Templar Globe

I wonder if the people sitting in churches this [last] week understand how very much Jesus of Nazareth’s last week of life was driven by clashes pertaining to wealth and poverty, freedom and tyranny. Probably not. Theologians generally don’t study history. Historians usually don’t study theology, and neither study economics.

Here’s what happened: For over half of a millennium, Israel had been passed from empire to empire. Each new world power treated Jerusalem as a cash cow, diverting its wealth into imperial coffers in order to finance imperial ambitions. First there was Assyria, then Babylon, Persia, and Macedonia. Then finally Rome was given its turn. It was at this time that Jesus of Nazareth came into the world.
Rome didn’t care much about places like Nazareth; it was much more interested in Jerusalem. Jerusalem was a company town, and the company was The Temple. The Temple was the Herod family business, and it had been created for one reason and one reason only — to squeeze enough money out of the region for Herod and his dynasty to buy their way back into favor with Caesar Augustus.

Rome needed money to buy off the urban mob, and Herod needed Rome to keep down the Palestinian rabble. And so when the people came to Jerusalem to make their offerings to God, they were met at each step in the process of religious devotion with another checkpoint at which tolls were extracted. The journey to Jerusalem often meant crossing a Roman checkpoint — ka-ching! Since the trip was long and hard on the animals, it was better to travel light and buy the sacrifices in Jerusalem — ka-ching! You can’t use pagan Roman coins for that sort of thing, of course, so off to the money-changers — ka-ching again. Tithes, offerings, sacrifices, festivals, Rome got her cut — ka-ching, ka-ching, ka-ching, ka-ching, ka-ching. In fact, that’s the only reason there even was a temple or a King Herod. Rome would have long ago plundered it and killed him, except you don’t kill the goose that lays the golden eggs.

If the temple was the bridge between heaven and earth, Herod was the troll who lived under the bridge. Every pilgrim was forced to pay the toll. That’s what kept Herod in power: no ka-ching, no king. Ordinary Jews hated the regime, and the anger was boiling over, but Herod didn’t care what they thought; he had Rome on his side.

Into this world steps the young son of a Galilean entrepreneur. Joseph was a tekton , a skilled contractor. His adopted son, Jesus, was a rabbi, who gathered around him a small group of apprentices (mathetai , disciples) and set off for Jerusalem. Along the way he said and did things that implied that the temple was losing its status as the exclusive provider of access to the presence of God. Most Jews had already come to similar conclusions. They knew the Temple was corrupt, and turned to small-group Torah study as an alternative. Jesus adopted and intensified this new worship model. He created a network of small, nimble, and self-replicating clusters of people who could study and pray together and care for the poor. In his words: “Wherever two or more are gathered in my name, I am there in the midst of them.” This threatened the Templar monopoly.

The Temple hierarchy was enraged by this. Their livelihood was at risk. Eventually Jesus went a step farther and staged a protest in which he overturned the foreign-exchange tables at the Temple where Roman coins were swapped for Jewish ones. The Temple was forced to shut down. That was the last straw. Jesus had demonstrated in a graphic, physical way that the Temple really did run on money. Even worse, he had demonstrated that during the time that The Temple, Inc. ceased to function the world still rolled along just fine without it.
Such knowledge could destabilize the entire world. Palestine was ungovernable without the Herodian Templar system, and an ungovernable Palestine meant the gold would cease to flow to Rome. It also meant the grain would cease to cross the Holy Land. As our tanks and ships run on oil, their horses and galley slaves ran on grain.

The Temple bureaucrats used their superior war chest to pay activists to call for Jesus’ execution, and even to bribe witnesses. The Roman governor, Pontius Pilate, knew how to keep his job in middle management — keep the money flowing to Rome. That meant killing Jesus.
Jesus was a politically sophisticated man. He knew what was coming.

He faced the executioners bravely. He accepted, even embraced his death, and overcame it. By doing this he took the stinger out of Jerusalem and Rome. Behind all the taxes and tolls, price controls, and monopolies, and behind the governors and tetrarchs and consuls and emperors, lurked a tax-hungry greed, and the greed was backed up by the threat of death. The emperor’s colossal ego was fed by the people of Rome; the Romans were fed by the bread and circuses; the bread and circuses were fed by the armies; the armies fed on the captive peoples, and the captive peoples who didn’t like it were fed to the lions, or (even worse) the crucifix.

Such it has always been. When tyrants rule, money flows uphill and pain flows down. At the top is always a Caesar (or his etymological cousins, a Kaiser or a Czar). In the modern age, they usually make a hypocritical nod to democracy by calling themselves “President,” but the suffix “for life” tells us what’s really going on. At the bottom is the enemy of the state and what awaits him is a cross, or a gas chamber, perhaps a syringe filled with poison, or the observation section of a rape room and then a trip to the paper shredder. Every tyrant rules the same way: through threat of torture, humiliation, and death.

But when Jesus said, “Go ahead, do your worst,” and, as his early followers testified, overcame death, he ripped the stinger out, rendering the whole wasp twitching and dying from tip to tail. When his followers chose the cross as their symbol, they seemed to be turning “the world upside down,” but they weren’t; they were turning the upside-down world, finally, right-side-up. To get the flavor, imagine a revolutionary-era Frenchman displaying a tiny replica of the guillotine, or modern Iraqis wearing little rape-room replicas around their necks, or industrial paper shredders. Imagine Russian dissidents making the sign of the syringe, or think of Holocaust survivors who display their tattooed identification numbers with pride instead of shame. This is what the early followers of Jesus did with the Roman cross.

Yes, Rome continued to plunder and murder for a time, but Jesus’ peaceful army grew. The empire tried to wipe them out, but the movement grew faster than Rome could kill. The Caesars gradually lost their grip on the world. Jesus’ new model survived, then prevailed and eventually spread. One by one it has been wiping the little Caesars from the face of the earth in a gale of creative destruction.

The gale blows still, Messrs. Putin, Kim Jong Il, and Ahmadinejad. The gale blows still, Raul, Hugo, Mugabe. House of Saud, the gale blows still.

By Jerry Bowyer in Crosswalker.com

In the biblical descriptions of the Easter event, the story moves straight from Good Friday to Easter Sunday. An entire day of grief, devastation and fear lies unspoken between the end of one paragraph, where Jesus is buried, and the beginning of the next, his resurrection two days later. Perhaps it was simply that there were no words to do justice to the empty day in the middle. We can only imagine that, for the followers of Jesus, it must have been the emptiest, most shattering experience they could ever encounter — a metaphorical hell. Tradition tells us that Jesus was in the real one.

The Christian church doesn’t worship on Easter Saturday — as God is dead, there is nothing left to worship. It gives the day over to the hardware shops and the football. But if any day in the Christian calendar resonates with the fear, sadness and desperation that so much of the world lives with at every moment, it has to be yesterday.

