Templar Globe

VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Benedict XVI and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I renewed their appeals for

Christian unity on Sunday during a Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica.
Benedict led the ceremony alongside the leader of the world’s 250 million Orthodox Christians and expressed the “common hope of seeing the day of unity draw near.”

While acknowledging key differences, Benedict has made healing the 1,000-year-old rift with the Orthodox a priority of his papacy.

In his speech, Bartholomew said that dialogue between the two branches of Christianity is continuing, despite “numerous difficulties” and that he was praying for these obstacles to be overcome.

After centuries of moving apart, the two churches formally split in 1054 over several issues, including the primacy of the pope, devotional differences, and Latin demands for priestly celibacy as the Greek-influenced tradition permitted married clergy.

Relations remain tense over Orthodox charges of proselytizing and rival property claims in places such as Russia and eastern Europe. However, Benedict and Bartholomew have met several times in an effort to promote or to seek a reconciliation.

Benedict, the leader of the world’s 1 billion Roman Catholics, told the crowd that Christian unity is even more important in a world that is increasingly connected by technical means, but is unable to resolve its conflicts.

“In today’s world there are new instruments of unity which, however, also create new conflicts and give new strength to old ones,” he said.

“In the midst of this external unity, based on material goods, we have an even greater need for interior unity, which comes from the peace of God.”

The Mass marking the feast of St. Peter and St. Paul included readings from the Gospels in Latin and Greek by Catholic and Orthodox clerics. Benedict and Bartholomew also prayed together in Greek.

During the ceremony Benedict bestowed the pallium, or a woolen shawl, on 40 archbishops from around the world to symbolize their bond with the Vatican. One by one the archbishops, wearing crimson vestments, knelt before the pope to receive the shawl and the pontiff’s embrace.

After the Mass, Benedict and Bartholomew silently prayed together underneath the basilica at the tomb the faithful believe houses the remains of the apostle Peter.

The editor of the Templar Globe just found this interesting article that brings us the view of a Pakistan islamic journalist. To form a better view of the issued that are part ou our history we have to read both sides of the accounts.

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The Book and the Prophet they hold in such contempt are the only religious head and the book that glorify Jesus and Gospel. If Jesus commands the respect he has today it is owing to the declaration by Muahammad and the Quran that Jesus was a Miracle of God and his mother was pious and virgin when she gave birth to Jesus. If this was not the stand of Islam, Pope can very well understand what the majority of the world could have called Jesus as. But Islam gave Jesus his true place in the history of the world by describing him as Messenger and Word of God.

o The Bible advocates much greater violence against the detractors than the Quran The following verses are from the Bible, New International Version (NIV), 1984:

* Do not allow a sorceress to live. Anyone who has sexual relations with an animal must be put to death. Whoever sacrifices to any god other than the LORD must be destroyed. (Exodus 22:18-20)
* This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: ‘each man strap a sword to his side. Go back and forth through the camp from one end to the other, each killing his brother and friend and neighbour.’ The Levites did as Moses commanded and that day about three thousand of the people died. (Exodus 32:27-28 )
* The LORD said to Moses, ‘Take vengeance on the Midianites for the Israelites…. The Israelites captured the Midianite women and children and took all the Midianite herds, flocks and goods as plunder. They burned all the towns where the Midianites had settled, as well as all their camps…. (Moses ordered) “Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man. (Numbers 31: 1-18 )
* (Jesus said) “But those enemies of mine who did not want me to be king over them - bring them here and kill them in front of me. (Luke 19:27)
* He (Jesus) said to them, ‘But now if you have a purse, take it, and also a bag; and if you don’t have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one. (Luke 22:36 )

Christians who are always blaming Quran for asking Muslims to “kill the unbelievers” must stop this tirade, as Jesus asked for the “enemies” to be killed “in front of me.” The Old Testament is replete with the accounts of bloody battles that killed thousands of persons. In this context, following remarks from an article are important:

