Whose Side are You On?

 The Virgin in the Ice is my last read in the Brother Cadfael series.  The books were written by Ellis Peters.  The setting is England during a Civil War between cousin contenders to the throne: Stephen and Maud.  In the middle is Cadfael's monastery.  Cadfael is not a priest.  He is a Benedictine brother.  He is the gardener, specifically of herbs, which makes him the medical person.

A boy and his older sister are lost on their way to Cadfael's monastery.  Cadfael is sent to another monastery, they could have gone to.  The siblings were accompanied by a nun and a monk.  Cadfael finds the monk, beaten close to death and nurses him at that monastery.  Retracing the monk's steps, still looking for the siblings, he comes across the virgin in the ice.  It turns out to be the nun chaperoning the girls.

It turns out that the girl is too head strong.  She set out on her own looking for her boyfriend.  Her brother comes to the monastery, grief stricken.  He tends to the ill monk.

To complicate matters, a band of vicious marauders is burning and looting the farmers.  Did they kill the nun?  What did they do with the girl she was chaperoning?

The girl makes it to her boyfriend, but he turned out to be a lout and she stabs him and runs away.  Fortunately, she finds refuge with a forester.

Oh, another mystery.  It seems a stranger seems to be looking for the sister and brother.  It can't be their uncle because he is on the other side, in this Civil War, and would be killed on sight.  

That ill monk gradually realizes that he was responsible for the group and feels guilty.  He gets out of his sick bed and leaves, presumably to find the girl.  The brother is charged to take care of him, so he accompanies him.

The kid brother thought he found help, but it turns out that the help was the band of bandits.  They take the boy for ransom because they could tell by his clothes that someone would pay to get him back.

In the background is Cadfael and the sheriff looking for the girl and the bandits, and possibly the stranger.

The boy is kept prisoner.  That stranger turns out to be working for the uncle.  He sneaks in where the boy is kept.  The two try to escape in the confusion when Cadfael and the sheriff attack the bandits.  Thrown in the confused, is the ill monk who is in a delirium and runs in like the mad man he has become, and the boy and his rescuer escape.

The boy and his rescuer make plans to go to his sister, who by now has found her way to the monastery.  They are to secretly meet and at a certain time to go home to their uncle.  Remember the rescuer cannot be caught because he's on the other side of the Civil War.  

Cadfael catches this strange rescuer and when he listens to his story, he realizes that he is his son.  The three make good their escape and Cadfael says prayers of thanksgiving, both for meeting his son, and for the children's return to their uncle.

Caught Between Right and/or Expedient

In reading Ellis Peters last Brother Cadfael, I came across an ethics question.  Does the end justify the means?  Of course not.  But...

It's not that simple. 

In various degrees, we are all sinners.  To acknowledge and accept that load is good.  Perhaps even to acknowledge and accept that load is good.  Perhaps even to acknowledge and accept it and not entertain either shame or regret may also be required of us.  If we find we must still say: Yes, I would do the same again, we are making a judgement others may condemn.  But how do we know that God will condemn it? His judgements are inscrutable... If the sin is one which, with all our will to do right, we cannot regret, can it truly be a sin? ...In the end, there is nothing to be done but to state clearly what has been done, without shame or regret, and say: Here I am, and this is what I am.  Now deal with me as you see fit....You do what you must do and pay for it.  So, in the end, all things are simple.  Brother Cadfael's Penance chapter 16.

Brother Cadfael says it is that simple.

Now, Brother Cadfael obeys the spirit of the law, not the letter of the law in every mystery.  So it's OK for him to devise nefarious means to justify a good end, or does it?  Should it?  Why can't everyone?

Let God judge.

Claiming Sanctuary

"God's reach is longer than man's; it had better be, otherwise we are all lost."

The Sanctuary Sparrow is a Brother Cadfael mystery. I enjoy medieval settings and Brother Cadfael circuitous solving of mysteries, plus seeing the hand of God in the solution. Ellis Peters, the author, manages to provide me with many hours of enjoyment with her Brother Cadfael mysteries.

In The Sanctuary Sparrow the protagonist is described as a hunted sparrow. He is a small, delicate man who races into the abbey, pursued by an angry mob intent on hanging him. The poor man races up the sanctuary steps and grabs hold of the altar cloth. 

