Judas the Apostle, page 21
She said weakly, “The word ‘condemned’ might also be translated as ‘damned,’ but I hardly think that matters at this point.”
The monsignor flopped back into his seat and was quiet for a long moment. “Signorina, this language confirms our hypothesis that there was a prior writing by Judas. In this context, the only possible interpretation is that the ‘condemned’ or ‘damned’ one would be Judas.”
“Agreed,” responded Cloe. “And ‘taken from the hand’ certainly suggests a writing by Judas. If true, we would have to assume that Judas kept some sort of journal or what we would call today a diary.”
“We cannot know that, Signorina,” replied the monsignor. “But it is a theory and one that bears further research. Why would a literate man write only about the last few days? We may never know.”
“But what of the rest?” asked J.E.
“Whatever ‘it’ was, it was presented to the bishop of Lugdunum, whom we now know as the bishop of Lyon and who was none other than Irenaeus. We believe that Irenaeus sanctioned our Greek version of the Judas Gospel to set the record straight. Right?”
“Yes,” said Cloe as she focused on the image on the wall. “Monsignor, what is the library of St. John?”
The monsignor appeared to think for a minute. “I had forgotten about this until this very moment, but there is a relationship between St. Irenaeus and St. John the Evangelist. As you know from our discussions, there are several ‘Johns’ mentioned in the Gospels, and it is sometimes difficult to know who is who. However, it is generally thought that the Gospel of John was written by St. John the Evangelist, who many scholars believe to have been John the Apostle. John had a pupil named Polycarp, later St. Polycarp, who was born in Asia Minor. Polycarp was directly taught by St. John, who obviously knew both Jesus and Judas.”
Cloe could see that the monsignor was becoming excited at the connections that were coming out of the manuscript.
“But what’s the connection?” asked J.E., impatiently rising and squinting at the Greek translation. “No offense, Monsignor, but who the hell is this Polycarp guy?”
“Well, that’s the thing,” said the monsignor. “Polycarp was the mentor and teacher of Irenaeus, who also was born in Asia Minor—possibly in what is now Turkey but what then would have been, at the time of Christ, the Kingdom of Armenia.”
“The Armenian connection again,” retorted J.E. “Why does all this seem to point to Armenia?”
“I’m sure it’s just a coincidence that Irenaeus and his mentor were from that area, as is, possibly, our adversary,” responded the monsignor.
J.E. turned and said quickly, “You know how I feel about coincidences.”
Cloe jumped in. “Okay, we have St. John, who personally knew Judas and Jesus and who taught St. Polycarp. Polycarp and Irenaeus were from the same general area, and Polycarp was teacher and mentor to St. Irenaeus. Our Judas Gospel speaks of the library of St. John, where this work of Judas supposedly lies. Where is the library of St. John?”
“It must lie in or under the Church of St. John, now the Church of St. Irenaeus, which is where we are going. It can be nowhere else,” said the monsignor. “The personal journal of Judas Iscariot must lie there.”
CHAPTER 43
“Think of it,” said Cloe. “The possibility of a contemporaneous writing of one of the Apostles … even Judas Iscariot. There are absolutely no such writings that have come to light. None. All of the Gospels were written decades after Christ’s public ministry. It’s not unreasonable to think that someone might have kept a journal. Indeed, it’s perhaps less credible to think that no one, of all the people that Christ touched, contemporaneously wrote about him and his mission. What if there really is a journal written by Judas setting forth the details of Christ’s journey or even a part of it?”
She sat back in her chair and contemplated the potential of such a writing. Her career was on the line here, but regardless of the enormity of the possible discovery, she had to do what was necessary to save Uncle Sonny. That might mean giving it all up. It was both a terrible choice and no choice at all.
“It would be earthshaking to say the least,” responded the monsignor. “We are ahead of schedule, so we can search to see what can be found at the church, if anything.”