“Is Christianity only a religion of Peace and Love? I do not think that anyone can honestly and objectively examine American or European history and answer “yes” to that question. Christianity can encourage Peace and Love - but it certainly need not, and it quite often has done just the opposite. Although the people responsible for violence might have found a way to express their hatred without Christianity, it cannot be ignored that Christianity offers a convenient divine mandate for hatred and violent acts against a wide range of people………Violent inclinations in Christianity are apparent right from the beginning……The course of modernity has been one strewn with blood, bones, and bodies - much of which can be attributed to Christianity.” (Atheist.com)

In another article, “The Real History of the Crusades”, Thomas F. Madden, despite his huge defence of the crusades against Islam, admits:

“…I was frequently asked to comment on the fact that the Islamic world has a just grievance against the West. Doesn’t the present violence, they persisted, have its roots in the Crusades’ brutal and unprovoked attacks against a sophisticated and tolerant Muslim world? In other words, aren’t the Crusades really to blame?….. Ex-president Bill Clinton has also fingered the Crusades as the root cause of the present conflict. In a speech at Georgetown University, he recounted (and embellished) a massacre of Jews after the Crusader conquest of Jerusalem in 1099 and informed his audience that the episode was still bitterly remembered in the Middle East. (Why Islamist terrorists should be upset about the killing of Jews was not explained.) Clinton took a beating on the nation’s editorial pages for wanting so much to blame the United States that he was willing to reach back to the Middle Ages. Yet no one disputed the ex-president’s fundamental premise…… The Crusades are generally portrayed as a series of holy wars against Islam led by power-mad popes and fought by religious fanatics. They are supposed to have been the epitome of self-righteousness and intolerance, a black stain on the history of the Catholic Church in particular and Western civilisation in general. A breed of proto-imperialists, the Crusaders introduced Western aggression to the peaceful Middle East and then deformed the enlightened Muslim culture, leaving it in ruins. For variations on this theme, one need not look far. See, for example, Steven Runciman’s famous three-volume epic, History of the Crusades, or the BBC/A&E documentary, The Crusades, hosted by Terry Jones. Both are terrible history yet wonderfully entertaining.….The Crusades were wars, so it would be a mistake to characterise them as nothing but piety and good intentions. Like all warfare, the violence was brutal (although not as brutal as modern wars). There were mishaps, blunders, and crimes. These are usually well-remembered today. During the early days of the First Crusade in 1095, a ragtag band of Crusaders led by Count Emicho of Leiningen made its way down the Rhine, robbing and murdering all the Jews they could find. Without success, the local bishops attempted to stop the carnage. In the eyes of these warriors, the Jews, like the Muslims, were the enemies of Christ. Plundering and killing them, then, was no vice. Indeed, they believed it was a righteous deed, since the Jews’ money could be used to fund the Crusade to Jerusalem….. Jews perished during the Crusades, but the purpose of the Crusades was not to kill Jews”. He takes lot of pains in proving the better side of crusades, which of course is opposite to the analysis of most of the neutral historians. This is why he calls his analysis “the real history”. But the negative side of crusades is extremely ugly. Not only Muslims but Jews were also brutally massacred in the process. In the first Crusade, the Christian fighters, in order to avenge the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, massacred tens of thousands of innocent Jews, Muslims, and even Orthodox Christians who had the misfortune to dress or look like Muslims. On July 15, 1099, they reached Jerusalem where streets were drenched with the blood of Muslims and Jews. Those who survived were sold into slavery. In 1144, in the Second Crusade, the Jewish communities of Germany faced another slaughter in Jesus’ name. During the Third Crusade in 1170. Jews in York, Lynn, Norwich, Stamford, and other towns of England were massacred. In 1198, Pope Innocent III began the Fourth Crusade. He ordered Jews to wear badges to identify themselves, and then ordered them to be killed to atone for Jesus’ death. After the formal ending of Crusades, thousands of young Crusaders burned their way across Europe exterminating more than 150 Jewish communities. The worst victims were of course Muslims. In the First Crusade, nearly all of the Muslims inside Antioch. were killed by the merciless crusaders. . Then the crusaders attacked Marrat an-Nu’man where the crusaders (The Templars, known for their religiousness) slaughtered a hundred thousand people. The attack on Jerusalem witnessed the worst kind of brutalities that ever occurred before in the history. No Muslim was given mercy. Old, young, men, women and children were brutally massacred. The blooded flooded the streets, reaching as high as knees. Muslims were thrown from the tops and burnt. The crusaders mounted the Mount of Solomon and killed hundreds of thousands. In contrast when Salaadin recaptured Jerusalem, no Christian was harmed. Those who wanted to leave the city were allowed to do so; those who wanted to live were allowed to live by paying tribute. Those who could not pay tribute were condoned. The irony is that Crusaders themselves lost millions of lives in the fights; often Christens killed fellow Christians with the same brutality with which they massacred Muslims and Jews.”

