IX

The Bishop

AS THE GIRL'S DISTRAUGHT FIGURE disappeared in the distance, a portly man just past middle age, wearing a Roman collar and a large ring, approached the steps. He turned and looked back at the girl, then up the two steps to the owner, and said, "Have you turned her away?"

"Not exactly," was the answer. "She seems to have turned herself away."

"But aren't you going to call her back?"

"I already have," said the owner. "She doesn't appear to be interested."

"But you have to make her interested, don't you realize that? You've taken the wrong approach. Do you want her wandering around out there in the cold and dark forever?"

"If that is what she herself prefers, well yes."

"But that's ridiculous! How could she prefer it?"

"Some seem to. Perhaps after a time ... But so far, no one who has turned away has come back."

"That's just the point. They probably can't find their way back here, once you send them away--especially if you make no effort to go after them!"

"For your information, they can, if they choose. None have chosen, that's all."

"Well no wonder, if what they're coming back to is some rigid taskmaster who's more interested in seeing to it that his commands are carried out than in the people he's supposed to love so much! I know you better than that."

"You do, do you?"

"Of course I do. It's just that you give the wrong impression. People get lost in the dogma, and forget that there's a pastoral dimension to everything too."

"In other words, you don't think I make a very good shepherd."

The Bishop laughed. "Well, I'd be the last to say that, wouldn't I?"

"Oh, I don't suppose you'll be the last," returned the owner.

"I mean, it's obvious to me," said the Bishop, "that that poor girl's situation is only temporary, and all based on a misunderstanding, and everything is going to be all right in the end."

"You're right that it's based on a misunderstanding. And whether it's will be all right in the end depends on what you mean by 'all right.' She will have what she prefers, whatever that is."

"You see? I know you. I can't believe there's not a room ready for her right now, and that you'll be welcoming her back the way the father welcomed the prodigal son in the story you told."

"You're right that the room is there, and I am ready to welcome her back when and if she comes. I am not angry with her."

"I told you so. But if you'd been just a little more gentle and flexible, you could have avoided all this unpleasantness. --Of course," he added, catching a look from the owner, "I'm not really accusing you of inflexibility either; it's probably due to the way she was taught about you, and she probably has to unlearn a good deal."

"She has to change her attitude toward me, at least," said the owner.

"For instance, she probably heard the intepretation of that story in terms of the two sons, the prodigal and the older brother, and was told to compare herself to one of them. But the way I preach it, I concentrate on the father. I think of the older son as representing the conservative wing of Christianity, who can't understand what the modern world is coming to; and the younger son is the liberal wing, who think that this Christianity stuff the conservatives talk about is just too confining.

"But the father is there, you'll notice, right in the middle of the road, welcoming in the prodigal, and welcoming in the older son when he complains about the treatment the prodigal is getting."

"The father is the moderate, in other words."

"Right. He's in the middle, where the truth is, and so he can see both sides."

"Really. Then why didn't he go looking for the prodigal?"

"Oh, he would have; except the prodigal came home. They always do. Remember, the woman looked through the whole house to find the lost coin, and the shepherd left the ninety-nine sheep and went after the stray."

"Let's extend the story a little bit. Suppose he goes looking for the son and finds him feeding the pigs. He asks him to come home and the son refuses. What does he do?"

"I imagine he'd reason with him."

"And after that, do you think he'd say, 'Here's another thousand, son. You can't think straight if you're breaking your back feeding these pigs. Take this and consider your life.'"

"I suppose he might."

"I thought you would. And what would the son do with the extra thousand?"

"Well, take it and find himself a decent place to live and reconsider his life based on how kind his father is."

"He wouldn't just spend it on prostitutes and then go back to the father for another 'loan' when it was gone?"

"Well, he might, of course. There's always that risk."

"In other words, the father would risk subsidizing the prodigal son's lifestyle, because he's in the middle of the road, and neither a conservative nor a liberal."

"Well, that sounds a little crude as you put it. It implies that the father approves of what the son is doing. He loves the son."

"And loving the son involves subsidizing his life of sin."

"Well ... sin."

"What would you call it?"

"Well, if you want a term, I'd call it an unhealthy lifestyle. I'd even go so far as to say that it was self-destructive behavior. But sin ... you see, sin has this connotation of an angry God who's going to send you into fire and brimstone if you violate his orders."

"Or perhaps let you wander in the darkness."

