Intervention (36 page)

“You’ve never come clean about Virginia,” Shawn continued, his slurring increasing.

“Did you nail her homecoming weekend, James? Here’s your chance finally to let your buddies know. After all, we were rooting for you and purposefully cleared out to give you space and privacy.”

“I refuse to be drawn into a conversation that might be disrespectful of Virginia,” James said with definite resolve. “Let’s get back to our discussion. How did we start out talking about papal infallibility and get bogged down about sex?”

“Because it is related,” Shawn said, glancing at Jack, whose silence he felt was out of character.

“How can it be related?” James questioned. “In modern times, the power of papal infallibility has been used only twice, and neither time did it in any way involve morals or sex. In fact, ironically enough, both times it has been used, first in 1854 and second in 1950, it has involved dogmas associated with the Blessed Virgin. In 1854 Pope Pius the Ninth proclaimed the Immaculate Conception an ex cathedra dogma, which, contrary to many people’s belief, is not about the conception of Jesus Christ, Mary’s son, but rather about Mary herself, so like her son, she too would be free of original sin. Of course, the second time was the
Munificentissimus Deus
of Pius the Twelfth, as I’ve already mentioned, concerning Mary’s Assumption to heaven body and soul. How on earth do you get sex out of that?”

“It’s not those two episodes of infallibility that has caused the current problem. From most of the popes down through the ages, there has been this evolving papal dialogue that sex is evil. I suppose Pope Gregory the Great was the worst offender, as he’s the one who said all sexual desire was sinful in and of itself. Now, because of the modern declaration of papal infallibility, these old beliefs have been given a new legitimacy, at least from the pope’s perspective. A modern pope cannot overrule an older pope without undermining his own legitimacy. And in the arena of attitudes toward sex, this is a particular problem, because a good portion of the laity has a new, much more modern view of sex not as sin but as evidence of divinity itself. The sacrament of marriage, providing a loving sexual union, is now more sacred in many people’s eyes. And far from being evil, it is both an affirmation of and gift from God. I believe the Church must abjure its old knee-jerk reaction against sex as sin and rather affirm that pleasure is divine and that sensual mutuality is something to strive for. It only makes sense. Why would an all-powerful God create the pleasure of sex and then insist his children don’t use it?”

“It seems to me you are justifying a very self-serving theology,” James said.

“Maybe so,” Shawn agreed. “But I’ll tell you, it makes more sense to me as an individual than the Church’s position, and the Church better recognize that most of its laity agrees with me.”

“That is a leap I’m afraid I cannot accept.”

“At your and the Church’s peril. As a good example is the celibacy issue. By making celibacy an individual’s decision rather than the Church’s, you’d solve the molestation problem and the priestly recruiting problem both. Just make it a personal decision so there can be crazy priests like you and normal priests who will be in a much better position to advise their flocks on marriage and parenting, the center issues of most people’s lives.”

“Shawn!” James said. “You are drunk or close to it, so I refuse to take offense, no matter what you call me or what you say. But let me be clear. If you publish anything about the Blessed Virgin’s bones being in the ossuary that you have stolen from the Vatican, you will not only hurt me, your friend, but hundreds of thousands of other people, particularly poor, poverty-stricken people, like those of the interior of South America, whose most cherished possession is their faith, which often is centered on the Virgin Mary, whom they look to as the absolute model of faith and spirituality. Shawn, don’t do this, especially when it is mostly based on personal vainglorious goals.”

“ ‘Vainglorious goals’!” Shawn shouted. “So you believe you are the only one on a mission here! Well, screw you. This ossuary fell out of the blue into my hands. How do I know it isn’t the Lord himself involved, knowing I was someone who would instantly see the power of its truth and be able to use it constructively?”

“You don’t know it is the truth,” James countered. “That’s the point!”

“And that’s why I’m investigating,” Shawn said. “When I finish with the scrolls—”

“What language are they written in?”

“Aramaic,” Shawn blurted.

James’s heart fell. He’d had a sudden hope that Simon’s scrolls would be in an inappropriate language, to help him discredit them, but Aramaic would have been Simon’s native tongue.