Islam, Peace and Jihad

Peace” in Islam does not merely refer to the absence of war. It is a much more comprehensive term that includes peace at physical, mental, family and social (national and international) levels. This implies absence of all forms of diseases and weaknesses at individual level, and absence of all forms of mischief in society. The verses of the Holy Quran are full of messages that speak of tolerance, endurance and peace. Equally strong are messages against chaos, mischief, suppression and oppression. In fact when one goes through the Holy Book, one can easily feel the intensity with which Islam wants to achieve its aim of grand peace. True, in exceptional circumstances, it allows armed struggle, but it prefers to avoid violence. And whenever it allows violence, it is only aimed at preventing greater violence or widespread chaos. Let us examine the following verses:

· “..but if they cease, Let there be no hostility except to those who practise oppression.” (2:193)

· “Therefore if they withdraw from you but fight you not, and (instead) send you (Guarantees of) peace, then Allah hath opened no way for you (to war against them).” (4:90)

· “But if the enemy incline towards peace, do thou (also) incline towards peace, and trust in Allah.” (8:61)

· “……………with those Pagans with whom ye have entered into alliance and who have not subsequently failed you in aught, nor aided any one against you. So fulfil your engagements with them to the end of their term: for Allah loveth the righteous.” (9:4)

· “If one amongst the Pagans ask thee for asylum, grant it to him, so that he may hear the word of Allah and then escort him to where he can be secure. That is because they are men without knowledge.” (9:6)

· “Allah forbids you not, with regard to those who fight you not for (your) Faith nor drive you out of your homes, from dealing kindly and justly with them: for Allah loveth those who are just. Allah only forbids you, with regard to those who fight you for (your) Faith, and drive you out of your homes, and support (others) in driving you out, from turning to them (for friendship and protection). It is such as turn to them (in these circumstances), that do wrong.” (60:8-9)

· “Whenever two factions of believers fall out with one another, try to reconcile them. If one of them should oppress the other, then fight the one, which acts oppressively until they comply with God’s command. If they should comply, then patch things up again between them in all justice, and act fairly. God loves those who act fairly.” (49:9)

· “…and let not the hatred of others to you make you swerve to wrong and depart from justice. Be just: that is next to piety”(5:8 )

· “If they do come to thee, either judge between them, or decline to interfere. If thou decline, they cannot hurt thee in the least. If thou judge, judge in equity between them.” (5:42)

· “Verily, this brotherhood of yours is a single brotherhood, and I am your Lord and Cherisher.”(21:92)

· “Do no mischief on the earth, after it hath been set in order…”(7:56)

· “The blame is only against those who oppress men and wrong-doing and insolently transgress beyond bounds through the land…”(42:42)

· “And fear tumult or oppression, which affecteth not in particular (only) those of you who do wrong…”(8:25)

· “…………..if any one slew a person - unless it be for murder or for spreading mischief in the land - it would be as if he slew the whole people: and if any one saved a life, it would be as if he saved the life of the whole people.”(5:32)

The above verses clearly spell out the principles of Islam. Quran is categorical in its condemnation of those who directly or indirectly contribute to mischief, oppression and anarchy. These terms surely include terrorism. But at the same time they also include glorification and commercialisation of human weaknesses (commercialisation of sex, gambling, smoking and drinking) that lead to rise in the incidence of several diseases, disintegration of families, crimes and social tensions. Terrorism is to be defined in a way in which it includes all its ramifications. The world today tends to define it in a way that suits its interests. Terrorism must include anything that can lead to diseases, instability and chaos at individual, family and social level. The states that directly or indirectly support such activities are also to be confronted with. The punishment of such activities is in fact extremely severe in Islam:

“The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His Messenger, and strive with might and main for mischief through the land is: execution, or crucifixion, or the cutting off of hands and feet from opposite sides, or exile from the land: that is their disgrace in this world, and a heavy punishment is theirs in the Hereafter..” (5:33)

The term “Jihad” in Islam does not mean an armed fight, which at best is only a part of it. Jihad, in fact is an incessant struggle to spread what is good and uproot what is evil. The best Jihad, according to Islam is against one’s self. And when this definition is extended to a social level, it again means struggle against forces that exploit human weaknesses or oppress the weak and poor.