“Correct, but we have one simple problem,” said J.E. forcefully, standing and turning to face Cloe and the monsignor directly. “There is a murderous bastard who will be at the Church of St. John at the appointed time waiting for us, and in spite of all our plans and good intentions to trade the Lejeune Manuscript for Uncle Sonny, I seriously doubt our man will keep his bargain. I fully expect some sort of double-cross on his part. You don’t really think that we’ll walk into the church and turn over the jar and everything else to him, and he’ll say, ‘Here’s Sonny,’ do you? You think we’ll all then leave and live happily thereafter?”
“No,” said Cloe. “But what are our options? If we don’t show, Sonny dies. If we resist, Sonny dies, as well as most or all of us. What can we do?”
J.E. felt a little defeated because there was no good answer. The only thing he could say was something that he couldn’t say—which was that Uncle Sonny was a dead man almost any way you looked at it. After all, it was, as the monsignor had said, in God’s hands. He was okay with that. But he would do what he could to help God out.
“We will have additional help,” interjected the monsignor. “As you know, I have kept up my daily reports to my superiors at the Vatican. Vicar General Antonio Sigliori, known by friends and colleagues as Father Anton, holds a special post in the Vatican with the military ordinariate. Father Anton has control and oversight of the operations side of anything of a martial nature that we do outside of the Vatican. He will be awaiting us in Lyon.”
“Monsignor, I thought the Vatican was a religious organization, and the last thing it would have would be a special ops capability with a priest in charge,” commented J.E., with a wry smile.
“Remember, J.E. … while the pope is head of the Catholic Church worldwide, the Vatican is also a sovereign nation. It has no troops and no army, but its agents must go in harm’s way from time to time to do the Lord’s work. It’s best to be prepared.”
“Wow,” J.E. said.
Cloe wondered whether they would ever plumb the depths of this man and the people behind him.
J.E. then looked at his mother and said, “Mom, we’ll go to the church and see what we can find. We really have two goals. One is to save Uncle Sonny, and the other is to see if there is any truth to this ‘journal’ idea. Here’s the thing: understand that the other side is not very likely to keep any agreement they make with us.”
“This is no doubt correct,” said the monsignor. “But how do we approach this?”
“We expect and plan for treachery,” responded the young officer. “We have to carefully examine the area around and including the church. Every contingency must be considered. All our forces must be arrayed as cleverly as possible. If we don’t plan and execute properly, Uncle Sonny is dead, and we’re all mortally at risk.”
Cloe could hardly maintain her sanity, listening to this frank assessment of the potential for violence and death. This was certainly not the ivory towers of academia. She put her hands to her head as if to prevent it from flying apart. “God never gives us a challenge that he does not also give us the strength to meet,” she remembered her mother saying. She sat up straight, finding her backbone, and asked, “What is your plan, J.E.?”
CHAPTER 44
Upon their arrival in Lyon, Cloe and the monsignor used the computer facilities at the general aviation depot to do additional research on the area and on the church and tomb of Irenaeus in particular. As a result of the industrialization of the area around the church and loss of the residential congregation, the church had, indeed, just gone through the ceremony to be decommissioned as a consecrated Catholic house of God. There was only a skeleton crew of staff still present. Sadly, it was now just a tourist attraction.
All three travelers made use of the private terminal’s facilities to shower and change to clean clothes and then made arrangements to leave their luggage.
The monsignor introduced them to Father Anton, who had come to the airport prepared. The Swiss Guard doubled in size to eight with the addition of four guards brought by the priest. The guard who had been slightly wounded in the shootout in Louisiana showed little sign of any injury. Weaponry and tactical gear had been brought in on the Vatican jet. J.E. seemed pleased and impressed.
Father Anton was ten to fifteen years J.E.’s senior and had that lean, hard look of military men. His hair was close-cropped but beginning to gray. He listened a great deal and spoke little. What he did say, he said well, and everyone listened carefully. He was clearly used to authority. Cloe felt somewhat relieved, although their core predicament had not changed.