If we needed evidence that the world is living through a long Easter Saturday, we don’t need to look any further than the newspaper headlines last week. It’s ironic that while many churches have been preparing for Holy Week and Easter, telling a story of sacrifice and salvation that happened 2000 years ago, a holy week of another kind has been unfolding in Tibet. We heard stories last week of monks and students who have stood against injustice and oppression, even though for many it has led to their deaths. They join a long line of people through history who have given everything they have for freedom, sometimes in the name of God, and sometimes in the name of life. Occasionally, the everything they have given has been enough to change the world. Often it hasn’t. It’s difficult to imagine greater courage or faith.

For the first time in years, hope has political currency around the world. It’s defining the current US election, in stark contrast to previous elections, where platforms of fear and terror have been certain vote-winners. For the first time ever, part of me wishes I lived in the US so I could vote for hope, too. It’s seductive, we all want to join its bandwagon. It’s tempting to think that if the world is speaking of hope, then everything just might change.

British guerilla graffiti artist Banksy visited the segregation wall that separates Palestine from Israel a few years ago. In his typically subversive style, he stencilled images on to the grey concrete wall: startling vistas of tropical islands, pictures of plush armchairs seated by windows that overlooked snow-capped mountains, a silhouette of a girl holding a bunch of balloons that were carrying her to freedom above the wall. He painted an alternative world of hope and liberation on to the concrete reality of conflict and despair. As he was working, an old Palestinian man approached him, and they had this conversation:

Old man: “You paint the wall, you make it look beautiful.”

Banksy: “Thanks.”

Old Man: “We don’t want it to be beautiful. We hate this wall, go home.”

Our human inclination, when we come face to face with despair on a personal or global scale, is to paint over it with easy answers, and to think that because we can only see the paint, the concrete reality behind it no longer exists. It’s almost impossible to sit in the great chasm of the world’s Easter Saturday and not fill it with glib promises and wishful thinking, to layer a resurrection story on top of it. We depend on the promise of a happy ending, but when we realise that there are some stories for which there is no ending, our hope crumbles.

It sounds cynical to assume that there won’t always be a happy ending but, if that’s the case, Jesus was the ultimate cynic. “The poor will be with you always,” he said, and then he continued to fight the systems that oppressed the poor all the way to his death.

The hope that Jesus died for should only be defined by its most despairing and cynical audience: the widow and the orphan, the betrayed and the betrayer. Their hope isn’t in the world being fixed, it’s in surviving the night.

“Hope begins in the dark,” says author Anne Lamott. That’s the miracle that Christians believe was made real through the resurrection, and a truth that has been proven through history. We can’t talk ourselves or anyone else into having hope. We get there only by turning up in the darkness and doing the right thing. By choosing and honouring justice and love every time, hope has a chance to be born.

There are a few words that should always be accompanied by official warnings, if only because their misuse causes so much damage. Love is one of them, hope another. But if we are going to vote for hope, we have to be willing to do more than simply paint pictures onto concrete walls. The only way the world can survive this Easter Saturday is if we have the courage and faith it takes to wait with those who are living in hell, even if there is no certainty that they or we will survive. It seems even God knows that there is no other way.

in theage.com.au
Cheryl Lawrie is a Melbourne writer.

J E S U S

had no servants, yet they called Him

M a s t e r.

Had no degree, yet they called Him

T e a c h e r .

Had no medicines, yet they called Him

H e a l e r.

He had no army, yet

Kings Feared Him .

He won no military battles, yet

He Conquered the World.

He committed no crime, yet they crucified Him.

He was buried in a tomb, yet

He lives today.

I feel honored to serve such a Leader who loves us!

AND HE IS COMING AGAIN!!!!

Prepare ye the way of the Lord. Praise the Lord!

We wish you the blessings of our Lord´s Holy Passion and of His Glorious Resurrection

____________________________________________

Sent in by: fr. Vincenzo Tuccillo KCT
Luogotenete Balivato Magna Grecia
Priorato Generale d’Italia OSMTJ-OSMTHU

The sufferings of Our Lord, which culminated in His death upon the cross, seem to have been conceived of as one inseparable whole from a very early period. Even in the Acts of the Apostles (i, 3) St. Luke speaks of those to whom Christ “shewed himself alive after his passion” (meta to mathein autou). In the Vulgate this has been rendered post passionem suam, and not only the Reims Testament but the Anglican Authorized and Revised Versions, as well as the medieval English translation attributed to Wyclif, have retained the word “passion” in English. Passio also meets us in the same sense in other early writings (e.g. Tertullian, “Adv. Marcion.”, IV, 40) and the word was clearly in common use in the middle of the third century, as in Cyprian, Novatian, and Commodian. The last named writes:

“Hoc Deus hortatur, hoc lex, hoc passio Christi
Ut resurrecturos nos credamus in novo sæclo.”

St. Paul declared, and we require no further evidence to convince us that he spoke truly, that Christ crucified was “unto the Jews indeed a stumbling-block, and unto the Gentiles foolishness” (1 Corinthians 1:23). The shock to Pagan feeling, caused by the ignominy of Christ’s Passion and the seeming incompatibility of the Divine nature with a felon’s death, seems not to have been without its effect upon the thought of Christians themselves. Hence, no doubt, arose that prolific growth of heretical Gnostic or Docetic sects, which denied the reality of the man Jesus Christ or of His sufferings. Hence also came the tendency in the early Christian centuries to depict the countenance of the Saviour as youthful, fair, and radiant, the very antithesis of the vir dolorum familiar to a later age (cf. Weis Libersdorf, “Christus-und Apostel-bilder”, 31 sq.) and to dwell by preference not upon His sufferings but upon His works of mercifulness, as in the Good Shepherd motive, or upon His works of power, as in the raising of Lazarus or in the resurrection figured by the history of Jonas.