 "...the great parish door suddenly hurled open to crash against the wall, and something unseen came hurtling and scrabbling and gasping down the length of the nave, reeling and fumbling and fending itself off from wall and pillar, heaving at breth as though run to death already...All Cadfael could see of the quarry was a thin arm and a fist hardly bigger than a child's that reached out of the chaos to grip the edge of the altar cloth with life-and-death desperation."


What the hunted man, Liliwin, was accused of was theft and attempted murder. As the story progresses, it certainly looks like he is guilty. There is romance too. In fact two romances are entertwined in the mystery, but one is ill fated. It is Cadfael's intuition and persistant investigatory techniques that lead to solving the crime.

Vengeance is Safe in God's Hands

 The Pilgrim of Hate by Ellis Peters is another Brother Cadfael mystery.  This series takes place in a twelfth century monastery.  It's time for the festival of Saint Winifred.  Many pilgrims come to the monastery at this time for pilgrimage, and physical and spiritual healing.  We do witness a physical healing of a lame boy, who discerns a calling to become a monk.

The boy's sister finds love with a dangerous knight.  What happened is that the one she loves is seeking vengeance and is following another man on a pilgrimage of penance.  

Brother Cadfael becomes involved because the lame boy was attended by Cadfael as was the man on the penance pilgrimage.  The penance involves walking barefoot to Dublin with a neck-chafing, heavy cross.  

I love the historical medieval setting.  The characterization is real, and the plot tense.  This is the tenth mystery in the Brother Cadfael series.  

Who Did This to You?

 The Potter's Field by Ellis Peters is another Brother Cadfael mystery.  A body has been found buried in a field.  Who was she, takes up about half of the story.  The reader figures out that she can only be one of two people and gradually, the name is known.

She had been murdered and buried with care.  Her arms were crossed over a wooden cross.  Her buriel place was safely away from anyone finding her.  But her grave was found when a plow unearthed some remains.  Her husband seemed the obvious suspect, but he was a monk, now.  He played innocent; he was kind of oblivious being very wrapped up in his religiosity.  A young monk professed that he loved the deceased, and she rejected him.  That's why he entered the monastery.  So, he was suspect.

Then there was a traveling peddler.  There was even another woman who could have killed her, but she moved on and was a help to Brother Cadfael.  But still.

The mystery is eventually solved by someone coming forward with a confession, but I won't spoil the story by telling you "Who done it."  

I found this book to be one of the best in the Brother Cadfael series.  It is a true medieval mystery. 

He/She

 

An Excellent Mystery (The Cadfael Chronicles, #11)
by 

Ellis Peters

Faith Flaherty's review

Aug 17, 2022  ·  edit

it was amazing

bookshelves: mystery

Read 2 times. Last read August 11, 2022 to August 17, 2022.

3 highlights (Private)

An Excellent Mystery by Ellis Peters is another Brother Caedfael mystery. I found this one different than the others. The protagonist is female. She was engaged to a crusader but he came home from the Crusades mortally wounded and broke the engagement off, so that his fiancee was free.

Her name was Julian. However, she didn't want to be free. She took her engagement as vows and finagled her way into his life. He joined the Benedictines and took the name Brother Humilus. Julian, with the help of a devoted servant, dressed as a young male and joined also, taking the name Brother Fidelis and consequently became the faithful caretaker of Brother Humilus.

Meanwhile, Brother Humilis' old lieutenant is seeking Julian to marry her. Of course, since Brother Fidelis is always beside Brother Humilis, he/she knows what's going on. Once Brother Humilus dies, in an accident, Brother Fidelis turns back to Julian in an ingenious way. (No spoilers)

A satisfactory conclusion.

Sortes Bibliae

The Holy Thief by Ellis Peters is the best one yet in the series.  The Brother Cadfael mysteries are set in medieval times and always seem to teach history interwoven throughout the story.  In this particular story, I learned about sortes Biblicae.  This is simply Bible roulette, where you open the Bible and blindly pick out a verse and use it to give you an answer.  When I've seen people use it, they fit whatever they want it to be, but in this story, it led to solving a murder.

