“It’s not just a book. This is a manuscript copy of Conferences, by John Cassian, in which Cassian examined various aspects of spirituality by putting discourses into the mouths of fifteen Egyptian priests. You will find it fascinating reading.”
Brendán lifted the manuscript from the container, marvelling at the number of thick vellum pages. “I’m not familiar with John Cassian,” he said.
Ninnidh looked pleased at the admission. “Cassian also wrote Institutes, which describes the organisation of a religious community. It’s something you really should read if you ever have the opportunity.
“John Cassian was born half a century after Athanasius, of Scythian lineage. He entered a monastery in Bethlehem as a young man and later spent several years in Egypt studying with the ‘desert Fathers’—hermits striving to emulate John the Baptist. That experience became the source of Conferences, in fact. After further studies in North Africa he moved to Rome and then to Provence, in Gaul. At Marseilles he founded both a monastery and a nunnery.”
Brendán felt a quickly suppressed pang of envy. “A true wanderer for God,” he murmured.
“Just so. Cassian taught that the Psalter was the most important text for a religious community. The hermitages around the Mediterranean coast took their inspiration from Cassian, as did the monastery founded by Honoratus on the island of Lérins—the monastery where Patrick studied and became a deacon before his eventual return to Ireland.”
“Bishop Erc never mentioned Cassian.”
“He probably knew nothing about him,” Ninnidh replied. “You and I, who have travelled, know more of the world, and I am happy to acquaint you with Cassian. You’ll find you have much in common with him. He was a moderate man who eschewed extremism, which often put him at odds with the more fanatically inclined.”
I took those words as I hope they were intended: as a compliment.
When the diocesan bishop arrived to consecrate the monastery, Brendán proudly showed him the book.
Over a hundred people assembled for the consecration; almost every Christian within a day’s walk and regional clerics and chieftains in carts and on horseback. The event might almost have been mistaken for a fair. Flanked by his monks, the new abbot of Clon Fert stood in front of his new church. He bowed his head as the air rang with hymns of thanksgiving.
It was the most wonderful day of my life.
When the bishop began to speak, Brendán looked up. One face in the crowd stopped his heart. One guest who had quietly arrived and slipped in among the others without his noticing.
To everyone else Íta was an old woman. To Brendán she was unchanged. Noticing the expression on the abbot’s unguarded face, Gowrán said softly, “You’re right. She is beautiful.”
It was the most wonderful day of my life.
There was no possibility of speaking with her alone; not for a while. But their eyes met.
I could hear the sun singing.
The consecration and attendant prayers and responses took up most of the morning. Afterwards the brothers served food to their guests. At the refectory table the abbot sat on the bishop’s right. Ninnidh sat beside him. Brendán talked with each of them in turn; talked with his monks; talked with his guests. Talked with God in his head. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
For those who had travelled some distance to attend the consecration, the guesting house was prepared. Its occupants would include three nuns from Cill Íde.
After Compline, Brendán walked alone in the courtyard. It was the custom of the brothers to walk together there, two by two, but on this special evening the other monks left him to savour the moment by himself.
The suggestion had come from Gowrán.
Our new courtyard. Our new church and scriptorium and refectory. The first time for everything. I had founded other monasteries, but I knew in my heart Clon Fert was my last. This was my crowning achievement; I could rest. I had done what God wanted of me.
She tread so lightly he did not hear her approach until she was beside him.
He felt her in the pores of his skin.
“It was good of you to come,” Brendán said without looking around.
She matched her steps to his. “How could I not?”
They walked a few steps in silence, folding their hands like people praying. Brendán said, “I tell the brothers that life is a school. It is. I’ve learned many lessons but not the lessons I expected to learn.” Daringly he added, “I’ve been given many gifts but not the gift I desired.”
“I’ve learned only one lesson, Braon-Finn,” she replied evenly. “We are given what we need, not what we want.”
They paced the perimeter of the courtyard in perfect step. Somewhere nearby a cricket chirped. A nightjar sounded its purring trill. Otherwise it was very quiet; the monastery seemed to be holding its breath. When they reached their starting point they made another circuit.
We did not talk, there was nothing we needed to say. Yet on that night I was more alive than ever in my life.
Before they parted, Íta brushed his forehead with her lips, a touch as light as a butterfly’s. She kissed each of his eyes in turn. “Your blue eyes,” she said.
I have known ecstasy.
The sea was calm, the waves little more than ripples. The sails were empty of wind. We drifted for a time. Our last landfall had been on a shore where the water was polluted. I had warned the monks against the water but some drank anyway, and were ill. I was content to wait until they felt better before pushing on.
Then Aedgal announced he saw an island some distance away. Those who could man their oars rowed towards it. As we approached land I told the brothers, “Three choirs live on that island. One is composed of boys, the second of youths, and the third of elders.”
“How do you know?” asked Solám. “Have you been there before?”
“Never in my life,” I told him truthfully.
The island was extraordinarily flat, like the top of a table. The air was very still. When we landed the boat we saw no trees, no bushes, nothing that would blow in a wind. Yet everywhere on the ground were huge clumps of white and purple fruit, plump and tempting to the eye.