But while the existence of such a tendency to draw a veil over the physical side of the Passion may readily be admitted, it would be easy to exaggerate the effect produced upon Christian feeling in the early centuries by Pagan ways of thought. Harnack goes too far when he declares that the Death and Passion of Christ were regarded by the majority of the Greeks as too sacred a mystery to be made the subject of contemplation or speculation, and when he declares that the feeling of the early Greek Church is accurately represented in the following passage of Goethe: “We draw a veil over the sufferings of Christ, simply because we revere them so deeply. We hold if to be reprehensible presumption to play, and trifle with, and embellish those profound mysteries in which the Divine depths of suffering lie hidden, never to rest until even the noblest seems mean and tasteless” (Harnack, “History Of Dogma”, tr., III, 306; cf. J. Reil, “Die frühchristlichen Darstellungen der Kreuzigung Christi”, 5). On the other hand, while Harnack speaks with caution and restraint, other more popular writers give themselves to reckless generalizations such as may be illustrated by the following passage from Archdeacon Farrar: “The aspect”, he says, “in which the early Christians viewed the cross was that of triumph and exultation, never that of moaning and misery. It was the emblem of victory and of rapture, not of blood or of anguish.” (See “The Month”, May, 1895, 89.) Of course it is true that down to the fifth century the specimens of Christian art that have been preserved to us in the catacombs and elsewhere, exhibit no traces of any sort of representation of the crucifixion. Even the simple cross is rarely found before the time of Constantine (see CROSS), and when the figure of the Divine Victim comes to be indicated, it at first appears most commonly under some symbolical form, e.g. that of a lamb, and there is no attempt as a rule to represent the crucifixion realistically. Again, the Christian literature which has survived, whether Greek or Latin, does not dwell upon the details of the Passion or very frequently fall back upon the motive of our Saviour’s sufferings. The tragedy known as “Christus Patiens”, which is printed with the works of St. Gregory Nazianzus and was formerly attributed to him, is almost certainly a work of much later date, probably not earlier than the eleventh century (see Krumbacher, “Byz. Lit.”, 746).

In spite of all this it would be rash to infer that the Passion was not a favourite subject of contemplation for Christian ascetics. To begin with, the Apostolical writings preserved in the New Testament are far from leaving the sufferings of Christ in the background as a motive of Christian endeavour; take, for instance, the words of St. Peter (1 Peter 2:19, 21, 23): “For this is thankworthy, if for conscience towards God, a man endure sorrows, suffering wrongfully”; “For unto this are you called: because Christ also suffered for us, leaving you an example that you should follow his steps”; “Who, when he was reviled, did not revile”, etc.; or again: “Christ therefore having suffered in the flesh, be you also armed with the same thought” (ibid., iv, 1). So St. Paul (Galatians 2:19): “with Christ I am nailed to the cross. And I live, now not I; but Christ liveth in me”; and (ibid., v, 24): “they that are Christ’s, have crucified their flesh, with the vices and concupiscences” (cf. Colossians 1:24); and perhaps most strikingly of all (Galatians 6:14): “God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world.” Seeing the great influence that the New Testament exercised from a very early period upon the leaders of Christian thought, it is impossible to believe that such passages did not leave their mark upon the devotional practice of the West, though it is easy to discover plausible reasons why this spirit should not have displayed itself more conspicuously in literature. It certainly manifested itself in the devotion of the martyrs who died in imitation of their Master, and in the spirit of martyrdom that characterized the early Church.

Further, we do actually find in such an Apostolic Father as St. Ignatius of Antioch, who, though a Syrian by birth, wrote in Greek and was in touch with Greek culture, a very continuous and practical remembrance of the Passion. After expressing in his letter to the Romans (cc. iv, ix) his desire to be martyred, and by enduring many forms of suffering to prove himself the true disciple of Jesus Christ, the saint continues: “Him I seek who dies on our behalf; Him I desire who rose again for our sake. The pangs of a new birth are upon me. Suffer me to receive the pure light. When I am come thither then shall I be a man. Permit me to be an imitator of the Passion of my God. If any man hath Him within himself, let him understand what I desire, and let him have fellow-feeling with me, for he knoweth the things which straiten me.” And again he says in his letter to the Smyrnæans (c. iv): “near to the sword, near to God (i.e. Jesus Christ), in company with wild beasts, in company with God. Only let it be in the name of Jesus Christ. So that we may suffer together with Him” (eis to sympathein auto).

Moreover, taking the Syrian Church in general — and rich as it was in the traditions of Jerusalem it was far from being an uninfluential part of Christendom — we do find a pronounced and even emotional form of devotion to the Passion established at an early period. Already in the second century a fragment preserved to us of St. Melito of Sardis speaks as Father Faber might have spoken in modern times. Apostrophising the people of Israel, he says: “Thou slewest thy Lord and He was lifted up upon a tree and a tablet was fixed up to denote who He was that was put to death — And who was this? — Listen while ye tremble: — He on whose account the earth quaked; He that suspended the earth was hanged up; He that fixed the heavens was fixed with nails; He that supported the earth was supported upon a tree; the Lord was exposed to ignominy with a naked body; God put to death; the King of Israel slain by an Israelitish right hand. Ah! the fresh wickedness of the fresh murder! The Lord was exposed with a naked body, He was not deemed worthy even of covering, but in order that He might not be seen, the lights were turned away, and the day became dark because they were slaying God, who was naked upon the tree” (Cureton, “Spicilegium Syriacum”, 55).

No doubt the Syrian and Jewish temperament was an emotional temperament, and the tone of their literature may often remind us of the Celtic. But in any case it is certain that a most realistic presentation of Our Lord’s sufferings found favour with the Fathers of the Syrian Church apparently from the beginning. It would be easy to make long quotations of this kind from the works of St. Ephraem, St. Isaac of Antioch, and St. James of Sarugh. Zingerle in the “Theologische Quartalschrift” (1870 and 1871) has collected many of the most striking passages from the last two writers. In all this literature we find a rather turgid Oriental imagination embroidering almost every detail of the history of the Passion. Christ’s elevation upon the cross is likened by Isaac of Antioch to the action of the stork, which builds its nest upon the treetops to be safe from the insidious approach of the snake; while the crown of thorns suggests to him a wall with which the safe asylum of that nest is surrounded, protecting all the children of God who are gathered in the nest from the talons of the hawk or other winged foes (Zingerle, ibid., 1870, 108). Moreover St. Ephraem who wrote in the last quarter of the fourth century, is earlier in date and even more copious and realistic in his minute study of the physical details of the Passion. It is difficult to convey in a short quotation any true impression of the effect produced by the long-sustained note of lamentation, in which the orator and poet follows up his theme. In the Hymns on the Passion (”Ephraem Syri Hymni et Sermones,” ed. Lamy, I) the writer moves like a devout pilgrim from scene to scene, and from object to object, finding everywhere new motives for tenderness and compassion, while the seven “Sermons for Holy Week” might both for their spirit and treatment have been penned by any medieval mystic. “Glory be to Him, how much he suffered!” is an exclamation which bursts from the preacher’s lips from time to time. To illustrate the general tone, the following passage from a description of the scourging must suffice:

“After many vehement outcries against Pilate, the all-mighty One was scourged like the meanest criminal. Surely there must have been commotion and horror at the sight. Let the heavens and earth stand awestruck to behold Him who swayeth the rod of fire, Himself smitten with scourges, to behold Him who spread over the earth the veil of the skies and who set fast the foundations of the mountains, who poised the earth over the waters and sent down the blazing lightning-flash, now beaten by infamous wretches over a stone pillar that His own word had created. They, indeed, stretched out His limbs and outraged Him with mockeries. A man whom He had formed wielded the scourge. He who sustains all creatures with His might submitted His back to their stripes; He who is the Father’s right arm yielded His own arms to be extended. The pillar of ignominy was embraced by Him who bears up and sustains the heaven and the earth in all their splendour” (Lamy, I, 511 sq.). The same strain is continued over several pages, and amongst other quaint fancies St. Ephraem remarks: “The very column must have quivered as if it were alive, the cold stone must have felt that the Master was bound to it who had given it its being. The column shuddered knowing that the Lord of all creatures was being scourged”. And he adds, as a marvel, witnessed even in his own day, that the “column had contracted with fear beneath the Body of Christ”.