The monks were using it to see who would win the relics of Saint Winifred.  The relics belonged to Cadfael's monastery in Shrewsbury.  However, the monks from Ramsey Abbey came on a mission to solicit funds to restore their Abbey.  While the monks were visiting, a flood threatened the abbey.  Furniture, etc. were moved to higher ground and the Ramsey Abbey monks rushed to leave before they were stuck in Shrewsbury.  After the monks departed, it was discovered that the relics of St. Winifred were stolen.  Also, the Ramsey Abbey monks were ambushed and robbed on their way home.  All the money they had collected was stolen, along with St. Winifred.

The robbers were only interested in the money and just tossed St. Winifred's reliquary aside.  When it was found it was brought to the nearby home of the Earl of Leicester.  The Earl brought it back to Shrewsbury.  The monks from Ramsey came back to Shrewsbury embarrassed and apologetic that one of their party must have stolen St. Winifred's reliquary.

There is a witness who can identify who took the reliquary.  Aldheim helped load the cart for the monks and he can point out the monk who was supervising the loading of the baggage.  But Aldheim is a shepherd and will come to identify the monk after his work in the pasture is done.  Unfortunately, Aldheim is murdered on his way.

The "holy thief" was a young novice by the name of Brother Tutilo, who claims he was told to move the reliquary to Ramsey by St. Winifred, herself.  Did she?  Tutilo's superiors believe him.  Tutilo, himself, is sincere.  This is where sortes Bibilae comes in.  The Shrewsbury insisted that St. Winifred's relics belonged to them.  But the Ramsey monks claimed that St. Winifred asked to be moved to their abbey.  Lastly, the Earl of Leicester pointed out that St. Winifred ended up at his estate.  Perhaps, that was her choice of residence?

While the sortes Bibilae was happening, the news of Aldheim's demise is learned.  So the Bible verses that are chosen include references to his murder.  It does seem evident that Brother Tutilo murdered Aldheim so he wouldn't finger him as the monk who took the reliquary.  But if not Tutilo then who?

Another Brother, enraged that Tutilo stole St. Winifred tried to kill him.  He thought he did, but it wasn't Tutilo he attacked but Aldheim, by mistake.  Tutilo was in the barn with a girl.  Yes, our "holy thief" was not a professed monk, yet.  He was still discerning his vocation.  It is obvious he doesn't have a vocation to consecrated life.  The girl Tutilo was with is a slave.  Yes, the author points out that slavery was frowned upon but did exist.  The slave girl and Tutilo make a sympathetic couple and the reader will root for them to be together.

Aldheim would have recovered if it weren't for another deadly blow on the head by the real thug who had actually stole the original money the Ramsey monks had collected for their abbey.  I'm not
spoiling the mystery by telling who committed the murder and how he was discovered.  Snitching is against the rules.

Cadfael # 1

A Morbid Taste for Bones, the first Brother Cadfael book, by Ellis Peters is a mystery. This is my second time reading it. Since I have the time now (COVID-19 quarantine) I thought I would finally read it. It didn't take me long to remember that I had already read it. The problem is, I didn't remember where the plot led, until after reading it. So I continued reading.

The first time I probably enjoyed the mystery. Who killed Rhisiart? Will the abbey get the relics?

However, this second reading I could see another layer of mystery. There is a battle between heaven and earth. The bones of St. Winifred are physical for sure, but they represent divinity. The people on earth are in conflict over these bones. Isn't there always a conflict between the spiritual and the physical? Thus Brother Columbanus spiritual ecstasies will bring him to rank high in the Benedictine order.

Peters' characters are very human. I enjoyed the monks' shenanigans. The villagers are more religious than the monks in that they accept religious mystery yet are also practical in their daily obligations.

The quarantine isn't over. On to Cadfael # 2.

St. Winifred

I'm reading about priest holes and came across the story of St. Winifred.  She is a new one for me although she has been referred to in the medieval poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.  Gerard Manley Hopkins wrote a drama entitled St. Winifred's Well.  Ellis Peter's Brother Cadfael books mention her frequently.  How come I haven't come across her before?

Winifred was a beautiful maiden and her holiness made her even more beautiful.  Legend has it that a rebuffed suitor chopped her head off.  (See the mark on her neck, in the picture.)  A spring of water sprung up where her head fell on the ground.  Winifred's uncle, Saint

Depiction of Gwenfrewy.

