’ (John 15:1-5, NRSV) But then he recommends those that do not bear fruit be thrown unto the fire.” (John 15:6)

         “Surely I’m not God the vine tender, Papa, but I also use that method of pruning. I do a hard pruning and burn what won’t produce.”

         “So you mean all these dead ones get uprooted and set afire?”

         Now my son laughs at my ignorance. “No Papa! There will be no uprooting in my vineyard!  The roots are good though they may seem gnarly. Only cut these stray shoots. They are like wayward and disconnected thoughts that take from the richness of the fruit. But please keep these roots and cordons. I leave the buds that are closest to the vine and keep them in numbers depending upon the strength of the vine. Jesus had it right. It all has to connect to the source.”

         “A-ha! That was the message of that! I kind of wondered about all that sorting and burning Jesus was affirming. It’s more fitting of his wide love message to think we are not dividing up good people from bad people so much as choosing within our own selves the most love connected ways to hold others in our hearts. It is a much better metaphor with that more personal nuance.”

         “So the pruning bible lesson is a new idea? Papa, I never expected you would find a new idea in an old Jesus lesson.”

         “Of course! The old is new for me all the time. It’s like pruning vines. Cut away the old fronds and save the buds that have yet to produce. See I’m already catching on.”

         “So did this new Jesus of our own time have a word about Landlords and taxes?”

(continues Tuesday, January 28)

Post #4.10, Wednesday, January 22, 2020

Historical Setting, 562 C.E. Gaul

         Ezra tells me the story of what really happened on that night when Jesse came for Eve. “You should know that Jesse’s wife’s family are shouting close neighbors to the sisters of Colleta. Her cousin Jesse told us what happened that night before. At both houses they heard him pounding their doors pleading for help. No one would go with him. They blamed the storm but in case it lessened they excused themselves saying it would be their duty to attend the Christ Mass at the church if it weren’t for the weather. Turned away by Christians Jesse came through wind and sleet all these miles down here for Eve. He believed family rumor that Eve is a pagan troll and so he could find help and also spite the Christian abandonment.

         “Eve found the mother was already dead. Jesse expected a servant of evil would surely be able to restore her to life. Eve insisted it was too late. ‘Angels were already about waiting to take her spirit to Heaven;’ so she gave him the task to hold onto the mother’s shoulders so angels could tug her soul away while Eve hid her work with a blanket to learn if the baby is to be of earth or of Heaven. Eve told Jesse to shout the Christian prayer as loud as he could so the angels would be sure they had a Christian soul here. She had to teach it to him line for line. He shouted it to show us he had not forgotten it. ‘Holy parent in Heaven!  Your Kingdom come! Your will be done! On earth!’ and then the baby cried. He knew it was of earth so he stopped praying, but Eve made him say it all anyway. In fact the ‘troll’ herself made him shout the whole of the Christian prayer over again and again. ‘Your will be done on earth as it is in Heaven now and forever and ever Amen.’

         “So when Colleta and I arrived I think Jesse was glad to see us though all he talked of was the kindness shown by Eve. All this praise stroked the furs of calm backwards and ruffled Colleta’s envy. He even wanted to name the baby ‘Troll’ after Eve. Had it not been for the sweetness of the baby I think Colleta would have been riled to misfit by her jealousy. But Colleta took the baby to her breast and all was peaceful. Jesse and I found Eve had already cleaned the bedding and the body and had wrapped the mother for burial. Jesse carried her to the cart and we buried her.

         Under the coating of ice we found the ground had not yet frozen.”

(continues tomorrow)

Post #4.9, Tuesday, January 21, 2020

Historical Setting, 562 C.E. Gaul

My intention in placing the ladder was to instruct Ezra on the necessary thickness of thatch. He works and moves and even speaks  with a rural pace – or has he simply the peace that is leftover in this place after the anxious push of Rome’s progress toward metropolis fell short here up against the Frankish warlords. He stares as though he were a listener to my advice on bundling straw and pushing the bound stems firmly in place.

         “Yes, Papa.  I failed to gather reeds at the river when they were so abundant last fall.”

         “Of course, Ezra. I know you were then about the tasks of helping at Saumur. How could you have repaired your own roof?”

         “It’s good you could fix this for us Papa. But I don’t know if you can fix the splitting thatch of my unholy thoughts. Did Jesus teach of jealousy, or did he not even know of such petty evils?”

         “Oh, Jesus knew well of siblings indulging in envy for one another…” But I wonder to myself what Ezra was noticing of this.

         “So you have a Jesus story to tell me? Don’t say it Papa; it is a lesson Colleta should hear and I don’t suppose she will listen.”

         “Why would you think Colleta needs a lesson? The story you told us is for Eve and I to ache in envy – with all of Colleta’s wonders – Colleta’s success with the new baby, providing her own family in Tours to take-in the young father and the baby. How could it be Colleta’s jealousy that concerns you? She’s simply all goodness.”

         And haven’t I given that my thoughts? My own envy cut deep when Colleta offered a different grandfather’s love to my grandchildren. It is my own short vision that needs a fix. And apparently this struggle is always about families intertwined with one another.

          I reminded Ezra, “Even the Jesus story I know is a tangle of hurts and it’s not at all a clear story of righteousness.”

         “Papa you are thinking of the Jesus story of the Righteous Son who stayed home? I don’t need to hear that again. This is not about a rich father’s inheritance and a wandering second son. This is a true life story about Colleta’s raging envy and what really happened when we went to call on Jesse and the new baby.”

         “’Colleta’s raging envy?’ Maybe you should tell me that story Ezra. What really happened?”

(Ezra tells the story tomorrow)

Post #4.8, Thursday, January 16, 2020

Historical Setting, 562 C.E. Gaul

         This great rock was surely delivered to the edge of River Liger in a time before days were counted on human fingers. Maybe it was smoothed to be a safe nest for ancient creatures and a high ground for the furry cub caught in a raging river current. Was this the last safe outpost for the elk fleeing the great flood after missing the fragile cut of life onto the ark? It is a rock people hardly would notice but so many of Creation come here often to meet with God. I come to this rock for that solace.

         When I farmed these fields years back my prayers were thanksgivings for my gentle wife who loved the yellow flowers the color of her hair; and there was so much thanks giving for our family of five children. But here I am in this new life and my prayers are yet thanksgivings, now for family that is. How I wish I could live in the midst of them always.

         Dear God, may I be useful in your work and may I be a loving father to this son and this daughter who have knitted their own ways into adults. And may I be useful to these beautiful grandchildren you’ve lent me. Thank you for this reunion, though I know it must be brief. Guide my choices.  Amen.

         The river flows strong and turbulent in a tandem of eternity in earthy rub against this immovable rock. It is current with current mingling as river, one force of water rolls a deep sunken log, another channels toppings of ice floe all as one river pouring these remembrances of the lands unto the sea. I come to this place for the energy of Spirit of God moving among us gathering our spiritual treasures, our creative works, our hopes to promises, our loves in currents, mingling them as one river without mortal boundaries separating shared spirit into individual possession.

         “Your grandfather sends his love.” The grandchild is beloved. Why must I think I am the only grandfather? Is it not the love that is the thing I wish for them?

         Dear God, in the oneness of Spirit let me see from the great view that I am not alone but part of the many and we are loved. Thank you. So be it.

(Story continues Tuesday, January 21)