In the devotional atmosphere represented by such contemplations as these, it is easy to comprehend the scenes of touching emotion depicted by the pilgrim lady of Galicia who visited Jerusalem (if Dr. Meester’s protest may be safely neglected) towards the end of the fourth century. At Gethsemane she describes how “that passage of the Gospel is read where the Lord was apprehended, and when this passage has been read there is such a moaning and groaning of all the people, with weeping that the groans can be hear almost at the city. While during the three hours’ ceremony on Good Friday from midday onwards we are told: “At the several lections and prayers there is such emotion displayed and lamentation of all the people as is wonderful to hear. For there is no one, great or small, who does not weep on that day during those three hours, in a way that cannot be imagined, that the Lord should have suffered such things for us” (Peregrinatio Sylviæ in “Itinera Hierosolymitana”, ed. Geyer, 87, 89). It is difficult not to suppose that this example of the manner of honouring Our Saviour’s Passion, which was traditional in the very scenes of those sufferings, did not produce a notable impression upon Western Europe. The lady from Galicia, whether we call her Sylvia, Ætheria, or Egeria, was but one of the vast crowd of pilgrims who streamed to Jerusalem from all parts of the world. The tone of St. Jerome (see for instance the letters of Paula and Eustochium to Marcella in A.D. 386; P.L., XXII, 491) is similar, and St. Jerome’s words penetrated wherever the Latin language was spoken. An early Christian prayer, reproduced by Wessely (Les plus anciens mon. de Chris., 206), shows the same spirit.

We can hardly doubt that soon after the relics of the True Cross had been carried by devout worshippers into all Christian lands (we know the fact not only from the statement of St. Cyril of Jerusalem himself but also from inscriptions found in North Africa only a little later in date) that some ceremonial analogous to our modern “adoration” of the Cross upon Good Friday was introduced, in imitation of the similar veneration paid to the relic of the True Cross at Jerusalem. It was at this time too that the figure of the Crucified began to be depicted in Christian art, though for many centuries any attempt at a realistic presentment of the sufferings of Christ was almost unknown. Even in Gregory of Tours (De Gloria Mart.) a picture of Christ upon the cross seems to be treated as something of a novelty. Still such hymns as the “Pange lingua gloriosi prœlium certaminis”, and the “Vexilla regis”, both by Venantius Fortunatus (c. 570), clearly mark a growing tendency to dwell upon the Passion as a separate object of contemplation. The more or less dramatic recital of the Passion by three deacons representing the “Chronista”, “Christus”, and “Synagoga”, in the Office of Holy Week probably originated at the same period, and not many centuries later we begin to find the narratives of the Passion in the Four Evangelists copied separately into books of devotion. This, for example, is the case in the ninth-century English collection known as “the Book of Cerne”. An eighth century collection of devotions (manuscript Harley 2965) contains pages connected with the incidents of the Passion. In the tenth century the Cursus of the Holy Cross was added to the monastic Office (see Bishop, “Origin of the Prymer”, p. xxvii, n.).

Still more striking in its revelation of the developments of devotional imagination is the existence of such a vernacular poem as Cynewulf’s “Dream of the Rood”, in which the tree of the cross is conceived of as telling its own story. A portion of this Anglo-Saxon poem still stands engraved in runic letters upon the celebrated Ruthwell Cross in Dumfriesshire, Scotland. The italicized lines in the following represent portions of the poem which can still be read upon the stone:

I had power all
his foes to fell,
but yet I stood fast.
Then the young hero prepared himself,
That was Almighty God,
Strong and firm of mood,
he mounted the lofty cross
courageously in the sight of many,
when he willed to redeem mankind.
I trembled when the hero embraced me,
yet dared I not bow down to earth,
fall to the bosom of the ground,
but I was compelled to stand fast,
a cross was I reared,
I raised the powerful King
The lord of the heavens,
I dared not fall down.
They pierced me with dark nails,
on me are the wounds visible.

 Still it was not until the time of St. Bernard and St. Francis of Assisi that the full developments of Christian devotion to the Passion were reached. It seems highly probable that this was an indirect result of the preaching of the Crusades, and the consequent awakening of the minds of the faithful to a deeper realization of all the sacred memories represented by Calvary and the Holy Sepulchre. When Jerusalem was recaptured by the Saracens in 1187, worthy Abbot Samson of Bury St. Edmunds was so deeply moved that he put on haircloth and renounced flesh meat from that day forth — and this was not a solitary case, as the enthusiasm evoked by the Crusades conclusively shows.

Under any circumstances it is noteworthy that the first recorded instance of stigmata (if we leave out of account the doubtful case of St. Paul) was that of St. Francis of Assisi. Since his time there have been over 320 similar manifestations which have reasonable claims to be considered genuine (Poulain, “Graces of Interior Prayer”, tr., 175). Whether we regard these as being wholly supernatural or partly natural in their origin, the comparative frequency of the phenomenon seems to point to a new attitude of Catholic mysticism in regard to the Passion of Christ, which has only established itself since the beginning of the thirteenth century. The testimony of art points to a similar conclusion. It was only at about this same period that realistic and sometimes extravagantly contorted crucifixes met with any general favour. The people, of course, lagged far behind the mystics and the religious orders, but they followed in their wake; and in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries we have innumerable illustrations of the adoption by the laity of new practices of piety to honour Our Lord’s Passion. One of the most fruitful and practical was that type of spiritual pilgrimage to the Holy Places of Jerusalem, which eventually crystalized into what is now known to us as the “Way of the Cross”. The “Seven Falls” and the “Seven Bloodsheddings” of Christ may be regarded as variants of this form of devotion. How truly genuine was the piety evoked in an actual pilgrimage to the Holy Land is made very clear, among other documents, by the narrative of the journeys of the Dominican Felix Fabri at the close of the fifteenth century, and the immense labour taken to obtain exact measurements shows how deeply men’s hearts were stirred by even a counterfeit pilgrimage. Equally to this period belong both the popularity of the Little Offices of the Cross and “De Passione”, which are found in so many of the Horæ, manuscript and printed, and also the introduction of new Masses in honour of the Passion, such for example as those which are now almost universally celebrated upon the Fridays of Lent. Lastly, an inspection of the prayer-books compiled towards the close of the Middle Ages for the use of the laity, such as the “Horæ Beatæ Mariæ Virginis”, the “Hortulus Animæ”, the “Paradisus Animæ” etc., shows the existence of an immense number of prayers either connected with incidents in the Passion or addressed to Jesus Christ upon the Cross. The best known of these perhaps were the fifteen prayers attributed to St. Bridget, and described most commonly in English as “the Fifteen O’s”, from the exclamation with which each began.