"Exactly. And you're not like that. The father welcomed the son back. And notice, he didn't ask for any 'atonement' or 'reparation' for what he'd done; he just killed the fatted calf because he'd come back."

"But in the story, he did wait until the son came back, and in fact welcomed him only after the son had completely changed his attitude."

"Well of course, but that's not the point of the story. The point of the story is that he welcomed him and didn't make him pay for his 'sin,' if that's what you want to call it; and that the older son's attitude was the one he condemned."

"Well now, he didn't condemn the older son."

"You're right, he didn't; I stand corrected. But that just reinforces the point I'm trying to make. He welcomed both of them, liberal and conservative."

"But the one you call the 'liberal,' only after he's returned to what is presumably 'conservatism.'"

"But that isn't the message. That story, after all, comes right after the one of the shepherd going after the lost sheep. You can't say that the sheep had to undergo a change of heart before the shepherd would take it back."

"It would be a little difficult to be realistic, wouldn't it, and talk about repentant sheep?"

"But the fact is that the story doesn't require the repentance of the sheep. And the shepherd goes looking for it, and doesn't wait until it's trying to find its way back."

"So the repentance of the prodigal is only secondary, in your mind. It wasn't added to the sheep story precisely to correct the impression that repentance might not really make a difference."

"Well, repentance makes a difference, of course, but it's more nuanced than you're making it out to be. You see, the prodigal was really doing himself damage without realizing it when he was engaging in his dissolute lifestyle. His repentance brought him in line with the truth, and in that sense it made a difference. But it wasn't that he was sorry he was disobeying an angry father, or was afraid of what his father would do to him if he caught him."

"He expected his father to treat him as one of his slaves, not a son any longer," said the owner.

"Well yes," answered the Bishop, "but you and I know that his father wasn't going to do that; and if he'd thought about it enough, he would have realized that too."

"You think his father would not have left him there feeding the pigs, supposing he hadn't come to his senses."

"I don't think his father would have left him there forever, no. And neither do you. Admit it."

"What would you have? Would the father go to see him and pick him up on his shoulders like a lost sheep and carry him back, kicking and screaming, to his family?"

"Of course not. He'd go to him and find some way of persuading him to realize what he was doing to himself and return on his own two feet. That father is a very, very clever father."

"And children are never perverse enough to withstand his blandishments."

"You have a way of putting things, don't you. Why would he have children who were only going to ruin their lives eternally? It doesn't make sense."

"It makes sense if he has enough respect for them not to try to manipulate them into doing something they don't want to do."

"Ah, well there you're avoiding nuances again. What do you mean, they 'don't want to do' it? Nobody wants his own destruction; they want to be happy; so the prodigal really wants to live in the family, and is just deluded about what he really wants. So the father's 'blandishments,' as you call them aren't 'manipulation,' they're simply the revelation to the 'sinner' of what the truth is about his situation. And anyway, what are threats about hellfire except manipulation?"

"What about a description of the way things really are?"

"Oh, come now. You're not going to tell me that there's really a pit of fire and sulfur that sinners dance around in with devils prodding them with pitchforks!"

"No more than that heaven is one eternal literal banquet. But does that mean that the psychological equivalent doesn't really exist?"

"I'm sorry, but I just don't buy all that; it's all rhetoric. The God I believe in is a compassionate God, and would never tolerate leaving his beloved children in eternal torment, whether it's physical or psychological."

"And if they prefer eternal torment to a life in Abraham's bosom? If they'd find it more torture to endure what most of us would call happiness than to pursue their own chosen lifestyle?"

"You mean, no matter what pain that lifestyle causes them?"

"Yes."

"That's absurd. Why would they do it?"

"Oh, there are many reasons. Because they hate me for making them blind, for instance. Or for forgiving someone they themselves can't forgive."

"They don't hate you. Not really."

"They certainly make a good show of it."

"No, you don't understand. They're just upset by the situation they're in. This is what I was talking about. If you show yourself as kind and gentle and compassionate--as you really are, in other words--then they'd get over their temper tantrum and embrace you. They always have with me when I've shown you this way."

"Yes, they have. I've seen it. Unfortunately, when you show me this way, what you're saying, in effect, is that I'm going to make reality conform to what they want it to be, rather than forcing them to accept it as it is."

"Well now, you're talking in terms of black and white again. Anyway, you can't 'force' people to accept anything they don't want to accept."

"Which was just my point. If they will not accept it, they will not accept it; it's their choice."

