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Chapter 24 (excerpt)
Rome
A limousine with SI insignia
takes the foursome to the SI hotel. There, an elevator with the
SI monogram sandblasted on its glass walls, lifts them in respectful
silence to the suite reserved for the SI VIPs.
"I'll wager that you and I are the only non-members of
the Solidarity who ever put their foot inside this building,
let alone this suite," Peter comments when, for the first
time in three days, they find themselves alone.
Ruth and Peter are given a three-room apartment with a western
exposure. If the view is not intentional, then, particularly
in Peter's eyes, it is prophetic. The hotel soars twenty stories
over the east bank of the Tiber, at the corner of Via di Monte
Brianzo and just off Lungo Tevere Manzo. There is one aspect
that makes this location unique in all of Romethus,
unique in the world. It is the only site which, looking West,
points directly over the Piazza Pia and along the full length
of the Via della Conciliazione.
"The Road to Reconciliation," Peter whispers as
they both admire the view.
Via della Conciliazione leads directly and irrevocably to
the Piazza San Pietro and thus to the Basilica itself. The hub
of the Citta del Vaticano.
The heart of the Vatican.
"Do you realize, Peter, that, over the last two thousand
years, countless millions of people have walked the Via della
Conciliazione in the hope of finding a spot on St. Peter's Square
close enough to the Basilica to see the Pope?" Ruth's voice
is filled with emotion.
Il Papa. The successor of Saint Peter himself.
The successor of the Master.
Peter smiles a little sadly. Not all is what it seems, he
muses. It had only been through the insatiable greed and personal
ambition that S. Pietro is where and what it is. Ambitious for
the Catholic Church, but even more ambitious for himself, Pope
Julius II had razed to the ground one of the most ancient and
most venerated places of worship in the Western hemisphere. He
ordered the destruction of the church, which marked the place
where St. Peter had been martyred. Pope Julius II brought together
the genius of Bramante, Michelangelo and Raphael. He cajoled,
coaxed and bullied them to produce the greatest theatrical extravaganza
the world had known up to that time. The Basilica was not completed
until a hundred years after Pope Julius II died, but the ties
with history had been torn there and then, in the early 1500s.
The ties with ancient thought, with the prose of Cicerothe
link with the civilization of early Greece and Romehad
been severed forever.
The new Humanism in the Catholic Church never looked back.
There had been feeble attempts to remind Rome, or rather the
Vatican, of its roots. The last such, in the middle of the 19th
century, Pope Pius IX issued a Syllabus of Errors, in which he
denounced, inter alia, materialism, free thought and nationalism.
But it was too little, too late. People no longer believed him.
Five years later, to add weight to the Word of God, and certainly
to the dicta of the Church, to gain power, Pope Pius convened
the Vatican Council, later known as Vatican I. In it he declared
the dogma of Papal ex cathedra Infallibility. But the
Papal pronouncement was not taken seriously. Spain, France, even
Italy denounced it.
The Church had lost another battle.
A hundred years later, John XXIII, tried hard to reverse the
course of history. He opened wide his loving peasant arms...
He tried to reconcile the irreconcilable. He did his best to
advocate compassion and discussion instead of harshness
and the imposition of power. He died before Vatican II was over.
His successor preferred... a more conservative approach.
It was too late by then. Much, much too late.
"Yes, dear. Perhaps people were looking for reconciliation.
I wonder what they found," Peter says after a while. "I
wonder if they found what they came looking for."
The people were not ready. Their consciousness would have
remained dormant, had the Popes succeeded in reversing the tide
of history. Not yet.
"Lena told me that our audience is scheduled for 11:30.
It is only for ten minutes. The Pope is very weak, she tells
me."
The Pope is very weak indeed. The College of Cardinals had
met over two weeks ago in expectation that the Pope might not
last another night. They were ready to do their duty. The king
is dead, they were ready to declare. God save the king!
But surely, my kingdom is not of this world?
It is late. Ruth decides to order a snack from room service,
and retire early. The worry over the children, the two flights
only a day apart, jet lag, the overall nervous tension during
the last few days have left her on the brink of collapse. Peter
refrains from helping her unless she asks. She doesn't. Ruth
has ambitions of being independent.
An hour later Peter is left alone. He sits back in a chair,
in the salon, facing the window. He looks at the eternal city,
at the volumes of history at his feet. So much history. So much
human strife and endeavour. So much pain, anguish...
Have I been right? He asks himself for the tenth time. Have
I done the right thing? His sigh empties his lungs. I give up,
he whispers. I give in. I submit to Your will...
That's what I have been waiting for.
Peter closes his eyes. "Who are you?"
I am you.
"Where are you?"
I am within you. And without you. I am also everywhere
and nowhere.
Peter remains silent.
I am a state of Consciousness. Your soul. Your salvation.
Your immortality. Your Lord. Your Master. I am also your friend,
your mate, your benefactor. I am that which you are, which you
always wanted to be. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and
the endyet I have no beginning and I have no end.
"And who am I?"
You are nothing, an illusion. You are a journey, a vehicle,
a way, Tao. You are a means of self-realization. You are that
which enables me to be that which I am. You and I are one.
"I do not understand."
I know. Nor can you, ever. Trust me.
continue reading
towards the stunning conclusion...
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