In modern times a vast literature, and also a hymnology, has grown up relating directly to the Passion of Christ. Many of the innumerable works produced in the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries have now been completely forgotten, though some books like the medieval “Life of Christ” by the Carthusian Ludolphus of Saxony, the “Sufferings of Christ” by Father Thomas of Jesus, the Carmelite Guevara’s “Mount of Calvary”, or “The Passion of Our Lord” by Father de La Palma, S.J., are still read. Though such writers as Justus Lipsius and Father Gretser, S.J., at the end of the sixteenth century, and Dom Calmet, O.S.B., in the eighteenth, did much to illustrate the history of the Passion from historical sources, the general tendency of all devotional literature was to ignore such means of information as were provided by archæology and science, and to turn rather to the revelations of the mystics to supplement the Gospel records.

Amongst these, the Revelations of St. Bridget of Sweden, of Maria Agreda, of Marina de Escobar and, in comparatively recent times, of Anne Catherine Emmerich are the most famous. Within the last fifty years, however, there has been a reaction against this procedure, a reaction due probably to the fact that so many of these revelations plainly contradict each other, for example on the question whether the right or left shoulder of Our Lord was wounded by the weight of the cross, or whether Our Saviour was nailed to the cross standing or lying. In the best modern lives of Our Saviour, such as those of Didon, Fouard, and Le Camus, every use is made of subsidiary sources of information, not neglecting even the Talmud. The work of Père Ollivier, “The Passion” (tr., 1905), follows the same course, but in many widely-read devotional works upon this subject, for example: Faber, “The Foot of the Cross”; Gallwey, “The Watches of the Passion”; Coleridge, “Passiontide” etc.; Groenings, “Hist. of the Passion” (Eng. tr); Belser, D’Gesch. d. Leidens d. Hernn; Grimm, “Leidengeschichte Christi”, the writers seem to have judged that historical or critical research was inconsistent with the ascetical purpose of their works.
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Written by Herbert Thurston. Transcribed by Douglas J. Potter. Dedicated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus Christ - The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume XI. Published 1911. New York: Robert Appleton Company.

Wearing a gray sports coat, necktie and business slacks, Andrew Linnell looked every bit the 21st century businessman that he is.

However, standing before a handful of people inside an auditorium in the Marlborough Public Library, the EMC competitive business consultant was poised to tackle a topic usually reserved for men of a different cloth: the history and development of the Christian church.

The 58-year-old Hudson resident indulged in one of his intellectual passions: the Crusades-era monk-warriors known as the Knights Templar.

In the third of a series of lectures, Linnell spoke about a specific facet of the much-mythologized group: Templar motifs represented in the art of the 15th century Florence.

To give his audience a point of reference, he first debriefed them on several hundred years of European and Middle Eastern history.

The information flew fast and furiously.

Linnell touched upon the Catholic Church’s violent opposition to views deemed to be heretical, such as gnosticism. He talked about the importance of church relics such as the Ark of the Covenant, the significance of zodiac signs in Templar history, the exile of the followers of Aristotle, the rise of Islam, and the fall of Persia. He discussed the sacking of Constantinople, which he said marked the beginning of the downfall of the Knights Templar.

He stopped briefly to field a question regarding the political ramifications of Charlemagne’s treatment of Muslims.

Ultimately it is the discrepancies between the church of centuries past and modern day Christian practices that fuel his curiosity and drives his research, he said. Linnell, who has a master’s degree in computer engineering from Michigan, at one time took a sabbatical for several months from his job to scratch his history itch at Emerson College in England.

“It can’t possibly be the same Christianity that spread so quickly throughout the world,” he said. “I’ve always been fascinated. I ask how is it that Christianity spread?”

The Knights Templar, said Linnell, played an important role in that globalization.

“When they came into town, people could just feel their presence; they’d come out and gawk,” he said.

It was this group - a secret society often shrouded in mystery - that brought the idea of baptism as a form of initiation back from the Middle East, said Linnell.

“Cultural evolution always flows east to west,” he said.

The Templars, said Linnell, were also the first international bankers, making travel from Europe to the Middle East less dangerous and more fiscally prudent.

As the son of an astronomer, whose family included several ministers, Linnell said he has always been interested in the sometimes adversarial relationship of science and religion.

“There was always this great battle between science and religion growing up,” he said.

(Dan McDonald can be reached at 508-490-7475 or dmcdonal@cnc.com.)

Pope Benedict XVI opened Holy Week at the Vatican with the traditional Palm Sunday procession and Mass in St. Peter’s Square on March 16.

About 50,000 people attended the Eucharistic celebration. Most were young people who were observing World Youth Day in the Rome diocese, preparing for the worldwide celebration that will be held in Sydney, Australia in July.

In his homily during the Mass, Pope Benedict recalled that after his entry into Jerusalem, Jesus found the Temple cluttered with traders busy with various money-making schemes. That bit of Gospel history should cause Christians today to pause and ask themselves whether our faith is “open and pure enough,” the Pope remarked. Non-believers coming into Christian churches should be able to “see the light of the one God,” rather than be distracted, he said.

The Pope prodded the faithful to examine their consciences particularly with respect to financial affairs, recognizing that “greed is idolatry.” Like the Jewish worshippers at the time of Christ, he said, we should notice how “in various ways we actually let idols enter the worth of our faith.”

Holy Week gives the Church a fresh opportunity for purification, the Pope said. After driving away the money-changers, he said, in their place “Christ put his own healing goodness. This is the true purification of the Temple.” Referring back to Christ’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem, the Pope took note that Jesus was always especially anxious to embrace children. Like those children, eager for Christ’s touch, “we must abandon the pride that blineds us, that pushes us away from God as if He were our competitor,” the Pope said.

In an unprecedented move an Englishman has been elected for the second time running as Grand Master of the Knights of Malta, the Roman Catholic order which traces its origins to the Crusades nearly a thousand years ago.

Fra Matthew Festing OBE, 58, an art expert and former army officer who leads the order in Britain as Grand Prior and is regarded as a forward looking reformer, was chosen today. The secret ballot took place today at a papal-style conclave in the Knights’ secluded headquarters on the Aventine Hill in Rome.