“Monsignor,” stated Father Anton, “we have developed some intelligence on our adversary as you requested. We worked on the assumption that we needed to take another look at the alleged death of the billionaire arms merchant who was well known as a ruthless collector of ancient objects.
“Most of our sources confirmed that he had, in fact, died. But with the fall of the Iron Curtain, we have been able to secure previously unknown KGB intelligence reports.” One such report flatly states the alleged death was faked. The conclusion of that report was the man, for reasons of his own, had decided to get out of the arms business and disappear.”
“Hence this collector may still be alive,” mulled Cloe softly.
“Yes, and in his native language, Armenian, the term would be pronounced ‘Ko-lek-tor,’” said the monsignor.
“Kolektor … Kolektor.” Cloe rolled the hard word off the end of her tongue. “So this may be our adversary.”
“It fits,” concluded the monsignor. “Anton, was there any other information?”
“Yes, the report contained a partial dossier,” replied Father Anton. “It seems this man was born in the mountains on the Turkish/Armenian border. His family was Catholic, and when the war broke out, they sought refuge at the Catholic Church in the region and hoped for expatriation to avoid the Turkish army. For reasons that are not clear from the report, they were denied any assistance. When the Turks arrived, many Armenians were slaughtered, including his family.”
“What happened to the boy?” asked J.E.
“According to the KGB report, the boy was pressed into the Turkish army and, in effect, grew up there.”
“My God, what a horror,” reflected Cloe. “No wonder he has become what he is.”
“Mom, no matter the circumstances, we all have choices,” stated J.E. “This man had his, and he made his bed. Remember, this murderer may have caused Thib’s death and Father Al’s death, and he has Uncle Sonny.”
Like a cold slap, this brought Cloe back to the center. “What else, Reverend Father?”
“Not too much. Some few sentences on his education in Europe and entry into the arms trade. The report suggests the KGB had thoughts of blackmailing him, but he was considered too dangerous, and his weapons trade was generally wreaking havoc in third world countries, which was part of the Soviet strategy at the time.”
“Too dangerous for the KGB … wow,” said J.E.
“Oh, a couple of footnotes,” Father Anton quickly added. “He is thought to have a home base in Jerusalem, and he has a broad and deep network of thieves, murderers, and operatives who are fanatically loyal to him. These are mostly Armenian.”
“Our foe now seems to have a name and an identity,” observed J.E.
“Yes, and given his family’s rejection by the Church during the war, we might surmise, a new and extremely powerful motive for wanting this particular jar and manuscript,” commented Cloe, as she turned to see the reaction of the monsignor to this revelation.
For once the monsignor had nothing to say.
***
Cloe and the monsignor now sat in the back of a taxi. The taxi driver initially had no idea where the Church of St. John was, but when they told him to take them to the Church of St. Irenaeus, he flipped the meter and sped off toward their destination. The day was stark, cold, and dreadfully gray. They traveled for a while on a highway lined with what looked like pear or plum trees, now leafless in the dead of winter. They exited onto the Rue des Macchabées, finally ending up on the Place St-Irénée itself.
The church was more modest and more modern than Cloe had expected, though the monsignor had told her that the present structure was a nineteenth-century version of a much older church. The Church of St. Irenaeus had been destroyed and rebuilt a number of times over the centuries. This latest iteration was only a couple of hundred years old, give or take. Some of its environs were much older.
Cloe rubbed her eyes with fatigue as she stepped out of the taxi. She had managed to catch a couple of hours of sleep on the plane after they made their tentative plans; however, the time difference was working against her. After the rushed packing, getting to the airport, and the long flight, it was now mid-afternoon local time on the day before the day of their crucial appointment. To her, it felt like early morning since that’s exactly what it was in Louisiana.