“When I finish with the scrolls and Sana finishes with her work—”

“How is Sana’s work going to help or deny the authenticity of the bones?” James interjected irritably.

“I have no idea,” Shawn said. “I don’t totally understand what she does, but it’s indicative of our wish to properly investigate the contents of the ossuary to the limits of our abilities.”

“In spite of whom you may injure in the process?”

“I see it more in terms of whom we might help, and I include in that the Church itself.”

“Do you honestly believe that you may have been selected by Jesus Christ to help guide his Church? Is that what I’m hearing?”

Shawn spread his hands as if exposing himself. “It’s possible,” he said, but it came out as “ossible,” as he was unable to pronounce the
p.

James let his head fall forward until his chin hit his chest. “This is worse than I imagined.”

“How so?” Shawn asked. He wasn’t so drunk not to notice a true change in his friend’s demeanor.

“I’m beginning to fear for your eternal soul,” James said. “Either that or your mental health.”

“Hey, you’re going overboard,” Shawn said. “I feel fine. Perfectly fine. I’ve never felt better. This ossuary and its contents are the most fascinating subject of my career.”

Sana suddenly reappeared from the kitchen bearing a candle-covered chocolate cake and singing “Happy Birthday.” Shawn and Jack joined in the singing as Sana placed the cake on the side table next to James’s chair. As they finished the birthday ditty, they all clapped.

Self-consciously James slipped forward in his chair, causing the bruise-like discolorations on his cheeks to darken. Taking in a big lungful of air, he blew out all the candles in one large sustained puff amid further applause.

As per usual, he didn’t let on what he’d wished, if he’d wished; but if he did, Jack had a good idea what it had been.

24

9:23 P.M., SATURDAY, DECEMBER 6, 2008

NEW YORK CITY

D
o you call this parked?” Jack questioned, standing on the curb with his hands on his hips and gazing at the more than two feet that separated James’s Range Rover from where he was standing.

“It was the best I could do,” James said. “Don’t give me a hard time! Just get in. I assure you I can get you home safely.”

Both men climbed into the SUV’s front seat. Jack made a point of fastening his seat belt.

If James’s park job was as good as he could do, Jack was mildly concerned. “You haven’t had too much wine, have you?”

“As wired as I am, I don’t feel like I’ve had any.”

“I could drive,” Jack offered. “I had very little.”

“I’m fine,” James said as he maneuvered out of the tight space.

They drove in silence through the West Village, each digesting the dinner party’s edgy conversation.

“Shawn is impossible,” James said suddenly, while they waited for a traffic light before getting onto the West Side Highway. “Of course, he’s always been impossible.”

“He’s always been his own person,” Jack said.

James glanced in Jack’s direction, catching the man’s strong profile against the streetlights. “That’s rather limp support.”

Jack looked over at James, and their eyes caught for a moment before the light changed, and James had to drive ahead. “I’m sorry,” Jack said. “And I probably shouldn’t say anything at all for fear of making things worse for you. I can certainly tell how passionately you feel, but from my humble perspective, he does seem to have a point.”

“You’re on his side?” James demanded, with a mixture of surprise and dismay.

“No, I’m not on anyone’s side,” Jack said. “But last time he invited me to dinner, which I told you about, and we were alone, washing the dishes, we did speak briefly about you and your impressive successes with the Church hierarchy. That stimulated him to tell me a few things that I’d never known. By the time we all came in contact, in college, he was already a lapsed Catholic, but I had never known why.”

James cast another quick glance in Jack’s direction before returning his attention to the road. “Don’t tell me! He wasn’t molested himself, was he?”

“No, nothing as dramatic as that, but close.”

“This is new material,” James said. “What do you mean ‘close’?”

“Because I had no experience with religion growing up in an atheist household, I feel at a disadvantage telling his story, but I’ll give it a go. Apparently, as a very young teenager, he loved the Church, as did both his parents.”

“I’m aware of that,” James said.

“Then you know he and his parents were very active in their parish.”

“I’m aware of that as well.”