The Knight’s inner council, dressed in black robes embroidered with a white eight-pointed cross elected the new leader of the order of the Sovereign Military Hospitaller Order of St John of Jerusalem of Rhodes and of Malta, as the Knights are also known. The 79th Grand Master, with the title “His Most Eminent Highness”, takes over an organisation which is noted for its humanitarian work in conflict zones.

The order is also fighting a campaign to dispel the “myth” that it is rich, powerful and secretive. The election took only a few hours, seen as a sign of unanimity over reported plans to make the order more “open and transparent” and better known globally for its charitable and medical relief operations in 120 countries.

Grand Masters, like Popes, are elected for life. The move was announced after it had been approved by Pope Benedict XVI. It comes a month after the death of Fra’ Andrew Bertie, a former schoolmaster and descendant of the Stuart dynasty who was the first Englishman to lead the order and served as its Grand Master for nearly 20 years.

Under his leadership the order - which has the status of sovereign state, with its own passports and stamps - expanded its diplomatic relations from 49 to 100 countries. The order has 12,500 full members, of whom only 50 are “professed knights” who take monk-like vows of poverty, obedience and chastity.

The order said that the new Grand Master “affirms his resolve to continue the great work carried out by his predecessor”. It added: “Fra’ Matthew comes with a wide range of experience in Order affairs. He has been the Grand Prior of England since the Priory’s re-establishment in 1993, restored after an abeyance of 450 years. In this capacity, he has led missions of humanitarian aid to Kosovo, Serbia and Croatia after the recent disturbances in those countries, and with a large delegation from Britain he attends the Order’s annual pilgrimage to Lourdes with handicapped pilgrims.”

He was educated at Ampleforth and St John’s College Cambridge, where he read history. As a child he lived in Egypt and Singapore, where his father, Field Marshal Sir Francis Festing, Chief of the Imperial General Staff, was posted. He is also descended from Sir Adrian Fortescue, a Knight of Malta martyred in 1539.

Frà Matthew served in the Grenadier Guards and holds the rank of colonel in the Territorial Army. He was appointed OBE by the Queen and served as Deputy Lieutenant in Northumberland. He joined the order in 1977, taking solemn religious vows in 1991.

A spokeswoman for the order said he was noted for his “very British sense of humour” as well as his passion for the decorative arts and encyclopaedic knowledge of the history of the Order.

Fra Matthew has promoted the teaching of Christianity in schools, observing that “We live during a strange period in history when children are taught “Comparative Religion” and leave school believing it does not matter what religion you profess …..No wonder many young people are astonished that anyone could possibly have been prepared to suffer and die for the faith”.

At one time the order, which is predominantly male, was drawn from European aristocratic families. This has led conspiracy theorists to paint it as a rich and powerful cabal given to arcane rituals.

However Albrecht von Boeselager, the Grand Hospitaller in charge of the order’s humanitarian arm, said this was “completely untrue”. Charges that the order was conducting a secret “New Crusade” in Muslim countries and had sent mercenaries to fight in Iraq or Afghanistan were also “absolutely without foundation”.

He added: “This kind of talk endangers our volunteers in the Muslim world. In Bethlehem we have a maternity hospital which delivers 3000 babies year, 80% of them Musulim. We are Catholic but neutral”.

Winfried Henckel von Donnersmarck, a member of the order’s Sovereign Council, said the order had 80,000 volunteers and spent £500 million a year helping the world’s poor. “The only mystery is one of history. Any organisation is going to have mysteries if it has a thousand years of history behind it ” he said.

He said women played a growing role, with Noreen Falcone recently becoming the first woman head of the order’s national association in the US.

On its website the order’s British chapter notes that there were English knights from the time of the First Crusade, with two priories established in the twelfth century , one for England, Wales and Scotland, and another for Ireland. The Grand Priory of England “received a great accession of wealth and property when the Templars were suppressed in 1312.”

The order was disolved by Henry VIII in 1540, when several prominent Knights of Malta were executed. The Grand Priory’s ecclesiastical seat is the Church of St. John of Jerusalem in St. John’s Wood in London. It is separate from the Most Venerable Order of St. John of Jerusalem in the British Realm, founded in 1888, but the two bodies signed a co-operation agreement in 1963.

La fortaleza de Montségur es el paradigma histórico de la resistencia cátara, la herejía que arraigó en el sur de Francia durante la Edad Media. Actualmente, las ruinas de este castillo son la culminación de una ruta que parte de las tierras catalanas y que constituye una verdadera peregrinación por los santuarios y paisajes que fueron testigos de la Cruzada que los exterminó

El camino de los hombres buenos es un itinerario de 189 kilómetros que discurre por las rutas utilizadas por los cátaros durante los siglos XII y XIV, cuando huían de la persecución de la cruzada albigense y de la Inquisición. La senda empieza en el santuario de Queralt, en Berga, termina en el emblemático castillo de Montségur, en territorio francés, y puede efectuarse en coche, en bicicleta, a pie o a caballo. El Camí dels Bons Homes –como ha sido bautizado– ha sido institucionalizado como un sendero turístico de Gran Recorrido (GR 107) que atraviesa villas medievales, iglesias románicas y castillos. Además de su notorio interés histórico, la ruta nos permite contemplar paisajes encantadores, ya que transcurre por la zona protegida del Parque Natural del Cadí-Moixeró.

La religión de «los puros»

El catarismo es una doctrina procedente de una corriente de origen búlgaro conocida como bogomila. Se trata de una religión cristiana, con una interpretación muy peculiar de las Sagradas Escrituras, basada en el dualismo, que percibe la Creación como el escenario de una batalla entre los principios del Bien y del Mal. Esta doctrina arraigó con fuerza en el sur de Francia. Se dio a conocer en un concilio cátaro celebrado en la ciudad de Albí, en 1165, por lo que pronto sus seguidores fueron conocidos como albigenses. Sin embargo, ellos se consideraban cristianos u «hombres buenos». Predicaban a los humildes en plazas y mercados, aunque si eran invitados por los grandes señores para adoctrinar en sus casas a familiares y criados, aceptaban con agrado. Enseñaban el amor, la tolerancia y la libertad. Decían que Cristo no se encarnó entre los hombres, pues en sus concepciones la materia era una creación del Mal. Para los cátaros –término que según los expertos significa «puro»–, el Jesús que vieron los apóstoles y crucificaron los romanos no era sino una apariencia angelical engañosa. Pero el Cristo verdadero nunca fue crucificado ni sepultado. Estas ideas, como es lógico, les valieron la condena de Roma y una implacable persecución.

A principios del siglo XIII, el papa Inocencio III tomó conciencia del peligro que suponía para los intereses de la Iglesia la expansión de la herejía cátara en Occitania. Los intentos por convertir a los herejes habían sido vanos. Ante este fracaso y con el apoyo del rey Felipe Augusto de Francia –que deseaba hacerse con el territorio occitano a toda costa–, el Papa proclamó la «cruzada contra los albigenses».