Three choirs constantly moved from place to place among the clumps of fruit. One choir was composed of boys, one of youths on the brink of manhood, and one of old men.
The brothers turned to me in astonishment.
“How did you know about this?” Crosán asked.
I had no answer.
The choir of boys, who were dressed in white robes, stopped and chanted in sweet, childish voices, “The saints will go from strength to strength and see the God of gods in Zion.”
No sooner did they finish this verse than the youths, who were attired in blue robes, took it up. The air was echoing with their words when the elders began the same chant. It was repeated over and over again in this fashion.
We listened in wonder. The music was incredibly beautiful but the singers paid no attention to us. I was not sure they could even see us.
We had landed in mid-morning; the choirs sang until a bell rang for Prime. Then they all dropped to their knees and prayed, as we did ourselves. Afterwards the singers came towards us and embraced us warmly, welcoming us to their island. They brought basins of water to bathe our feet and pitchers of fruit juice to slake our thirst. While we refreshed ourselves they began singing again. Their voices were so pure none of us had the audacity to join in—except for the youngest of the three latecomers who had demanded to join us.
When the choir of youths chanted, “May God be merciful to us…” and followed it through to the end of the psalm, he sang with them. His voice blended so perfectly we could not distinguish it from theirs.
At Terce the psalms were “Out of the depths,” and “Behold how good,” and “Praise the Lord O Jerusalem.”
For vespers the choirs chanted, “A hymn is due to thee O God, in Zion,” and “Bless the Lord, O my soul, O Lord my God,” and “Praise the Lord, children.”
To all of this we listened with a sense of profound peace and joy. But only the latecomer sang.
Instead of sunset, a cloud of extraordinary brightness covered the island, shimmering with a hundred rainbows. We lay down on the soft grass amid the delicious fruit, and slept and ate and slept again. “This cannot be Paradise,” said Tarlách, though he sounded unsure.
The next day was the same. The three choirs chanted the psalms for the canonical hours while my crew and I rested and restored our strength. Then the chief elder, who had never identified himself or his companions by name, began the prayers for the Lord’s Communion. In this we gladly partook.
When the sacrifice was over, two youths gathered a basket of purple fruit and carried it to our boat. “Accept this fruit from the Island of Strong Men,” they said. “Give us our brother to live with us in happiness and virtue, and go forth yourselves in peace.”
My crew exchanged glances. “Your brother?” queried Mernoc. “What do you mean?”
They went to the third latecomer. One put a loving arm around his shoulders; the other took him gently by the hand.
He turned towards me with a quizzical expression. “I do not understand, Brother Abbot. If, as you prophesied, this is God’s reward for a deed of great merit, there must be some mistake. I am a simple man; I have never performed a memorable deed.”
“God does not make mistakes,” I told him. “At some time in your life you have done something that seemed trivial to you but was great in the eyes of God. You may never know what it was, but God knows. God always knows.
“Embrace your former companions and go with those who summon you now. It was a good hour when your mother conceived you, and a good hour when you were born to enter such a community.”
When he had embraced all of my crew in turn I said, “My son, be mindful of the great favour God has conferred upon you. Go and pray for us who have not yet earned such joy.”
And we sailed on.
Chapter 25
Long before gods had names her ancestors had worshipped Those Who Are Sacred. Sky Fire, Birthing Woman, and Sweet Water.
As the scion of an ancient royal line, she had been educated. Ignorance is of no value. She could scribe her name in the sand with a rouged fingertip. She could recite the names of the Great Cities from Ur and Babylon to Nineveh and Tyre. With her own dark eyes she had seen Aleppo and Alexandria and even the ruins of exotic Algiers, destroyed by the Vandals.
Once her tribe had possessed great riches. Gone now. Looted, stolen, carried away on horses and camels and in the hot clutching hands of sweaty men. She too had been transported on horses and camels, like the treasure she was.
Now her only treasure was a small soapstone image of Birthing Woman. She thought the carved figure very beautiful. Immense mounded belly, heavy breasts swollen with milk. Life, bounteous and indestructible.
When she was young and beautiful her name had been murmured in Antioch; songs in her praise had been sung in Damascus.
The woman kept the soapstone carving inside her gown, between her breasts. She was ashamed that she had become so thin. “When our men ruled, our women were plump,” she whispered to herself. Speaking in the tongue of her vanished tribe gave her comfort.
So did caressing Birthing Woman. Or naming the Great Cities aloud to be certain she never forgot. She always began with Çatal Hüyük, the Ancient Mound in the center of the plain beyond the Taurus Mountains, where the first ancestors had built spacious apartments of mud brick and tilled the richest grain fields under the sun.
Until the winds of change blew.
The winds of change nothing can resist.
Çatal Hüyük was very long ago and very far away. The gods of war and acquisition had dispersed her people across Anatolia and beyond. They had put down roots wherever they could, and over the centuries other names had become part of their history.
Persia.
Syria.
Arabia.
