The 13 th tribe

[24]

Although it was the dominant building within the monastery walls, the Church of the Transfiguration was small by modern standards. Built between 542 and 551, it was designed as a place of worship for the monks, not the public. Within, its marble, gold, and rare art could buy Trump Tower with a few million to spare.

Jagger quietly pulled open one of the heavy cypress doors, which had hung at the basilica’s entrance since it was new. He held it for Tyler, who stopped to gaze up at the inscription overhead. It was too dark to see the Greek words; still, Tyler recited from memory: “This is the gate to the Lord; the righteous shall enter into it.” As rambunctious as he was, the boy accorded the monastery a deference Jagger found hard to muster. It may have come from talking to the monks, or from his mother’s awe of the place’s venerable traditions and sites, but Jagger didn’t think so. He suspected it came from someplace more primal, someplace at the heart of Christ’s admonition to “become like little children.”

The righteous shall enter.

He almost said, Maybe I should wait outside, but he didn’t think his son would appreciate the joke.

Tyler smiled at him and stepped inside. Jagger followed and eased the door closed. The service had started. Across the nave’s floor of intricately patterned tiles, a monk stood at a lectern, chanting a prayer. The language was lost on Jagger-Byzantine Greek, he had learned-but its singsongy cadence and the reverence in which it was delivered instantly calmed the remnants of the nightmare’s emotions.

Jagger followed Tyler into the dark nave. The only light came from a lantern above the praying monk. They found a wooden bench against a wall and sat. Slowly, monks in black robes lowered brass lamps suspended from the ceiling, lit them, and raised them again. The lamps turned and swung, filling the room with an undulating amber glow. The chains and chandeliers, granite columns, and ornately decorated walls seemed to pulse with life. Above the altar, mounted to a beam that spanned the room, hung a massive gold-painted crucifix-upon which Christ appeared to be gasping for breath. As the lamps settled, Christ’s breathing slowed and stopped. Jagger felt, simultaneously, a shiver along his spine and a warmth filling his chest.

The monk at the lectern finished and backed away. Another monk stepped up and began chanting a passage from a leather-bound book the size of a gravestone. Moving as stealthily as shadows, monks roamed the church, stopping at icons to light candles and pray. A monk appeared from one of the nine tiny chapels that lined the sides and back of the church, waving a smoking lantern. The smell of lilacs and charred timber filled the room.

The fifteen-centuries-old structure… the religious relics from every century since… the strange combination of majestic splendor and subdued humility… the ancient words and bowed servants: at that moment, the church felt like a bit of heaven on earth, like one of the mansions Jesus promised to prepare for his saints. It wasn’t hard to imagine God himself setting this place here, at the base of the mountain on which he spoke to Moses.

Jagger felt like a trespasser. It wasn’t that he didn’t believe in God; he had spent too many years studying the Word, praying with Beth, attending church to completely reject the idea of the Almighty. He just wasn’t so sure he liked God, wasn’t so sure God liked him… or any of his creations. Intellectually, he understood what C. S. Lewis called the “problem of pain” as it related to reconciling human suffering with a loving God. He grasped the concept of Isaiah 55:8: For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways. That is, humans don’t establish the standards of what is right. And Jagger would have argued God’s position-until it had leapt off the pages of theological and Christian-living books and gouged out his heart. He felt bloodied and beaten, left for dead in a ditch, the glassy eyes of the Bransfords glaring at him.

Still, Jagger hoped that it was he who had the problem, not God. If it were God’s problem, all was lost; life was meaningless. But if he, Jagger, just wasn’t getting it, then there was a chance of finding peace once more, of reclaiming the comfort he’d known back when he believed God was good and caring.

It was this hope, small as it was, that had driven him to take his present job. If he couldn’t bring his spirit to God, he could at least put his body someplace where God’s presence was everywhere: in the work being done, the conversations being shared, even the mountains being climbed.

Beth, smart gal that she was, had agreed. Last night he’d almost told her he was coming around. He was happier-with her, with Tyler, with life in general. God was more on his mind than he’d been in the States. How could he not be, here? But Jagger wasn’t sure he felt any closer to him or that his attitude about the Big Man’s disposition toward mankind had improved.

A monk floated past them, the hem of his robe whispering along the floor. Jagger leaned into Tyler’s shoulder to tell him it was time to go. He glanced over to see the boy’s head bowed, hands clasped in his lap. His son was praying. Jagger wondered what he was bringing before God. He thought he knew, and his heart ached. He wanted to give Tyler something-hope, maybe-so he mimicked his son’s body language, interlacing his fingers and closing his eyes. He vowed to stay that way until he knew Tyler saw him, but then a strange thing happened. He forgot about Tyler and found himself tentatively, even reluctantly talking to his Creator.