After their conference at the airport, while the monsignor and Cloe returned to the computer terminals to complete one last bit of research, J.E. and the operations group had rented a van and gone ahead to the church to spend some time assessing the tactical situation. J.E. and Father Anton would place the guard members in strategic locations to provide cover in the event of a double cross.
Although the man on the phone might not know of the additional help from the Vatican, he had been absolutely clear that any contact with the authorities would mean instant death for Uncle Sonny. Cloe had no doubt that their opponent would follow through on his threat, and accordingly, they had not alerted the local police. Whatever played out in the next few hours would depend on their wits and the good Lord.
She thought about this and the resurgence of her faith. She was coming to understand that her faith was a little like a very good friend that she had not seen for a while. Having run into that friend unexpectedly, she had taken up pretty much exactly where she had left off.
Her mother’s faith had been like a rock. It was hard and fast, and no questions were asked. Cloe felt a little differently. The fabric of her faith was more pliable, but she was coming to understand that it was no less indestructible than her mother’s. She could feel the solid shield of that faith encompassing and enveloping her. It had the feel of her mother’s arms. She would do what had to be done to get Uncle Sonny back, and she knew that, somehow, God would help her.
Now approaching the old church, Cloe and the monsignor paused at the Mémoire de Lyon plaque that adorned the building. The monsignor read out loud, translating from the French: “This was the primary place of worship of the Lyon martyrs, the first-century Christian martyrs in Gaul. The church and the neighboring calvary which overlook the city date from the nineteenth century. The church replaces one of the oldest churches in France, which was pillaged and rebuilt on several occasions. The admirably restored crypt, surrounding a Paleo-Christian apse, commemorates the martyrs of 177 and the first Lyon bishops: Pothin and particularly Irénée, one of the Fathers of the Church, who is buried in the church.”
Cloe said, maybe a little more lightly than she felt, “Well, it looks like we’re in the right place. We need to examine the burial area and crypt of Irenaeus in case he’s left us some clue as to the whereabouts of the journal.”
“Surely, Signorina, there can be nothing left from those days so long ago.”
“Maybe,” she responded, “but a few days ago we knew nothing of the jar, the manuscript, and its apparent reference to a journal of Judas Iscariot. Sometimes you don’t know what you don’t know. New information can make references that have been around forever now suddenly highly relevant. There may be some clue. No matter how small or innocent, if there is one, we have to find it.”
They climbed the steps and entered the quiet church, slipping away from the noise and commotion of the outside world. Cloe glanced about, noting the traditional pews, the nave, and the altar complex. The altar itself seemed bare after the decommissioning. There was only a single soul in the church, sitting in a pew about a third of the way up the main aisle. The penitent was obviously deep in thought and contemplation.
Cloe and the monsignor walked quietly up the aisle toward the recognizable figure. Cloe leaned over and hugged J.E. as he sat there, thinking or praying—she did not know which. She shuddered to think of the weight on the shoulders of her young son.
“Hey, Mom,” said J.E., standing, turning, and hugging her back as if they had not seen each other in a long time.
“Hello, Monsignor.” J.E. reached out to shake the monsignor’s hand. The monsignor gripped J.E.’s hand firmly, shook it, and gave him a man’s hug.
“How are you?” asked Cloe.
“I’m fine,” he said tiredly. He had gotten even less rest than Cloe. “We’ve spent our time carefully checking out everything that we could. But the place is virtually indefensible. It’s almost deserted. The only person we’ve seen is a kindly old priest who is the caretaker of the campus here at the church. Father Anton spoke with him, and it seems most of the church personnel have now been reassigned. Some are in Africa on a Thanksgiving mission and will return in time for the Christmas season. They will be reassigned at some point.
“Unfortunately, the priest has only been at St. Irenaeus for a few weeks, mainly in connection with the decommissioning. He seems to be something of an expert in defrocking churches. He knows relatively little about the church’s facilities and the grounds. The only maps he had were some drawings in the various guidebooks. He was not much help to Father Anton.