Beuno, managed to put the head back on her shoulders.  Winifred entered a convent and eventually became Abess.  She is the patroness of virgins and female infertility.

Pilgrimages to her well were popular.  People walked barefoot for the last mile.  Many miracles happened at her well.  One legend says that many pilgrims on their way to well fell through the ice into the stream.  They were immersed for a while until they were rescued.  Yet,  they were not cold afterward, in spite of wearing dripping wet clothes.

Monastic Science

 A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller, Jr. is a novel about life after a nuclear holocaust.  The novel is divided into three parts.  The first section, life is similar to what I imagine Medieval times were like--before the printing press.  The setting for all three sections is a monastery.  

I wonder if people who aren't familiar to life in a monastery would like this book.  I'm a fan of Brother Cadfael mysteries, so I know pretty much what monastic life was like.  The monks' patron is Blessed Leibowitz.  Leibowitz was martyred for booklegging.  He was a secular engineer who converted to Catholicism and became dedicated to preserving knowledge.  Hence, he was booklegging.  

The focus is on a novice, named Francis.  He fancies that he met Leibowitz, but he was fasting out in the desert--it's Lent.  No one believes him and later on in the other parts of the story we find out who Francis really did meet.  In this part of the story, it doesn't matter.  Francis, finds a hidden stash of papers, books, and other relics that might have been Leibowitz's.  Here is more criteria to offer for the postulation for the cause of canonization of Leibowitz.  Francis is sent to New Rome to bring a blueprint signed by Leibowitz; proof for consideration of sainthood.  Francis witnesses the canonization.  

On his way to New Rome he is accosted by bandits.  Evidently, the land is riddled with bandits and bad people.  They steal a blue print and the hand copy of the blue print.  Since the copy was copied with gold ink and decorated with fancy doodads, the bandits thought it was more valuable and kept it.  They gave back Leibowitz's relic.  When Francis told them that it took 12 years to copy the original, the bandits said he could buy it back for two heklos of gold.  Providentially, the pope gives Francis the ransom.  Unfortunately, Francis is killed by the bandits on his way back.  That's the end of the first section.

In section two, we meet Thorn Taddeo.  Thorn seems to be a title for honor or some sort of distinction.  Taddeo thinks the monks are hoarding their knowledge and hence obstructing advancement because the monks won't send their Leibowitz reference material out of the monastery.  Interesting, the monks are preserving knowledge and Taddeo accuses them of hoarding it for themselves, alone. So, petulantly, Taddeo goes to study at the monastery.  The monks, because of their protected accumulated reference materials, have learned to make electricity.  Needless to say, Taddeo is impressed. 

Also, another character appears--maybe not.  He is known as the Poet.  At times, I thought he could be the man Francis saw.  There's also a hermit hanging around the monastery.  He's a Jewish hermit.  The poet and the hermit don't affect the story; they add commentary.

Lastly, the time is the future.  Space ship transportation is not new.  In fact, a war where nuclear bombs exploding in outer space seem to have occurred.  The land and its people, including the monks, are suffering from radiation.  

For me, this section held the most interest.  There is a lady living in a village near the monastery.  Mrs. Grales has two heads (radiation effects).  She calls her second head, her child.  She's always pestering the priest monks to baptize her daughter, Rachel.  The reason they won't was a catechetical lesson for me.  The abbot won't baptize because women aren't allowed in the monastery and the ministry really belongs to a parish where sacraments are recorded.  Mrs. Grales said the parish priest wouldn't baptize Rachel.  The description of Rachel explains why a priest wouldn't baptize her.  It's questionable whether the growth on Mrs. Grales' shoulder was even alive, never mind human.  No one wanted to hurt Mrs. Grales' feelings and tell her that she was crazy and that thing she called her daughter wasn't even a human being.  

Also, an important catechetical episode involves the abbot and a doctor.  Everyone is suffering from the effects of radiation.  The monastery is open to the public for succor.  The doctors are treating people the best they can.  Those that are beyond hope for recovery, are sent for euthanasia.  The abbot opposes this and the arguments between the head doctor and the abbot are interesting.  Even more so when you consider that the author, Walter M. Miller,  Jr., commits suicide at the age of 73.