"No, no, no, you keep misunderstanding me. What I meant was that you can't force people to accept things; but you can explain things to them in such a way that they realize that it wasn't the rigid black-or-white, sin-or-virtue situation that they thought it was."

"Suppose it is black-or-white."

"Oh, come now. Nothing is ever black or white."

"Nothing? Ever? Even 'Nothing is ever black or white'?"

"Good heavens! Who would ever believe that you, of all people, would start spouting sophisms!"

"I was just pointing one out."

"You know what I mean! Reality isn't some fixed lump of rock that is rigid and immovable forever and ever. Reality can be modified; think of how we've progressed over all the centuries in reshaping our world--just as you yourself intended. And reality has, as you so well know, an infinite number of facets; you can't just focus on one or two to the exclusion of all the others."

"So you're telling me that if I run into a recalcitrant servant who, instead of listening to me, proceeds to tell me how to manage my universe, I should find some new facet of reality which will mollify him, and then I can win him back to me."

"Well isn't that the loving and compassionate thing to do? He's lost without you. You have to listen as well as talk, or there's no dialogue."

"And after all, dialogue and presumably consensus is what we're really after."

"There, you see? I told you I knew you. It's just a matter of emphasis."

"The emphasis being that instead of just asserting my will for my creatures, I should listen to them and modify it so that we can come to a consensus."

"Of course. You know that. I didn't need to tell you that."

"You apparently thought you did."

"You seem to think I don't realize who I'm talking to."

"What you've been saying is open to that interpretation, to say the least."

"Well, but you see, I know you. After all, I've been talking to you for a good fifty years and more."

"Yes, that's very true, isn't it? You've been talking to me for years and years and years. But now that we've reached consensus on this, perhaps we should postpone further dialogue for the moment. You'd like to see your room, I presume."

"Well yes, I would, if it isn't too much trouble."

"First, before we go in, do you know the name of the door in front of you?"

"The name? It's a beautiful door, of course. Carved oak, isn't it? But does it have a name?"

"Indeed it does. Its name is 'reality.'"

"Ah, I see," said the Bishop. "Very clever. You mean, I'm now facing reality."

"Exactly. You always were quick and capable of catching subtle nuances. The reason I'm telling you, however, is that most people find reality something of a shock. We have been having this conversation, actually, not simply to pass the time, but to prepare you for the experience. I make it explicit now to be sure that you are forewarned."

"Oh, I think I'll be able to handle it. Lead on."

The owner opened the door and passed through, with the Bishop following. As they entered the foyer, the owner grew larger and larger, until he was at least three times as tall as he had been outside; the Bishop's eye was now at the level of his kneecap.

As he stepped over the threshold, the Bishop shrank back a bit, but then took a deep breath and trotted, feeling ridiculous, after the enormous figure who was preceding him down a long corridor. The Bishop wanted to protest the speed, but had no breath to spare. A single stride of the giant was a dozen of his, and no concession seemed to be being made for the sudden difference in size.

Unfortunately, the mansion was quite large and they seemed to be going into one of the farthest wings. "This is the area I have reserved for my chosen slaves," came the booming voice from above. "Your room is down this corridor."

There were many very ornate doors, worthy of kings rather than slaves, on either side of the passageway; but there were others that looked as if they opened into very definite servants' quarters. It was in front of one of these that the owner stooped, about to turn the handle.

The Bishop stopped, gasping, looking up into the enormous face of the owner. "Sl--slaves?" he managed finally to say. "I thought you called us 'friends.'"

"Indeed I did," said the owner. "I preceded it, however, with 'You call me "master" and "teacher," and you are right, because that is what I am.' I choose to call you 'friends' and to make you children; but that is my choice, just as you yourself were my choice, not I yours. I had a mission for you to perform."

The Bishop had found his breath by that time. "I know that. I tried my best to fulfill it. It was to love others."

"As I loved you. Did I make life easy and comfortable for my people?"

"I know that you wanted to."

"Do you. The time for all of this is gone. Do you want to see the room?"

The Bishop looked up at the owner, surprised at his tone, and then meekly answered, "Yes, please."

The owner opened the door, ducked under the lintel, and both entered. "But--but this is a--a tomb!" said the Bishop. It certainly looked like one, or like a dungeon. The walls were huge blocks of rough stone, and instead of windows at eye-level and below, there were niches which held caskets of various sizes and degrees of ornateness.

Fearful of what they held, the Bishop went over to one and gingerly lifted its lid--and discovered that inside it was just what one would have expected: a collection of bones and rotting flesh. In speechless horror, he looked up at the owner.

