Crusade of Tears: A Novel of the Children's Crusade (8 page)

Chapter 4

THE CALL TO CRUSADE

T
he church bell echoed loudly throughout the abbey’s grounds and Karl tingled with excitement. With sunlight streaming in thick shafts through both colored glass and plain, the entourage of ecclesiastics bowed to positions behind the modest pulpit and the monastery’s abbot stood alone. Dressed in humble vestments, the old Benedictine lifted his hands in a protective gesture over his flock and, after a few formal pronouncements, began to speak in native tongue.

“My beloved children, it is our counsel that we have been beset by a mischief from another world. We have buried dear Brother Lukas, our dear friend, who we have discerned was murdered by poison. And, on the evening prior, a good man, Ansel of Limburg, was laid to his eternal rest, also a victim of fiendish ends.”

Udo continued. “The Evil One sees all and his reach extends where he will. We are offered our spiritual protection by God and His angels, but not without due homage. Our lords and sovereigns have been mightily blessed with great victories in the east, yet they now fear all shall be lost for the evidence of sin which now abounds in this place. This day was to have been a day of merry, a day of rejoicing for God’s bounty in victories granted. Instead, woeful children, thy secrets have invited the legions of the Pit among us.

“Yet, you are our beloved children. So I say to all, this day shall not pass lest we have committed ourselves to join with you in a great penance. We seek God’s divine and boundless mercy, we beg the aid of our Virgin Mother, we seek the counsel of others … for we are all sinful and degenerate sheep.”

He raised his hands higher. “I say to you again, my dear children, poor souls, my dear, dear, tender flock, we have sinned against all heaven. We have allowed darkness to loom in our land. You have been entreated for some years to join our Holy Church in settling its new lands in the east and in the north. But few have obeyed. Instead, all stay, selfishly crowding our poor manors. We have paid dearly for thy protection by our worthy neighbor, Lord Heribert. Yet I hear only of grumblings and complaints among you, rebellion and scheming such that Moses never suffered.”

The abbot lowered his arms and closed his eyes. “Fairest Lord Jesus, ruler of all Nations, Son of God and Son of Man. Thee will I cherish. Thee will I honor….”

The old man stopped as if overcome by grief for his wicked people. He generously blessed them with the sign of the Cross, bowed his head, and backed away from the pulpit.

The congregation in the courtyard spread his words, then remained absolutely silent, troubled and confused by the reprimand. Karl trembled, overcome with fear and shuddering at the thought of Lucifer’s hand around his mother’s throat. The powerful Archbishop of Mainz gathered his robes and approached the simple oak pulpit with the legate at his side. Except for the warm breezes that toyed with the pennants and drapes, nothing moved. It was as if an unseen hand had hushed all tongues and turned all faces now fixed on the ambassadors from heaven.

The archbishop stood tall and erect in the ample, silken robes which flowed to the tops of his black shoes. Large, bright red crosses were sewn on each breast of his yellow chasuble and a dark green stole with a white underlining hung neatly across his shoulders. His brass headpiece reflected points of light from the sun-rays beaming through the windows, conferring on him an ethereal authority. The legate, an honorary appointment from the diocese of Cologne, stood by his side in equal splendor. He fixed his hands tightly to his red stole and arched his back forward as he peered into heaven.

His Grace raised his golden crosier over his flock and pronounced a blessing to all gathered, then stood quietly to appraise the congregation. The fix of his steely eyes and the remarkable potency of his silence captivated prince and peasant alike. The souls gathered before him waited anxiously, filled with an anticipation that nearly begged aloud for him to begin.

Then, at last, almost as if it were an act of mercy, the archbishop began to speak. “Come, my children, listen to us, for we’ll instruct you in the fear of the Lord. The Evil One is in thy midst and you have suffered most terribly at his filthy hands. For that, you have my heartfelt pity and the merciful sympathy of our Lord. And He shall lead you to His bosom.

“I see in thy faces that you be filled with dread for thine own plight, but what terror do you counsel for the sad course of others? Shame be on thy heads. This selfsame wicked dark Prince of the Air prowls
all
the world. Even as I speak, he leisures in Palestine, the very land of our Lord. You may weep for
thy
troubles, but for six generations the strong hearts of Christendom have yielded life, limb, and fortune to restore the Land of Promise to the People of the Covenant.

“While you rest in thy peaceful valley, our Lord God pleads, ‘My land cries out against me and all its furrows are wet with tears. They came up with their livestock and their tents like swarms of locusts, they invaded my land to ravage it.’

“Shame on those who sing songs to God while these locusts, these Saracen infidels, these children of the Wicked One, desecrate the very soil that Christ Himself walked upon.” The archbishop looked to the heavens, then backed away to leave the pulpit to the legate, a large man of middling years named Paulus who once hailed from Hohenstaufen—the homeland of the old emperor, Barbarossa.

“If I forget thee, O Jerusalem,” Paulus cried, “may my right hand forget, may my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth, if I do not consider Jerusalem my utmost joy. The great fortress of God is abandoned, the noisy city is deserted, citadel and watchtower have become a wasteland forever. Our God’s house has become the delight of donkeys, a pasture for flocks.”

The legate drew a deep breath and bellowed, “For the Lord says, ‘The land I have given to Abraham and Isaac, I also give you,
my children.
They shall neither hunger nor thirst. Nor shall the desert heat or sun beat upon them. You shall be led beside springs of water.’

“Dear children, please come and I’ll turn my mountains into roads and my highways shall be raised up. You shall come from afar … from the north.”