Islam is for peace. God clearly abhors mischief, and loves peace:

· Every time they kindle the fire of war, Allah doth extinguish it; but they (ever) strive to do mischief on earth. And Allah loveth not those who do mischief. (5:64)

· And We shall try you until We test those among you who strive their utmost and persevere in patience; and We shall try your reported (mettle). (47:31)

· …verily Allah loves those who act aright. (3:76)

· ..but do thou good, as Allah has been good to thee, and seek not (occasions for) mischief in the land: for Allah loves not those who do mischief. (28:77)

· Those who believe, and suffer exile and strive with might and main, in Allah’s cause, with their goods and their persons, have the highest rank in the sight of Allah. they are the people who will achieve (salvation). Their Lord doth give them glad tidings of a Mercy from Himself, of His good pleasure, and of gardens for them, wherein are delights that endure.. (

Thus Islam has a perfect, yet pragmatic approach towards establishing a lasting peace in society. In an effort to prove that Islam is for peace, some scholars tend to totally disregard any form of armed struggle. Islam does not merely ask its followers to engage themselves in a few rituals; it prepares them to establish a system and protect it. Every ideology and system takes all the necessary measures to protect it from external and internal mischief and to consolidate it. Islam is no exception and it has greater right to work in that direction because it aims to establish the rule of God, not an oligarchy. All ongoing struggles in the world cannot be equated with terrorism. To fight against the occupation by external forces, usurpers of land, tyrannical rulers, exploiters, forces of evils and oppressors cannot be regarded terrorism. To sacrifice one’s life in a bid to harm the enemies for a justified cause cannot be condemned as “suicide attacks”; any bombing that is for a justified cause and is aimed at justified targets must be termed sacrificial bombing. There are some Islamic scholars who argue that Jihad can be undertaken only by an Islamic state. They are awfully mistaken, playing in the hands of those who want to reserve all military options open for them including pre-emptive strikes and at the same time want Muslims to forego their right to fight altogether. If Muslims can fight only under the command of a state, it means they cannot fight against an occupying force and against a tyrannical ruler. If the government of a state is corrupt, anti-Islamic or oppressive, nobody can deny the people the right to organise into groups and campaign against it. However, deliberate killing of innocents cannot be regarded desirable even if it is in response to killing of innocents by a country or a group. Though Quran allows Muslims to transgress against the enemy if it transgresses against them, this is surely the last and not the first option. Furthermore, state terrorism and state-sponsored terrorism are much more dangerous than the terrorism of splinter groups. The so-called Islamic terrorism has caused much less damage and has taken much fewer lives than the state terrorism of the US and Israel and state sponsored terrorism of some other countries. What is the US action in Iraq if not the worst form of terrorism? What are Israel’s actions against Palestinians if not terrorism of the most abominable kind?

Another allegation that is labelled against Islam is that Quran calls for killing all the unbelievers. The protagonists of this thesis base their arguments on the verses that call for killing the Unbelievers, forgetting that these verses are war-time-injunctions. “Unbelievers” in these verses means only the unbelievers engaged in the combat. Refer to the verses quoted above that speak against compulsion in the religion, Thus the Holy Book states:

· “..but if they cease, Let there be no hostility except to those who practise oppression.” (2:193

· “Therefore if they withdraw from you but fight you not, and (instead) send you (Guarantees of) peace, then Allah hath opened no way for you (to war against them).” (4:90)

· “But if the enemy incline towards peace, do thou (also) incline towards peace, and trust in Allah.” (8:6 1)

It is clear also that the injunctions of Quran are almost similar in the case of fights between factions of Muslims. It asks its true followers to also fight those Muslims who are unjust.