"These," was the deafening reply, "are the remains of the people your stupid 'compassion' affected. Some will in fact occupy their rooms in spite of you; but the hearts of many were hardened against reality by your sophistical attempts to pretend that I did not really mean what I was saying."

"I don't know what to say," said the Bishop. "I'm shocked! Shocked! You can't be the bloodthirsty God the hellfire preachers rant about. This must be some kind of joke."

"The joke is what you made of my attempt to explain to my people what they actually were, and that they could not make reality over into something else simply by declaring it to be what it was not. I sent you to deliver my message to people so that they could be saved--and you spent your life arguing not with unbelievers, but with me, because it did not suit your puny idea of what I and my reality ought to be. You succeeded not only in deluding yourself, but in seducing my beloved into sin, and not only into sin, but into sin in my name!

"Fortunately for them and you, neither of you fully realized what you were doing. Many of them will be saved through their sincere adherence to the errors into which you led them, since they thought they were following the authentic shepherd. You are capable of being saved because you were too stupid yourself to be aware of the implications of your rebellion--so stupid that you were able to convince yourself that it was service to me and not Satan."

"Satan?" said the Bishop in a small voice.

"You were warned that he masks himself as an angel of light; but his object is to convince mankind that it has control over reality, and can remake it simply by a technological manipulation that allows it to appear the opposite of what it is. You, for instance, championed sex-change operations for those dissatisfied with what you call their 'gender'--as if an operation could actually change their genetic structure and the body that it built. You debased the difference between the sexes by reducing it to one of external organs and hormones."

"But the only important thing about gender--" "We will have no more of that! I have heard all your arguments. Instead of looking at the reality of what you were doing, you protested against me and my authentic representatives as being too harsh and not taking human reality into account, by which you meant human desires. Reality, as you now see, is not measured in by the strength of desire."

"But I can't believe--"

"Beware when you say that! You have hidden behind 'but I can't believe' as if it were an innocuous phrase. You can believe. Whether you believe or not depends on whether you choose to believe. I gave you much, not the least of which was a brilliant mind, which you have squandered on 'I can't believe,' finding all kinds of reasons why it is plausible not to believe. Now is the moment of truth. Do you believe or not?"

"I believe. I believe in a God of forgiveness and mercy."

"Your task in the next few days is going to be to discover whether you believe in the God who is letting you have the heaven you have constructed for yourself, which is this room, because this room is the result of your use of the commission I gave to you to be my emissary to my people. Instead of flinging you out into the darkness, I permit you to remain here, and to study the contents of those caskets. As you understand what each of them contains, they will disappear, and a window will open in this room onto the landscape in which the people whom your penance will save will find their happiness. Eventually, when you have made atonment for all the damage you have done to them, you yourself will be able to leave the room and wander outside, and eventually even furnish the room itself to your liking. That is my mercy toward you."

"Do I understand you? You're sentencing me to prison?" squeaked the Bishop.

"For your misuse of my gifts. You were ordained presbyter: an elder, and elders are supposed to be wise with tradition, not sophomores full of their own cleverness, looking for innovations. You were then ordained as my emissary, whose function was to preserve my truth intact and transmit it through the ages, not to distort it according to the 'wisdom' of the spirit of the age. Your mind was to be my mind, not to remake my mind unto your own image and likeness, whatever your 'compassion' for my people."

"Then why did you create me with a mind," said the Bishop, flushing, "if you don't want me to have a mind of my own?"

"When you chose to be my emissary, you freely gave up the 'mind of your own.' My thoughts are not your thoughts, and for us to be one, your thoughts must be transformed into mine, not the other way round."

"This has to be a nightmare! I can't believe it's happening! It's the very opposite of everything I've stood for and struggled for!"

"Exactly. It is time to face reality; you can no longer evade it."

"But--"

"It is also no longer time for objections. These are the facts. You will be locked in here for a few days because that is the only way you will be able to circumvent your considerable powers of evasion. After that, you may leave and wander in the darkness, where you will wail and gnash your teeth, and I will declare that I never knew you; or you will begin the slow process of undoing the harm you have perpetrated in your foolishness."

"You can't do this to me! You can't!"

"You have done it to yourself. It is not your blindness which will condemn you; it will be your persistence in saying that you can see. The only way you will open your eyes is if you are locked in here; and therefore, in spite of your protests, it will be done to you. The choice afterward is yours.

"But--"

"Farewell."