Paulus softened his tone and turned a kindly, gentle eye out the windows and onto the children scattered throughout the silent courtyard. He motioned them to the bishop’s guards. “Bring them to me. Suffer the children to come unto me.” He waited patiently, like an indulgent grandfather on a summer Sabbath. The footmen hurried throughout the courtyard and beckoned the wide-eyed children to hurry to the nave where they slowly, almost fearfully, forced themselves between the hips of the astonished adults pressed in around them.

“Komme, meine Kinder
,” cried the legate. “Come, all my children, and gather before my feet. Sons of shepherds and daughters of ploughmen … come, come you all… all my dear children come.”

Karl was as stunned as the others but quickly snatched Maria by her hand and squeezed his way into the sanctuary. Flushed with excitement and nearly trembling with anticipation, the boy and his sister joined their peers near the front of the church.

The legate called twice more for the children to come and, at last, nearly a third of the church was filled with their awestruck faces. The displaced nobility crowded to the margins and viewed the spectacle with notable annoyance, but Paulus smiled kindly. “My precious lambs,” he said softly, “thank you, every one, for hearing the Word of thy Lord … for a great task lies before you. It may be that some already know of those Christian youth who have begun a march to carry the good news of our Savior to the heathen occupiers of Palestine.”

The children stirred, few having heard any such report.

“’Tis true. An army of children is gathering in the Empire and in France to rescue Jerusalem. They are marching now and need you, each and every one. Perhaps this sad manor might be rid of its evil presence should such piety be found midst you as well? By faith, I do believe bounteous blessings await this manor should it join its lambs to the flock preparing for Palestine.

“Indeed. God has granted visions of you crossing into Palestine on dry land.
Ja
, as did the Hebrews cross the Red Sea. Oh, dear ones, offer thyselves to the will of thy loving Father in heaven. You depart not with bow or spear or dagger, but rather with gentleness and meekness and simple faith … weapons against which stands no defense.”

The cleric was contented by the immediate enthusiasm evident on the faces of the innocents, but he became alarmed at an uneasiness spreading among their parents now crowding every portal. Sensing reluctance, the man turned his attention to the murmuring elders. He set his face squarely on those eyes narrowing toward him and stretched his open hands over the heads of the little ones at his feet. “He tends His flock like a shepherd; He gathers the lambs in His arms and carries them close to His heart.”

The man paused to stand his hooked staff against the pulpit. He clutched his heart and cried to the congregants, “I am convinced that neither life nor death, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation is able to separate these little ones from the love of God that is in Christ, our Lord.”

He lifted his chin high and shouted, “I trust not in my bow, my sword does not bring us victory, but thou shalt grant us victory over our enemies, thou shalt surely put our adversaries to shame.”

He bent toward the children near his feet and placed his hands on his knees. “You little ones were once in darkness, but now you are in the light. Live as children of the light so that you may be found blameless and pure, children without fault in a crooked and depraved generation. Shine like stars in the universe so that you may boast on the Day of Christ that you did not march in vain.”

Karl was speechless. It was as if his heart had been lifted to the heavenly realm. He was convinced that God was speaking to him through this holy man.

Paulus continued as he returned to his pulpit. “Dear children, this is the last hour, a new age is dawning.
Now
is a time for the innocents of Christendom to claim dominion. Our own emperor, Friederich II, is but himself a child, and the visions have been granted to mere boys of ten and twelve. The words of our Lord ring true to me: ‘I praise thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hidden these things from the wise and revealed them to …
little children.’”

Paulus paused, then raised his eyes again to the elders. “Thy children shall be mighty in the land, ’tis true, and the generation of the upright shall be blessed. Wealth and riches shall come to you and thy righteousness shall endure forever. Good shall come to you who are generous and lend of thy loved ones freely.

“Oh, dear fathers and good mothers,” wailed the churchman, “thy sons and daughters are a heritage from the Lord. Like arrows in the hands of a warrior are sons born in thine youth. Blessed are those whose quiver is full for they shall not be put to shame.” The legate’s words did not miss their mark. Indeed, apprehensions began lifting like fog past prime.

Paulus turned his face toward the slack-jawed children beneath him and adroitly closed the net. “Children, obey thy parents in all things for this pleases God. Listen carefully to my words: If you be children, then you be heirs of God. Indeed you share in His sufferings in order that you might also share in His glory.

“I send you not to an easy place, but to a hard place, and you shall shoulder the Holy Cross as did our dear Lord. You, my dear, dear children, are sent from God to overcome, for the One who goes with you is greater than the Evil One that is in this world.”

The man’s constricting eyes swept the congregation. “If the Lord is pleased with you, He shall surely lead you into that land … a land flowing with milk and honey. Go up and take possession of it! Be not afraid and do not be discouraged.”

He stared heavenward, now nearly weeping. “And the little ones, dear God, Thy children who know not yet good from evil, they shall enter Thy land. Thou shalt bestow it upon them, and they shall surely take hold of it. Then all mankind shall truly know that Thou art Jehovah, the Redeemer, the Lion of Judah. With windstorm and tempest and flames of a devouring fire, go before this flock of Thy most precious lambs. May Thine many enemies become like fine dust; the ruthless hordes like blown chaff.

“For the wolf shall live with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together … and the
little child
shall lead them. The
infant
shall play near the hole of the cobra, and the
young child
put its hand into the viper’s nest. They shall neither harm nor destroy
any
on Thine holy mountain.”