And the wind blew and blew and the dust rose and swallowed towns that were supposed to last forever, and some men became kings and their children became slaves and everything changed. Prophets extolled new gods and the gods demanded bloody sacrifices and everything changed.
In an unstable world a beautiful woman could survive—if she was very clever.
Her father had sent the soapstone carving to her from his deathbed. The statue was her only inheritance, but it was enough. In the night she had fled from the tent of the last man who thought he owned her. She took only the tiny goddess and a bag of seeds, and let the wind blow her where it would. When she came to a patch of earth that called out for her seeds she planted them.
There was a town in the far distance. A poor and hopeless town. Nervously at first, the elders of the town approached her. Because she was creating a green heart for a barren land they thought she was holy. They knelt before her and listened to her jabberings in an unknown tongue and thought they heard truth.
When she was an old woman she sat in the shade and listened to the music of the wind blowing through her trees.
‘In the Year of Our Lord 560,’ Brendán wrote in his journal, ‘the abbess of Cill Íde died peacefully in her sleep.’
How can a mortal continue living after the immortals are dead? Erc. Brigid. Íta. Where has she gone? Has she abandoned me, is her soul fleeing through the spaces between the stars?
Brendán could not share his grief with anyone. He wrote a letter to Fionn-barr at Ard Fert and never sent it. He had thought Colmán’s strenuous exercises were beneath his dignity as abbot, but he resumed them. Throwing his body around as if he were a young man, trying to exhaust himself so he could sleep at night.
Sleep and not dream.
There was only one outlet for his unspent love. Brendán prayed with an urgency he had never known before. He prayed for his sister and each of his monks, for sunny days and rainbows after rain. He prayed for the people he had met on his travels—for Malo on the long-eared horse, and the woman in the desert, and Paul the hermit, whose hair had grown to cover his body, and a dark-skinned man on an unfamiliar shore who had welcomed him with a smile. He prayed for the bishop of Rome and the bishop of Byzantium and the abbot of Ard Fert. He prayed for birds and animals and the fish in the sea as fervently as he prayed for human beings.
His friends grew concerned about him.
“Brother Abbot looks strangely hollow,” Aedgal remarked, “as if the life’s been sucked out of him.”
Moenniu said, “Of course he’s hollow, he hardly takes a bite of food. I keep urging him to, but…”
“That isn’t the problem at all,” Tarlách interjected. “I know what’s wrong with him, it’s the dreadful weather.”
“According to Brother Abbot,” said Liber, “the weather is never dreadful, it’s always a gift from God. I think he has a sickness in his chest, myself.”
“It’s in his stomach,” Eber averred. “That’s why he has dark circles under his eyes.”
Gowrán shook his head. “Don’t any of you recognize grief when you see it?”
Fursu spoke up. “You mean he’s still mourning Brother Ruan? But that was years ago! And not my fault anyway,” the monk added under his breath.
Colmán listened to the conversation without comment, then sought out Brendán. He found him in the cell the abbot had built for himself; a small bare room furnished with two stools, a table, and a sleeping pallet. One of Brigid’s crosses hung on the wall.
Brendán was sitting on one of the stools, holding his head in his hands. He looked up as the monk entered.
“The brothers are worried about you,” Colmán said bluntly.
“I’m all right.”
“You don’t look all right. Brother Gowrán thinks you’re grieving. Are you?”
Brendán heaved a sigh and got to his feet. “The personal feelings of your abbot should not be refectory conversation.”
“That’s dog dung and you know it. This is me you’re talking to, Brendán.”
&nbs
p; “Brother Abbot!”
“Brendán,” Colmán reiterated. For a moment the warrior he had been looked out of his grey eyes. Brendán sat down again.
“We’ve walked together through sun and rain,” Colmán reminded him. “We’ve shared food and fire, told lies and admitted truth. You keep your knife in the scabbard I gave you. Do you think of that when you cut the bread?”
“Sometimes.”
“Then think about this too. You’ve made everyone here a part of your life. If you’re sorrowing, we have a right to share your sorrow and try to help you.”
I had once told Fionn-barr I didn’t want to be responsible for anyone else. At the time, I meant it. One of my many mistakes.
I was deeply touched that these men I had come to love felt responsible for me.
“Colmán—not Brother Colmán, not then—please believe me; nothing short of a miracle could help. Be patient. I’ll be all right.”
“I did the best I could,” Colmán reported to the other monks. “He didn’t deny he’s suffering, but he told me nothing about the cause.”
“The man’s entitled to his privacy,” said Gowrán.
For their sakes, Brendán made an effort to be his old self. It was difficult at first. The sun rose and the grain ripened; the sun set and the leaves fell.
And eventually the abbot of Clon Fert was able to laugh again.
He was laughing over a remark of Anfudán’s when one of the newer monks tugged at the sleeve of his robe. “Brother Abbot, you have a visitor. He says he’s the abbot of Ard Fert.”
‘My kinsman Fionn-barr came to me full of excitement,’ Brendán recorded in his journal. ‘I listened to his story.’
Brendan Page 24