Jihad in Islam is obligatory. It is an important constituent of the Islamic mission of universal peace and justice. It is in fact incumbent on all the human beings to engage in this mission. But for Muslims it is a divine duty. Jihad is meant for protecting the weak against the mighty; for alerting the forces of evil that their sordid adventures will not go unchallenged; for giving the oppressed sections a voice and wrecking the nerve-centres of the tyrants; and for giving the exploiters sleepless nights. Jihad prepares a person to sacrifice his possessions including his life if required for the cause of God. But Mujahids must clearly know that the objective of Jihad is not to bring certain persons to power, nor to bring theocracies to the whole world through sheer use of force. “Deen”, the system of God does not necessarily mean the establishment of a theocratic government through violent means; it means the rule of justice. Fighting is only the last but an open option in Jihad. If conditions are justifiable for fighting, it becomes obligatory; if conditions do not demand fighting, it becomes aggression. If its objectives are for the welfare of the masses it is desirable; if it is an excuse for selfish ends, it is an unparalleled sin. Jihad through peaceful means must always continue without halt; Jihad through arms must be an aberration. But once the conditions are justifiable, fighting must see no sympathy for the enemy; it must be given a crushing below. Fighting against the wicked is no violence; it is an exercise aimed at minimising violence. Killing bacteria and viruses through antibiotics and antiviral drugs is essential to maintain a healthy life. If microbes are not killed, they will kill the very person who provides them the food for their sustenance.

Islam however does not accept that “all is fair in love and war”. Even in war, all Islamic conditions must be followed in letter and spirit. As soon as the conditions are bright for an honourable settlement, fighting must be stopped without delay; for the ultimate objective is not the subjugation of the enemy but an end to mischief, anarchy, chaos and oppression. The powers that dominate do always try to take the right to fight away from others, so that they can continue to hold reins. They amass massive stocks of deadly weapons, but deny others the right to possess them. They do not hesitate a second to attack or invade the positions of their challengers, but make too much fuss of even the smallest acts of armed resistance. They kill innocents in big numbers and label it as ‘collateral damage’; and lambaste their opponents, through the weapons of words and war, if their actions cause the deaths of even a handful of innocents.

Several thinkers have tried to prove that the expansion of Islamic State after its establishment at Medina was achieved through the use of force. The hawks within the Islamic community present this as a ground for their aggressive intents; the hawks outside Islam use this as an evidence of the religion’s expansionist designs and support for violence. The countries were given the option, they argue, to either accept the supremacy of Islamic State or face war. This is true that several Muslim rulers used such tactics. But there was nothing extraordinary about this strategy, for it had been an inveterate practice throughout the world at that time, before and even for centuries after that. There were no clear injunctions in Quran directing Muslims to expand the borders of their empire. What the Caliphs did was only in keeping with the established norm. At that time there was no UN charter in force, and no international treaty bound the states to certain international obligations. All the powerful rulers in that era used to demand allegiance from the smaller states, and this had been happening throughout the ages in Europe, Asia and Africa. Britain, Russia, France and China—all had been using force to expand their influences, till very recently. Islamic rulers must however be credited for their humanistic approach to their political consolidation. They did not usuallyin general followed. Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) gave clear guidelines regarding conduct during combat. He prohibited Muslim soldiers from killing women, children and the elderly, or cut a palm tree. He advised them, “… do not betray, do not be excessive, do not kill a new-born child.” Another tradition of the Prophet states, “Whoever has killed a person having a treaty with Muslims shall not smell the fragrance of Paradise, though its fragrance is found for a span of forty years.” Yet another tradition states, “The first cases to be adjudicated between people on the Day of Judgement will be those of bloodshed.” Quran equated the killing of an innocent as the killing of the whole mankind. The Prophet also said, “Truly your blood, your property, and your honour are inviolable.” And “There is a reward for kindness shown to every living animal or human.” indulge in massacres. Moreover, they took practical steps to earn the favour of the masses. They gave them the right to practise their own religion, the right to refuse services in the military in return of a tax, the right to live as honourable citizens, the right to earn, the right to own properties and the right to follow their own family laws and laws of inheritance. Their life and honour were guaranteed full protection. Even in fighting, strict observance of certain principles was prescribed by Islam, which most of the rulers