Quienes formaran parte de la misma serían absueltos de sus pecados y se garantizaba la entrada al Paraíso de los fallecidos en combate. Los señores feudales que se sumaran a la iniciativa recibirían, además, las mismas prebendas que los cruzados en Tierra Santa. Sólo así se entiende la aparición de figuras como Simón de Montfort que escondían su desmesurada ambición bajo pretexto de erradicar la herejía.

Las tropas se organizaron bajo el mando del legado pontificio Arnaud Amaury y avanzaron hacia el sur por el valle del Ródano. El 22 de julio de 1209 los cruzados entraron en Béziers, matando a todos sus habitantes, sin distinción de creencias. Las crónicas aseguran que Amaury ordenó: «Matadlos a todos que Dios ya reconocerá a los suyos en el Cielo». Tras la masacre, los cruzados pusieron rumbo a Carcasona, donde resistía Raymond Roger Trencavel. Éste murió en prisión, después de ser desposeído de todas sus tierras. Más tarde caerían las plazas de Foix, Carbona y Comminges.

La muerte de Inocencio III hizo perder ímpetu a la cruzada y algunos de sus más importantes líderes abandonaron la empresa. Como consecuencia de este hecho el catarismo resurgió con fuerza. Pero en 1226, Luis VIII se lanzó a una nueva cruzada, dicen que influido por su esposa Blanca de Castilla, quien reivindicaba los territorios del sur para la Corona de Francia. Al parecer, sería ella quien habría instado al Papa Gregorio IX a crear la Inquisición. El terror se apoderó de Occitania. Los cátaros solicitaron protección a Raymond Péreilhe, señor de Montségur, y se prepararon para defenderse y resistir.

Esta legendaria fortaleza cayó en 1244. Y once años más tarde, en 1255, corrieron la misma suerte Quéribus y Puylaurens. La guerra había terminado con el extermino de la Iglesia de los hombres buenos, o «del amor», como también fue conocida. Con ella desapareció una tradición cristiana que llevaba su respeto a la vida hasta el extremo de abstenerse de matar o maltratar a los animales, y de cuya enorme piedad dejó testimonio incluso San Bernardo de Claraval, después de intentar en vano que renunciaran a su fe para abrazar el catolicismo.

El paisaje y su historia

Muchas de las rutas que hoy conforman el camino de «los hombres buenos» eran senderos de huida de los cátaros hacia Cataluña. Allí estuvo exiliado en 1240 Raymond Trencavel, un hijo de Raymond Roger que intentó en vano recuperar Carcasona. También fue utilizado por los tejedores cátaros y conocido como «la ruta de la lana», que llega hasta Sabadell o, más al sur, hasta Morella, en Castellón.

La senda señalizada hoy por el Consejo regulador del camí dels bons homes, entidad formada por diversos consejos locales, diputaciones y entidades culturales, discurre por las comarcas catalanas del Berguedà, la Cerdanya, el Alt Urgell, el Solsonés y el departamento francés del Ariège.

Parte del santuario de Queralt, en la cueva donde fue hallada su virgen románica presidida por una hermosa cruz cátara y, desde allí, se dirige a la pequeña localidad de Gòsol, en medio de un paisaje bellísimo presidido por el macizo del Pedraforca, un lugar mágico relacionado con la brujería catalana desde la Edad Media. Una vez en Gòsol podemos visitar las ruinas de su castillo o contemplar las tumbas del cementerio anejo, con numerosas cruces cátaras y templarias. Después recorreremos por carretera Gòsol, Saldes y Guardiola de Berguedà, hasta llegar a Bagá, en el límite norte de la provincia de Barcelona. Esta villa fue el feudo de los barones de Pinòs, señores de un extenso territorio que iba del Baridà y la Cerdanya hasta el Alt Berguedà. Algunos han relacionado a Galcerán de Pinòs con el fundador de los templarios Hugues de Payns, en una polémica que dura hasta nuestros días. En Bagà podemos visitar el centro medieval, el museo de los cátaros o la iglesia de San Esteban, donde se puede admirar una pequeña cruz bizantina del siglo X u XI, que fue llevada a Bagà por los cruzados. También cabe destacar la vidriera que representa «El rescate de las cien doncellas», concretamente el momento en que San Esteban libera a Galcerán de Pinòs de una prisión sarracena.

La ruta continúa por la comarca de la Cerdanya, a la que accederemos cruzando la sierra del Cadí por el Coll de Pendís, a 1764 metros de altitud y, desde allí, cruzaremos la frontera hasta Porté-Puymorens, L’Hospitalet y Ax les Thermes. En este punto ya estamos en el departamento francés del Ariège, donde nos aguardan impresionantes castillos, como Puylaurens que, junto a Quéribus, resistió hasta 1256.

Tras hacer una parada en el castillo de Puivert, escenario del film de Roman Polansky La novena puerta, y cuna de los trovadores occitanos, encaminamos nuestros pasos hacia la culminación de la ruta: Montségur.

El castillo de Montségur fue construido entre 1205 y 1211 en lo alto de una montaña extremadamente escarpada y de difícil acceso. Quienes lo «descubrieron», sin embargo, no fueron los cátaros. Desde tiempo inmemorial este lugar era considerado sagrado. Algunos autores, como el fallecido «papa cátaro» René Nelli, suponen que la fortificación fue erigida sobre un antiguo templo solar. La cima de este enorme bloque calcáreo se alza 1207 metros sobre el nivel del mar. El edificio está orientado astronómicamente. Nelli apunta el importante papel jugado por la figura del pentágono en la simbología cátara. Y lo cierto es que este castillo está construido sobre un plano pentagonal. Desde el interior, recuerda la forma de un gigantesco cofre. ¿Fue ésta la última morada del Grial, como algunos sostienen?

En cualquier caso, quienes asuman a pie los casi doscientos kilómetros del «peregrinaje cátaro», hallarán sin duda su particular Grial en el esfuerzo, la dedicación y la constancia, valores necesarios para llegar a cualquier Verdad trascendente.

The vaulted cellars of the Templarske Wine Company are located in the beautifully reconstructed buildings which were a former commandary of the Templar Knights back in the 13th Century. The Czech wine company uses the legendary Templar cross both as company name and emblem since their creation in 1992, although the cellars were never actually used as a winery back in that era. For the second year running, Templarske Wine company has won a prestigious SYBA “Packaging of the Year” Award for its emblematic packaging, developed in collaboration with O-I.

The range of containers combines nostalgic design with the latest trends, and includes traditional Bordeaux models with long neck and tall shoulders (two furthest bottles on right, above), and Bourgogne-inspired “vintage” models (centre and centre-left bottles), which already won the company a SYBA award in 2006. Completing the range, O-I has developed a prestigious tall, Catalan-inspired bottle with a modern flat finish and customized engraving, bearing the Company’s emblem, the “Templar’s Cross” proudly on its shoulders (far left bottle, above).

