Autopsy of an Eldritch City: Ten Tales of Strange and Unproductive Thinking (23 page)

He arrived at the church at 12:25, parking his car in the small parking lot located to the side of Plaza Center. He then walked over to the front of the church, shivering a bit from the cold. The main doors could be accessed by ascending a number of granite steps which formed a terrace across the front of the church’s facade. There were seven of these steps, that number being symbolic of the number of days that it had taken God to create the Earth. As Timothy made his way to the steps, he glanced up at the snow-capped two towers, a little intimidated by their soaring heights and the gargoyles leering down at him: from street level, he could see crows flying into and out of the tops of the towers, and from this distance the crows resembled tiny winged demons as they nestled amongst the gargoyles. Three doorways served as an entrance into the church, no doubt symbolizing the Holy Trinity, and these doors were made of wood, and had been painted a brownish-red color, symbolizing the blood that Christ had shed for humanity. Instead of a rose window above the main doors, there were three large stained glass windows, these also representing the Holy Trinity: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Above the central door was a ledge, held up by four big ionic columns, and resting on this ledge (and standing sentinel before the trio of stained-glass windows) was a six foot, nine inch tall hollow-cast bronze statue of St. Durtal himself, the saint who the church was named after and dedicated to. Timothy gazed admiringly at this statue as he ascended the slippery granite steps: the statue depicted a man in his fifties in terms of age, dressed like a monk, with a bald head, a neatly trimmed moustache and pointy-beard, cat-like eyes and Mephistopheles eyebrows, his hands slender, nicotine stained and almost feminine. For some reason, Timothy had always felt that St. Durtal greatly resembled the 19th century French writer J.K. Huysmans in appearance.

A few other people were gathered outside the wooden front doors, most of them standing, a few seated on the steps, huddling to keep warm. Timothy spotted a young mother with her two children (one of whom was a boy, the other a girl: the girl was playing
Candy Crush Saga
on her iPad while the boy was picking his nose), an elderly man huddled under what looked like ten jackets, and a nondescript middle-aged married couple wearing New England Patriots sportswear. Timothy tried to blend in, which was somewhat difficult as he kind of stood out: his hair was dyed bright blue and pink and cut in a very stylized, almost emo-like fashion, while his extremely thin body was clad in a Lady Gaga
Fame Monster
t-shirt (the front of which depicted a close-up of the pop star’s face as she cried tears of blood) and tight dark purple leather pants. Still, the back of the t-shirt provided a list of all the venues on Lady Gaga’s Monster Ball tour, and all of these names were arranged to form the shape of a Christian cross, so in a manner of speaking the t-shirt was appropriate.
Also, crying tears of blood is often seen as one of the signs of the stigmata,
Timothy reminded himself. As he waited for the tour to begin, he noticed a few signs near the front doors of the church, such as “No Loitering” and “No Trespassing: Police Will Take Notice.” He wished that his friend Daphne were there with him, so that he would feel less alone, and he felt a sliver of sadness sink into his heart. He had tried to convince his friend Christopher to come along, but his friend had just mumbled something about there being “too much glass” at the church, so Timothy had just decided to drop the subject.

Around a minute or so after one o’clock, the central door of the church was unlocked and a man stepped out. He was middle aged, a tall and thin fellow with a shiny bald head, a curly moustache that looked as if it were waxed religiously every day, and serene eyes that resembled two tiny round meditating Buddhist monks. He wore a black Adidas track suit, similar in appearance to the one sported by Jane Lynch’s Coach Sue character on the TV show
Glee
, and on his feet he wore neither socks nor shoes, but instead moccasin slippers. When he saw the people assembled outside, waiting to enter the church, he smiled and gave them a little bow. “Good afternoon,” he said to them in a laid-back voice, a heavy French-Canadian accent present in his speech. “Welcome to St. Durtal’s Church. Please follow me inside. My name is Henri, and I’ll be your guide.” He pronounced his name ‘On-Ree’ as opposed to ‘Hen-Ree.’ The small assembly followed Henri into the heated church, grateful to get out of the cold. Timothy saw that he was in a small vestibule, which in the old days would have been called the narthex. It was a tiny foyer, with three doors directly in front of them leading into the church’s nave. To their right was another door which Timothy knew led up to the choir loft and, beyond that, the belfry. Next to one of the doors leading back outside was a wooden stool and on this stool there was an old-fashioned boom box that Timothy supposed supplied the interior of the church with background music. As Timothy walked past this boom box he stole a quick glance at the CD jewel case resting atop it, saw that it was a Libera CD:
Eternal: The Best of Libera
, to be precise.