The truth is that in most of the places conquered by Muslims the people took a sigh of relief at their arrival; they more often than not brought them out of the yoke of injustice and tyranny. This is why the masses thronged to accept Islam in most of the places, and even after the departure of their conquerors they mostly remained loyal to their new religion. In the conquered countries, Muslim caliphs often preferred to have local men in charge of the affairs. The rule of Muslims, with a few exceptions, proved to be far superior to that experienced by the masses before. It was this confidence in the new system that the Islamic caliphate, despite the fact that many of the caliphs were not as pious and upright as Islam would want them to be, was able to sustain itself for about a millennium. Even after the dismemberment of the caliphate, almost all the people of most of the Muslim countries have continued to be within the fold of Islam; some of them have emerged as its citadels. It is significant that an outstanding number of Islamic scholars in the current world hail from non-Arab countries like India, Pakistan, Malaysia, Iran and Turkey.

It should be made clear here however that the nations are now bound by the treaties of the UN that do not permit any country to conquer any other country for the expansion of ideology. Muslim as well as non-Muslim nations are parties to this agreement. So no Muslim or Non-Muslim nation can now be allowed to invade or threaten other nations for the export of its own ideology or for any other reason unless there are compelling reasons to do so and the majority of the members of the UN agree to it. However, people are free to propagate their beliefs, ideas and customs through peaceful means. But the world must be ready to ban all such substances and practices that lead to death and social problems at a big scale. In the name of freedom, the business of death cannot be allowed to prosper.

It can be seen that not only the constitutions of all countries as well as that of the UN permit the use of force for certain purposes, scriptures of almost all religions also prescribe the use of force in several situations. Compare them with Quran, and it will be clear that Quranic guidelines are much better example of a perfect and pragmatic approach in the current world.

in Editorial on Religion in the Pakistan Daily

A luxurious ancient pagan tomb located in a necropolis under St Peter’s Basilica has been reopened to the public after a year of restoration.

Catholic News Service reports the Vatican has completed the restoration of the largest and most luxurious mausoleum in the vast necropolis under St. Peter’s Basilica.
The Mausoleum of the Valerii displays some of the most ornate decoration among the 22 family mausoleums in the ancient underground cemetery.

“We had wanted to restore it for a long time, but we didn’t have the money. Now we’re extremely happy” the funding came through and the year long restoration has been completed, said Maria Cristina Stella, an official at the Fabbrica di San Pietro, the office responsible for the basilica’s upkeep.

The $300,000 project was funded by the Rome based Foundation for Music and Sacred Art, the Italian branch of Mercedes-Benz, and other sponsors.

The Vatican necropolis includes the burial grounds where St Peter’s tomb has been venerated since early Christian times.

The Valerii mausoleum was built sometime after 160 by Gaius Valerius Herma - a wealthy, highly educated Roman slave who had bought his freedom. He built the site for his family and his freed slaves and their descendents.

Like many other pagan tombs in the necropolis, the sarcophagi were later “recycled” by Christians who buried their loved ones and added inscriptions referring to Christ.

The cemetery had been used until the fourth century when the emperor Constantine had workmen fill in the open-air necropolis with dirt in order to lay the foundation for building a basilica above St. Peter’s tomb. The airless, lightless atmosphere actually had helped preserve much of the artwork and statuary.

Restorers for the Valerii mausoleum used hand held lasers, tiny drills, scalpels, sponges and plain water to remove mineral salts, other encrustations and dirt, and they injected special glues to reinforce crumbling plaster walls.

They pieced together broken plaster or marble fragments back onto statuary tucked into niches lining the mausoleum walls.

The second century subterranean burial ground is two levels below the basilica floor, and St. Peter’s tomb is directly under the basilica’s main altar.

The cemetery was excavated for the first time in the 1930’s and 40’s, revealing a double row of mausoleums and niches decorated with paintings, stucco and mosaics, along with a section of simpler graves.

The Vatican has spent the past decade repairing and restoring the tombs, labyrinthine lanes and funerary artwork using state-of-the-art techniques, as well as setting up a complete conservation system that controls the climate of the necropolis.

