"...New Virginia's Catholics included a sprinkling of zealots displeased with the changes in the Church after Vatican II." (p. 430)
That answers one set of questions asked earlier. See here. However, I am not sure why it is mentioned at this point in the text. The reference has been merely to a Franciscan mission and its converts in Antelope Valley (see image).
Theologians might ponder whether the Jesus of one Earth saves souls on another Earth? There must be many Jesuses as well as alternative versions of Christianity or of other religions that have performed the same role on different Earths, like, e.g., an alternative Mithraism that admitted women and historicized the story of Mithras sacrificing the bull. (These changes would make Mithraism more acceptable as a universal religion in the Roman Empire, just as Christianity preserved Jewish monotheism but without the divisive Jewish dietary laws.)
I did not intend to make this post just about alternative religions but have wound up saying slightly more than expected and it has got quite late so let's sign off until maybe some time after a night's sleep. Onward.
3 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
I'm speaking from memory here, but Poul Anderson did suggest in one of his letters to me that one way the same historical persons could appear in more than one alternate universe would be if that universe was once part of OURS (or ours of theirs) before some unique split the two into different timelines. That would explain why Our Lord, Charlemagne, Charles I, Prince Rupert of the Rhine, etc., could appear in such divergent worlds as those seen in THREE HEARTS AND THREE LIONS, A MIDSUMMER TEMPEST, and the OPERATION books. And, by extension, the alternate worlds speculated about by other writers.
Sean
Sean,
But the Shakespearean timeline of MIDSUMMER TEMPEST had diverged from/been different from ours long before Prince Rupert's birth.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
I agree! And I'm sorry I seem to have been unclear. Poul Anderson was telling me that all "alternate Earths" might have had a common origin, but then they split off into different timelines at different times. That's why they can be so different from one another.
Sean
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