Timothy stepped into the church itself and as soon as he did so, it took all of his self-control to keep his mouth from dropping open. Simply put, the interior of St. Durtal’s Church was staggeringly huge: in terms of square footing it was actually larger than the Sistine Chapel. With a seating capacity of 1,300 people and ceiling vaults that were over 65 feet high, everything about St. Durtal’s church was supersized: even the two large stained glass windows at the transepts had the square footage of a ranch house, being 32 feet in height and 22 feet in width. Everywhere Timothy looked, there was some new novelty to feast his eyes on, from the towering marble forest of Corinthian columns to the soaring flying buttresses to the statues of angels wielding swords and shields standing guard near the ceiling of the church, these angelic statues illuminated by spotlights near their feet, spotlights that were hidden from view for those on the ground level looking up at them. And, of course, Prof. Mancini’s frescoes, which covered the walls and ceilings of the church every which way.
This is religious art of the highest order,
Timothy thought in awe as he gazed at the frescoes all around him, all of which were bursting with color and life.
Surely the angels themselves helped guide the artist’s paintbrush as he went about his task beautifying this church
. To think that one man had done all of this: St. Durtal’s church housed over 200 fresco paintings, featuring over 600 characters. For the most part, the frescoes depicted scenes and characters from the Old and New Testaments of the Bible. In effect, to gaze at the frescoes within the church was to look at one of the world’s largest illustrated Bibles.
This church tells a story; it’s a building you can read like a book
, Timothy thought, feeling almost overwhelmed by all of the beauty surrounding him.
And to think that this treasure house of Christian art is located here, in plain old Thundermist… truly this church is like the diamond in the rough
.

Henri led them in front of a small gift shop set up near the doors leading out to the vestibule (this gift shop obviously being a recent addition to the church). He then gave the group a few quick facts about the church, all of which Timothy was already aware. Henri then encouraged the group to go and explore the church at their own leisure, and if they had any questions, to just ask him. But Timothy, by that point, had already broken away from the group to start examining the church in greater detail on his own.

He began by walking along the aisles of the nave, passing by the long rows of empty pews, his wanderings accompanied by the angelic music of Libera coming forth from speakers set up all around the church, most of these speakers clinging to the Corinthian columns: the current song playing was “Sanctus.” The aisles of the nave (the nave being the area where parishioners sat or stood, and which formed the length of the cross shape) were lined with stained glass windows, five on each side, these windows being eighteen feet in height and seven feet wide. They depicted various scenes from the Bible, or religious scenes in general: the ones on the eastern (or Locust Street) side of the church showcased St. Peter being saved from the waters, the Last Supper, Mary’s Communion, the Procession of the Blessed Sacrament, and Pope Pius X giving communion to the children. Meanwhile, the stained glass windows on the western (or rectory) side of the nave depicted Jesus resurrecting Lazarus, the Samaritan Woman, Christ among the teachers, the Nativity, and the Annunciation. Above all of these stained glass windows, in the topmost story of the nave wall known as the clerestory, were smaller stained glass windows, these portraying the Twelve Apostles.