The Holy See Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life has published a new instruction on authority and obedience for religious men and women.

The new instruction entitled, ‘The Service of Authority and Obedience’ examines the theme of religious obedience, “the root of which is seen in that search for God and for His will which is particular to believer,” according to a media release from the Congregation, Spero News reports.

“Christian and religious obedience does not, then, appear simply as the implementation of ecclesiastical or religious laws and rulings, but as the momentum of a journey in search of God which involves listening to His Word and becoming aware of His design of love - the fundamental experience of Christ Who, out of love, was obedient unto His death on the cross.”

“Authority in religious life,” the communiqué added, “must be understood in this light, in other words, as a way to help the community (or institute) to seek and achieve the will of God. Obedience, then, is not justified on the basis of religious authority, because everyone in a religious community (first and foremost the authorities themselves) are called to obedience. Authority places itself at the service on the community so that God’s will may be sought and achieved together.”

The instruction also considers “the delicate matter of ‘difficult obedience’, that in which what is requested of the religious is particularly hard to carry out, or in which the subject feels he sees ‘things which are better and more useful for his soul than those which the superior orders him to do’.”

The instruction seeks to recall that obedience in religious life can give rise to situations of suffering in which it is necessary to refer back to the Obedient One par excellence, Christ.

“It must, moreover, be borne in mind that authority too can be ‘difficult’, experiencing moments of discouragement and fatigue which can lead to resignation or inattention in exercising an appropriate guidance of the community.”

The document also offers a vast and coherent set of guidelines for the exercise of authority, such as inviting people to listen, favouring dialogue, sharing, co-responsibility, and the merciful treatment of the people entrusted to authority, the communiqué said.

in CathNews

A Saint and Compassion Fatigue …

There is a story told about St. Vincent de Paul. Perhaps it’s partly myth, but its challenge is real nonetheless.

Vincent once gave an instruction to his religious community that sounded something like this: “When the demands of life seem unfair to you, when you are exhausted and have to pull yourself out of bed yet another time to do some act of service, do it gladly, without counting the cost and without self-pity, for if you persevere in serving others, in giving yourself to the poor, if you persevere to the point of completely spending yourself, perhaps someday the poor will find it in their hearts to forgive you. For it is more blessed to give than to receive and it is also a lot easier.”

That might sound curious. Why do the poor need to forgive us? For what do we need to be forgiven? Shouldn’t we feel good about serving others?

All of us, I suspect, have a pretty good sense of what he means. We all know there is a certain humiliation in needing to receive, just as there is a certain pride in being able to give.

The things we often complain about are really our greatest blessings: What is worse than being too busy? Having nothing to do. What is more painful than having to give away something we own? Having nothing to give away. What is harder than being dragged out of bed to minister to someone in need? Being the person who is in bed and who needs someone to help him or her.

What is harder than being brought to our knees by the demands of those around us for our time and energy? Being on our knees asking someone else for his or her time and energy. It is more blessed to be able to give than to receive and it is easier. But there’s more.

There is a certain divine power, literally, in being able to give. The one who gives gets to be God or, at very least, to feel like God. That’s not an overstatement. God is the source of all that is, the source of all gift. When we are in a position to give, we mediate divine power and we get to feel that power. Whenever we act like God, we get to feel like God.

Yet, the irony is that our very gifts and strengths, if not given over with the proper attitude, can easily make others feel inferior. It is important to understand this so that we are more careful to not serve others in ways that demean them. It is not automatic, nor easy, to give a gift in a way that does not shame the recipient. Vincent de Paul’s counsel highlights this caution.

But there’s a second lesson here as well. Vincent de Paul meant this too as an antidote to self-pity. For anyone who is in a giving role (a parent, a minister, a teacher, a nurse, a social worker, an advocate for justice, a philanthropist, a politician), there is the temptation to fall into self-pity: “Look at all I am doing! I do all this for others, but nobody is doing anything for me. I am so tired. Is there no end to this? Am I the only one who cares? This is asking more of me than is fair. I have my own problems that I should tend to.”