The new package is aimed at both the Horeca and retail segments. The bottles in this Templar range are available in number of shapes and colours: amber, dead leaf green and flint colours. Whilst the coloured tints are made locally at the Nove Sedlo plant in the Czech Republic, the flint bottles are produced in limited quantities nearby at an O-I facility in Germany.

Templar knights will be back in Hertford when a new pub opens on Monday, after a £3million revamp.

Herts-based pub chain JD Wetherspoon has spent the past 12 months converting the building in The Wash into the new-look pub, called The Six Templars.

The pub takes its name from the town’s strong connection with the Knights Templar, reputedly the custodians of the Holy Grail. When the order was forcibly disbanded in the early 1300s, a number were imprisoned in the nearby Hertford Castle.

But modern day Templar Ben Acheson, of Ware, wasn’t convinced about the combination of ‘Grail’ and ale. He told the Herald: “I’m not sure a restaurant or pub is the most appropriate acknowledgement. At least it’s an improvement on ‘Don’t mention the Temple’!”

He added: “You’re probably aware that the name of the pub was changed to The (Six) Templars from the Five Bishops because somebody within the Temple pointed out to Wetherspoons that the Templar heritage was much more relevant.

“But personally I question the wisdom. A library or church perhaps would have been more fitting.”

Pub manager Christina Venables, of Cheshunt, said: “I’m looking forward to welcoming customers into The Six Templars.

“I am confident that they will be impressed with the transformation of the building and that the pub will be a good addition to the town’s social scene.”

The pub will open from 9am to midnight Sundays to Thursdays, and 9am to 1am on Fridays and Saturdays.

The focal point of the cold, bare room is a stone table on which rests a plain cup held in a jewelled stand.

It seems ordinary, but it’s anything but. “This monastery was a resting place of the Holy Grail,” our guide Belen Bistue says casually. “It’s now in Valencia Cathedral; that is a replica.”

For anyone steeped in the many and varied legends of the Grail – the cup used by Christ at the Last Supper – it’s a momentous announcement. What’s more, there’s not a trace of doubt in Bistue’s voice, despite the fact that the Valencia Grail – a Middle Eastern chalice and jewelled medieval stand – is only one of several claimants in various parts of Europe.

Of them all, however, this particular Grail probably has the best provenance. It is believed to have been in Huesca Cathedral in about 553 AD, but following the Muslim invasion in the 8th century, was hidden away in various places in the region, including this remote monastery about an hour’s drive north of Huesca. San Juan de la Pena possessed the cup from about 1071 to 1372 when it was the medieval equivalent to a tourist attraction.

A major pilgrim route to Santiago de Compostela in northwest Spain runs through the area and pilgrims would stop at the monastery, hoping for a glimpse of the Holy Grail.

Built underneath a huge, overhanging rock, the monastery is high up in the mountains, and about 30 kilometres southwest of Jaca. The small lower church is the only part left of the original building – the monastery was founded in 920 – while on the second level there’s a pantheon with the tombs of Aragonese rulers such as Pedro I and Ramiro I. One of the monastery’s best features, however, is the lovely cloister, built in the 12th century.

Huesca Cathedral doesn’t capitalize on the Grail legend but does contain several items of interest, including a magnificent alabaster retable created by sculptor Damian Forment in the 16th century.

“It is the most famous thing we have in Huesca,” says local guide Ismael Navarro. It also has an impressive portico dominated by the Virgin Mary and with 14 stone figures either side of her.

Beneath her is a female sinner, identifiable by her long hair and exposed breast.

Entering the cathedral, there is (or so we were told) a sculpture high on top of one of the pillars showing a man and woman “misbehaving.” In what way, I can’t tell you – it’s impossible to make out any details with the naked eye.

The 11th century Church of San Pedro el Viejo – one of the oldest in Spain – is also thought to have housed the Grail for a while. It contains the tombs of Ramiro II (the Monk) as well as that of King Alfonso the Warrior, and also has a shivery little chapel specifically designed for exorcisms.

Best of all is its Romanesque cloister, with each of its wonderfully carved pillars showing what Navarro describes “the slippery slope of sex” – scene after scene of women tormented by sexual obsession, temptation, depravity and suffering. It’s strong stuff.

Talking of legends, a bloody drama orchestrated by Ramiro the Monk took place in the 12th century palace of the kings of Aragon, now the provincial museum.

Ramiro was being treated with contempt by the nobles, said Navarro. “He asked his spiritual master what to do about the rebels and his adviser didn’t say anything. He just went into a garden, took out a knife and cut the heads off cauliflowers.”

Ramiro got the message. He told the nobles that he wanted them to help him make a new bell and summoned them to a meeting. As soon as they arrived, Ramiro had their heads chopped off, then arranged all 12 of them in the shape of a bell.

The legend – of doubtful authenticity – is known as the Bell of Huesca. Today the room is used for weddings and other, more peaceful purposes.

In The Star

Rosslyn Chapel has chalked up a £1.35m surplus due to the stream of visitors who came to see the building in the wake of the Da Vinci Code film.

The 15th-century Scottish church, which featured in the controversial hit movie, saw the number of visitors climb from just 30,000 a year in 2000 to 120,000 in 2005/06 and 176,000 in 2006/07.

The cash is being ploughed into speeding up a planned £12.75m renovation of the building and a revamped visitor centre.

But the managers of the attraction, entrance to which costs £7 for adults and £5 for children, believe that Da Vinci Code fever has peaked and that annual visitor numbers are due to fall by about 20,000 a year.

They believe that the number of visitors in 2007/08 will fall to 155,000 as the effect of the film wears off – although numbers are still well above the annual target of 80,000.

Colin Glynne-Percy, the director of Rosslyn Chapel, said: “We think it’s clear now that the initial interest in the aftermath of the film has peaked. If you look at the figures for the August bank holiday, they were 31,000 in 2006 and 29,000 in 2007.

“We did achieve the aim of getting visitor numbers up and we want to make it an essential destination for visitors to Scotland.”

He explained the takings were being used to speed up a major series of works to the building.

Glynne-Percy said: “The money raised may only be used for the upkeep of the building. The renovations will be completed within five years. Without the extra money, they would have taken considerably longer. Several years longer.”

The chapel features in both the Da Vinci Code book and the film. It emerges in the film as the ultimate location of the Holy Grail.

Among Rosslyn’s many intricate carvings are a sequence of 213 cubes or boxes protruding from pillars and arches with a selection of patterns on them. It is unknown whether these have any particular meaning.

Many people have attempted to find information coded into them, but as yet no interpretation has proven conclusive.

By Murdo MacLeod