Timothy walked along both of the aisles, analyzing each window, and he eventually came to the conclusion that he liked the Last Supper one the best. It consisted of Jesus Christ, his head surrounded by a halo, the Holy Graal in one hand, with his other hand blessing the bread that lay on the table before him. Surrounding him were his Twelve Apostles, with Judas standing off at the far right of the window, a pensive hand held to his chin while he gazed at Christ with a sinister expression on his bearded face. However, Timothy was most captivated by St. John, who sat on Christ’s left. St. John, as he was depicted in this window, had long and almost girlish-looking orange-blonde hair, and he was the only Apostle in the window who was without beard, being clean shaven and almost effeminate looking. He had his head tilted and was gazing up at Jesus with a rapt, almost loving expression on his feminine face. Of all the Apostles, Timothy had always liked John the best, so much so that when the time had come for Timothy to choose a Confirmation name many years ago, he had almost chosen the name John, but had instead ended up going with Teresa, as Saint Teresa of Avila was his favorite saint: needless to say, some of his classmates had teased him about that, but luckily for him, there were no rules that said a male Catholic couldn’t assume the name of a female saint as his Confirmation name.

Although come to think of it, this window depicting Christ resurrecting Lazarus is also quite beautiful
, Timothy thought. This window had Christ standing before a tomb, hands raised, Lazarus stepping out from the tomb while a few people nearby looked on in shock. What made the window interesting to Timothy was that Lazarus was portrayed as completely colorless, almost black and white in appearance. Timothy thought back to chapter eleven of the Gospel of John, in which Christ raises Lazarus of Bethany from the dead. Timothy had always liked that chapter because it contained the famous verse 35, “Jesus Wept,” the shortest verse in the King James Version of the Bible (and the name of one of Timothy’s favorite Current 93 songs, for that matter). It was a short but simple verse, yet a powerful one. Some theologians argued that by weeping, Christ is revealed to be a true human being made of flesh and blood, with actual bodily functions and secretions, and that he was therefore not a spirit or an illusion (contrary to what the heretical Docetists argued). And St. Fulgentius of Ruspe claimed that ‘Jesus did not weep, as the Jews thought, because his friend was dead; rather He wept because He was going to call back to the misery of life one that He loved.” As J.K. Huysmans wrote about life in his 1903 novel
The Oblate of St. Benedict
, “The fact is, once is enough, quite enough.”

It fascinates me how, when seen from outside, stained glass windows look so boring and colorless, and can only truly be appreciated when one is gazing at them from within the church itself
, Timothy mused. He thought of another Huysmans’ novel,
The Cathedral
, published back in 1897.
In that book, Huysmans puts forth the notion that this is symbolical of the soul having light inwardly, an allegory of the spiritual life, which requires one to turn away from the material world and focus all one’s contemplation on the soul. In any event, these stained glass windows are quite lovely
. And Timothy admired the way the colorful sunlight streamed through the glass, making it look as if the stained glass windows were weeping rainbows into the church’s nave.

As Timothy walked down the central aisle, surrounded by the finely carved wooden pews on both sides, he gazed up at the nave’s ceiling. The ceiling above the central aisle was decorated with five very large frescoes illustrating the ministry of Jesus in the Gospels. Beginning near the central dome and moving down to the choir loft above the main entrance, one could see Jesus getting baptized by John the Baptist, Christ’s transfiguration on the mountain, the Feeding of the 5,000, Christ’s agony in the Garden of Gethsemane, and the Descent of the Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost. In the ceiling vaults immediately below these New Testament paintings, Prof. Mancini had painted a number of Minor and Major Prophets of the Old Testament: from far below, Timothy spotted Isaiah, Jeremiah, Zechariah, Micah, Hosea, Obadiah, Joel, Malachi, Daniel, and Ezekiel. Timothy overheard Henri comment that it almost seemed as if the Prophets were standing as an honor guard for the coming of the Messiah.

Timothy moved on to St. Durtal’s crossing, which was the place in the church where the nave and transepts intersected (the transepts forming the arms of the cross shape). Timothy veered left until he stood in the north transept, on the rectory side of the church. The arch-shaped wall of this transept was dominated by an enormous stained glass window (also arch shaped) of the Crucifixion of Christ, while the arch on the ceiling overhead illustrated the archangel Michelangelo casting the rebel angels out of Heaven, and below this painting was another one entitled “The Portals of Hell,” where one could see the fallen angels surrounded by flames. What made this painting impressive to Timothy was that some of the rebel angels were painted so that it seemed as if they were falling out of the frame of the above painting, into the pit of hell below.