The reader also indirectly picks up the importance of apostolic succession.  The abbot foresees the destruction of earth and sends the following out to alpha centuri or somewhere else.  The monks are on a mission to evangelize wherever they land.  Hence, on board were no novices.  Only essential people needed for colonization: scholars, janitor, cook, priests, bishops and cardinals--to secure apostolic succession.  You need bishops to ordain other priests.  Of course, the memorabilia from the monastery were on board the spaceship.  It takes off successfully.

The monastery was not so lucky.  An atomic blast blew the monastery up.  The abbot, before he dies, runs to the chapel's tabernacle and takes out the ciborium containing the Eucharistic hosts.  Everything collapses.  The abbot is stuck under rubble.  Before he dies, Mrs. Grales, or rather her daughter finds the abbot.  Mrs. Grales' head is dead, but the daughter's is alive.  The abbot baptizes her conditionally.  She opens the ciborium and gives communion to the abbot.  She then very reverently closes the ciborium and places it securely under some rocks.

The novel ends with the last monk entering the space ship.  Before he closes the door, he takes off his sandals and slaps the soles together.  "Sic transit mundus," he says. Luke 9: 5.

St. Ewolda Where Are You?

 If you like to read thrillers, then Charlie Lovett’s novel, The Lost Book of the Grail, will suit you just fine. It is a unique kind of thriller, though. It’s not violent. There’s a mystery to solve. There’s romance. There are places to go where you know no one should be going, but you will follow curiously if anxiously.

The setting is in England with references to P.G. Wodehouse. The reader follows the adventures of Arthur and Bethany. These two are an unlikely pair. Arthur is a medievalist who resists modernity. He is aghast when he is introduced to Bethany.
1. She’s a wise mouth American. (Arthur is a wise mouth Englishman.)
2. She’s a computer whiz who comes into Arthur’s library to digitize the manuscripts (some date from the sixth century).
3. She has faith. Arthur is an atheist.
4. Bethany’s father is an Evangelical preacher. Although a nonbeliever, Arthur loves the rhythm and poetry of the psalms and attends all the monk’s hours.
5. She’s young—20’s. He’s 20 years older.

The adventure begins when Bethany starts putting two plus two together and squares it with her computer skill, to help Arthur find lost manuscripts. There are pressures from rich people who want to buy the old manuscripts, superiors who need money to keep the library open, and those who need to keep the cathedral viable.

The setting and story remind me of Brother Cadfael’s mysteries. There’s history from medieval times to the reformation. The author has his character explain how to make vellum and how the scribes made their ink and art work. Some of the manuscripts are written in Latin and some in Saxon and of course there’s a code that hints of where the Holy Grail is hidden.

The town, college, abbey, cathedral, and the ever important, St. Ewolda, are all fictitious. But they remind the reader of real places, saints, and characters. All in all, it’s fun.

Reading is Better the Second Time Around

When I went to enter my review on Goodreads, I saw that I had read this book eight years ago.  I knew it was familiar but I didn't remember what was going to happen.  So I kept reading.

I like Brother Cadfael's mysteries.  I enjoy the twelfth century history.  The setting is England during the civil war between Stephen and Maud.

St. Peter's Fair happens once a year, and this time a murder is committed.  There's usually romance in the stories and this one is no exception.  Emma and Philip will live happily ever after.  Emma's uncle was the murdered victim.  But she has no reason to be unhappy, for long.

There's always a happy ending.  What's not to like?

My First Father Gabriel Mystery

 The Sleeping Witness by Fiorella de Maria is my first Father Gabriel mystery.  Like Brother Cadfael's mysteries, Father Gabriel is a Benedictine monk.  I guess Benedictines have more freedom than your usual run-of-the-mill monk, because these two are always investigating murders outside the monastery.

Whatever happened to a monk's vow of stability?

The setting is important in the story.  I don't mean the place.  I mean the time--right after War II.  The people are affected by that war in many different ways, and I don't necessarily mean by being directly in it. Those that were directly involved, came home.  Therein lies the devil.  Everyone is damaged.

The wife of the local doctor was beaten into a coma.  She was in the concentration camp.  Her husband found her in the camp and nursed her back.  The murder victim was a camp guard in her camp.  The husband is the obvious perpetrator, but Father Gabriel keeps digging deeper.