It is easy, especially when one is tired and frustrated by lack of support, to lose heart, begin to feel sorry for oneself and to eventually feel that we are being unfairly used by others, that we are being asked to give more than our share.

That is very common. Caregivers often feel victimized by those to whom they are giving of themselves. We’ve even coined some terms for this: “compassion fatigue,” “compassion burnout.” Not surprisingly, many good people resent the demands of the poor: the welfare system, the push by various groups for their rights, the pressure for more immigration, the drain that the sick put on the energy and money of our society, the cost of repairing the damage done by youthful vandals and so on.

The temptation is to give up and give in - give up on going the extra mile and give in to the temptation to resign and take care of ourselves.

And so Vincent de Paul’s counsel should be told and retold: If we do not continue to serve the poor, despite our tiredness and self-pity, the poor will never find it in their hearts to forgive us. We need to remember that it is more blessed to give than to receive and it is also easier.

Portraits of Vincent de Paul show him with a strong, warm face, a face that everywhere suggests a comfortable friendliness. He looks like a man you would want over for dinner. But if you had him over for dinner, you might want to make sure that you didn’t complain about the unfairness of life.

by FR. RON ROLHEISER, omi

Sydney University has bought Australia’s only copy of reproduction manuscripts of the 14th century trials of the Knights Templar that rehabilitated the order.

The University of Sydney has purchased a $10,000 reproduction of a document that rehabilitates the medieval Christian military order, the university press service reports.

The Knights, recognisable by the white robes with a red cross they wore over their chain mail, guarded pilgrims visiting the Holy Lands. In the early 14th-century. King Philip IV of France accused the knights of heresy and sodomy, and many of the order’s leaders were burnt at the stake.

“The crux of these trial documents is that Pope Clement V didn’t think the Templars were guilty of heresy,” says Neil Boness, Rare Book librarian at the University’s Fisher Library.

It is “very unusual” for the Vatican to release a reproduction of material from the Secret Archives such as this, known as the Processus Contra Templarios - Papal Inquiry into the Trial of the Templars, he added.

According to John Pryor, Associate Professor for Medieval Studies at Sydney, there was “significant pressure” exerted on the Pope by the King’s agents to find the order guilty.

“Several thousand of the order survived in Spain and elsewhere, but mainly they disappeared into society,” says Pryor. He hopes the documents will assist potential PhD students: “There is a huge scholarly interest in the trials.”

The order was popularised by Dan Brown’s book The Da Vinci Code, and has been the subject of all sorts of myths and legends over the years. The Knights have been linked to the modern-day Freemasons, and portrayed as guardians of the Holy Grail.

The key document in the reproduction is known as the Chinon Parchment and it shows that the Pope absolved the Knights of heresy charges. It was “misplaced” in the Vatican archives until it was discovered by a researcher in 2001.

The elaborate reproduction is bound in an ornate leather case, and includes scholarly notes and reproductions of the original parchments - mould stains and all - as well as the wax seals used by their inquisitors.

Only 799 copies were made: Pope Benedict was given the first copy, and the University owns copy number 300.

in CathNews

An American researcher has convinced Oxford University scientists to reconsider a test that had cast doubts on the authenticity of the Shroud of Turin.

After carbon-14 testing on a fragment from the Shroud, an Oxford team announced in 1989 that the cloth was only about 600- 7000 years old. That result undermined claims that the cloth was used for Christ’s burial. The carbon dating also clashed with other studies that have tended to confirm beliefs that the Shroud dates back to the region of Palestine and the time of Christ.

Now John Jackson, a University of Colorado physicist who has become a leading authority on the Shroud, has persuaded the Oxford Radiocarbon Accelerator Unit to undertake new studies, to determine whether the 1989 testing was flawed. Jackson theorizes that the fragment of the Shroud used in the earlier tests had been contaminated by smoke from a fire that damaged a portion of the Shroud. Carbon monoxide from smoke could easily produce a false result in carbon-14 dating, he reasons.

Christopher Ramsey, the head of the Oxford study group, said that he had agreed to reconsider the results of the earlier test because he recognized the need to reconcile the dating of the Shroud with other evidence suggesting that the cloth is much older than 600- 700 years.

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.
__________________________________________
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.