“Anyhow,” Jack said, “he reached puberty without much preparation, maybe none. As he tells it, it is rather humorous if nothing else. Apparently, he masturbated the first time by accident and utter surprise. He was in the shower, and he was washing his privates such that the cleaner they got, the better it felt, until he had an orgasm, which he described as divine pleasure. For obvious reasons, that episode ushered in a proclivity for taking showers, up to three a day, which made him feel closer to God and all the saints than he ever had previously.”

James found himself chuckling despite his general unease. He could clearly see Shawn telling such a story, as he was a gifted raconteur. A moment later he quieted, as he feared how the story was about to unfold.

“Apparently,” Jack continued, “it was several blissful weeks later that he came in contact with the teaching of the pope he mentioned tonight.”

“You mean Pope Gregory the Great?” James asked.

“I believe that’s the one,” Jack said. “Was he as negative about sex as Shawn suggested?”

“He was,” James admitted.

“Anyway,” Jack continued, “Shawn described the collision with the supposed antimasturbation dogma of the Church and his own sense of experiencing the divine as cataclysmic, especially learning that to receive the Eucharist he had to confess every episode of self-gratification and every unclean thought, such as fantasizing about Elaine Smith’s ass.”

“Was Elaine Smith’s ass something to admire?”

“According to Shawn and the number of times he had to confess he’d fantasized about giving it a good look.”

“I know this amusing anecdote has to be going somewhere bad, so let’s hear it.”

“Shawn said he struggled with this epic battle for as much as six months, trying to regain his chaste life so as to be in accordance with Church dogma. To do so required him to confess his transgressions week after week, such that to remember what he’d done when he got into the confessional, he began to keep a very accurate diary of his masturbation episodes, which had moved out of the shower because, as he said, his skin became too dry. As for his unclean thoughts, they had expanded to take in more parts of Elaine Smith’s supposedly enchanting anatomy.”

“You’re dragging this out,” James complained.

“Okay,” Jack agreed. “Sorry. As I said, this battle went on for months, with Shawn doing his best to remember everything he did and confess it each Friday in minute detail.”

“And?” James asked impatiently.

“Shawn began to notice that the two priests who normally heard confessions began to get progressively interested.”

“Good Lord, no!” James uttered.

“Don’t get upset,” Jack warned. “Nothing really happened, at least overtly.”

“Thank God!”

“But no matter how much detail Shawn offered in the confessional, it was never enough, and each week toward the end, he was asked more and more questions, such as even he, as a newly pubescent teenager, knew that something was wrong. The crowning moment for Shawn was when one of the priests offered, in the confessional, to meet with him privately to help him overcome this soul-endangering habit.”

“Did they ever meet?”

“Not according to Shawn. Instead it was at that point, to the consternation of his parents, that Shawn decided he and the Church would sever relations, supposedly on a temporary basis but which has been maintained until today.”

“That is an unfortunate happening,” James agreed. “It is a pity that he didn’t have more knowledgeable priests to help him at such a crucial juncture.”

“But isn’t that one of Shawn’s points? Celibate priests are probably not the best guides for children through the stresses of puberty, just as they are probably not the best guides for young adults starting families. Having children is always much more problematic than people imagine, even in the best of circumstances.” Jack couldn’t help but think about his own current situation.

“I cannot contest that, and it is an issue I will pray upon. But now I have to concentrate on the problem at hand.”

“You mean your hope of talking Shawn out of publishing his findings?”

“Exactly.”

“Here’s my sentiment. You are fighting an awfully steep uphill battle. Unless Shawn and his wife come up with definitive proof somehow that the bones cannot be the Blessed Virgin’s, he is going to publish that they are, even if he cannot prove it. You are not going to talk him out of it. Your switching your attack from talking about his hurting the Church in general to hurting you personally was clever, but even that didn’t sway him, especially after he got you to admit you didn’t believe yourself that it was inevitable you’d be punished for his errors.”

“Unfortunately, I think you are right,” James said with resignation. “I’m the last person who should be trying to talk him out of something he truly wants to do and has convinced himself he should do as if he’s on a mission from God. When I heard that, I knew I was surely barking up the wrong tree. Thank goodness it’s not as messianic as I’d feared when I first heard it.”