Children of clergy -- Fiction; Clergy -- England -- Fiction
"I tried to get rid of my personal opinion," Mark explained. "I tried to
look at the question strictly from the standpoint of the member of a
community. As such I felt that the Reverend Brother was wrong to run
counter to his Superior. At the same time, if you'll forgive me for
saying so, I felt that you were wrong to give up Aldershot. I simply
could not arrive at a decision between the two opinions."
"I do not blame you, my son, for your scrupulous cast of mind. Only
beware of letting it chill your enthusiasm. Satan may avail himself of
it one day, and attack your faith. Solomon was just. Our Blessed Lord,
by our cowardly standards, was unjust. Remembering the Gadarene swine,
the barren fig-tree, the parable of the wedding-guest without a garment,
Martha and Mary. . . ."
"Martha and Mary!" interrupted Mark. "Why, that was really the point at
issue. And the ointment that might have been sold for the benefit of the
poor. Yes, Judas would have voted with the Reverend Brother."
"And Pontius Pilate would have remained neutral," added Father Burrowes,
his blue eyes glittering with delight at the effect upon Mark of his
words.
But when Mark was walking back to the Abbey down the winding drive among
the hazels, he wished that he and not the Reverend Father had used that
illustration. However, useless regrets for his indecision in the matter
of the priory at Aldershot were soon obliterated by a new cause of
division, which was the arrival of the Reverend Andrew Hett on the Vigil
of the Annunciation, just in time to sing first Vespers.
It fell to Mark's lot to entertain the new chaplain that evening,
because Brother Jerome who had become guest-master when Brother Anselm
took his place as cellarer was in the infirmary. Mark was scarcely
prepared for the kind of personality that Hett's proved to be. He had
grown accustomed during his time at the Abbey to look down upon the
protagonists of ecclesiastical battles, so little else did any of the
guests who visited them want to discuss, so much awe was lavished upon
them by Brother Raymond and Brother Augustine. It did not strike Mark
that the fight at St. Agnes' might appear to the large majority of
people as much a foolish squabble over trifles, a cherishing of the
letter rather than the spirit of Christian worship, as the dispute
between Mr. So-and-so and the Bishop of Somewhere-or-other in regard to
his use of the Litany of the Saints in solemn procession on high days
and holy days.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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