Before a battle, a priest stands in a booth to hear confessions and every soldier receives Communion. Only the allied Turks do not fear clerical disapproval. Lucas confesses a few sins of anger or envy and is given a penance of twenty Paternosters:
"Pater noster qui es in caelis, sanctificetur nomen tuum. Adveniat regnum tuum. Fiat voluntas tua sicut in caelo et in terra. Panem nostrum quotidianum da nobis hodie; et dimitte nobis debita nostra, sicut et nos demittibus debitoribus nostris, et ne nos inducas in tentationem; sed libera nos a malo. Amen."
What else do we know about confession in fiction?
In a novel by John Gardner, Moriarty commits an ultimate blasphemy by posing as a Jesuit priest in order to hear a Mafia boss's confession!
On TV, Fr. Brown, in the confessional box, hears a cheerful voice proclaim, "Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. It is so long since I have done this that I do not remember the procedure!" Recognizing the voice, Brown says, "Hercule." His enemy, Flambeau, has come not to make a confession but to impart some information. For this, they exit the confessional and Flambeau stretches out on a church bench.
Back to Lucas:
"Now, with spears awaiting him beyond the mountain, he felt a sudden wish to be genuinely at peace with God." (p. 99)
However, what does trouble him is not guilt but doubts and lostness. When the Host is elevated at dawn, he is not awed but alone. That strikes me as a good way to approach the ultimate but what do I know?
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
But one of the conclusions I drew from reading ROGUE SWORD was that, when push came to shove, Lucas did believe. One of the things he longed for was to find a state with a just gov't. And I think he found that at Rhodes after the Knights Hospitaller took over the rule of that island. Recall the discussions he had about that with Brother Hugh de Tourneville.
Ad astra! Sean
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