O Canada! Our book is coming out in French (the Canadian variety)! Check out Graal Code: Enquête sur le mystère du Graal. Mais, oui, you can order your copy now, for June delivery. I can’t read much French, but I do love the cover.

Of course there are still some copies left in English: The Grail Code.

When I was a kid, my parents had an old, battered and tattered Family Bible, in the back of which was a long list of saints. I was fascinated by the entry for St. Aquilina. It was nothing but her name, of course — but her name was my name, and I was not accustomed to seeing my last name in lights. At nine years old, I couldn’t imagine a time or a place where people observed naming conventions that were different from my own. (Even Jesus had a last name, right? Jesus Christ.) What’s more, I could hardly imagine a Church where all the important people didn’t have names like McCormick and O’Brien.

Yet here was this little-girl saint, who apparently went by her last name, which happened to be my last name — a last name that ended in a vowel.

My distant cousin, my paesan, St. Aquilina had made it to the back pages of a Catholic Bible — and from an Irish publisher, no doubt, like P.J. Kenedy & Sons. I don’t recall whether I fantasized about a Da Vinci Code-style bloodline transmitting fortitude across the centuries, but I might have.

Fast-forward many years, to the advent of the World Wide Web. When my son first taught me how to surf, he plugged in our surname, to impress me with a vanity search. And who should we find but my long-lost cuz, St. Aquilina, the child martyr of Byblos, Lebanon. The Maronite Research Institute had built up an impressive virtual shrine of scholarship in her honor, all sumptuously illustrated.

She’s not a Father. She never even reached the age to be a mother! But she lived in the patristic era, and so she lives within the purview of this blog, and she’s worth getting to know.

Aquilina was born in Byblos in 281 … She received her catechism from Evthalios, Bishop of Byblos. Her heart was inflamed with the love of Christ; hence her faith and fervor radiated like the sun in Byblos and its surroundings. At the age of twelve, Aquilina began an endeavor to spread Christianity among her compatriots. That was done through her example and teachings driven by the zeal of apostles and the innocence of children. Due to her preaching, many of the pagans were baptized, especially young lads and maidens. She was reported to and brought before Magistrate Volusian during the reign of Emperor Diocletian, and, according to ancient tradition, this dialogue took place:

“I am Christian,” she answered, when Volusian questioned her.

The Magistrate said, “You are leading your friends and comrades away from the religion of our gods to the belief in Christ, the Crucified. Don’t you know that our kings condemn this Christ and sentence to death those who worship Him? Leave this error and offer oblation to the gods and you shall live. If you refuse, you shall undergo the most atrocious sufferings.”

You can guess where this story is going. I’m told that Aquilina is to the eastern churches what Agnes is to the west: an icon of Christian innocence crushed under the heel of Diocletian, in the Roman Empire’s last, worst, and most systematic persecution.

Read the rest of Aquilina’s story at the website of the Maronite Research Institute, an organization that has sponsored great work on the eastern Fathers, but is struggling now for want of funds.

In some online discussions of the Syriac Fathers, scholars actually refer to the Aramaic translation of the New Testament as the “Pe****ta,” in order to foil filtering software. The crosses we must bear…

I’m convinced that what made Irenaeus such a great saint is that he had the stamina and the stomach to suffer through all the gnostic works. We don’t know for sure how the man died, or whether he was a martyr, as some late biographies aver. But there is perhaps a greater martyrdom in reading apocryphal gospels cover to cover, one after another, shelf after shelf. Irenaeus read enough, after all, and read closely enough, to provide definitive analysis of all the polymorphous varieties of gnosticism concocted up till his time.

All that is mere prelude to my praise for Amy Welborn’s book De-Coding Mary Magdalene — because, gosh, she not only read the ancient gnostics, she read the neo-gnostics as well. I’ve been patting myself on the back for finishing The Da Vinci Code (on the third try). But Amy’s actually read Margaret Starbird, Baigent and Leigh, and other modern heirs of Valentinus and his dreary ilk.

The genius of De-Coding Mary Magdalene is the author’s patient and charitable effort to disentangle orthodox tradition from many strains of fanciful legends, heretical fictions, and artistic conventions. The Fathers are everywhere in this book, especially Irenaeus, Hippolytus, and Gregory the Great. But so are the better modern exegetes, such as N.T. Wright, and critics of gnosticism old and new, such as Philip Jenkins. In the end, we see that the Mary of the canonical gospels — the historical Mary — shines brighter than any of the made-up (and now made-for-Hollywood) versions.

Amy’s chapter analyzing gnosticism as a wider cultural current includes helpful summaries of the most infamous gnostic writings. So you won’t have to suffer through them as Irenaeus did — or Amy herself did!

On the homepage of her blog, Amy applies a Flannery O’Connor line to herself: “She could never be a saint, but she thought she could be a martyr if they killed her quick.” Don’t believe her. Enduring page upon page of gnostics old and gnew is a species of martyrdom. And it’s hardly the quick kind.

De-Coding Mary Magdalene deserves to outlive the fifteen minutes of fame we’ve given Dan Brown. It stands on its own.

Toward the end of the movie “The Da Vinci Code,” the main character, Robert Langdon, tells his sleuthing partner, Sophie Neveu: “You are the last living descendent of Jesus Christ.”

That line, meant to be the dramatic apex of the film, drew laughs from many of the approximately 900 journalists who viewed the film’s first press screening May 16 at the Cannes Film Festival.

The derisive laughter, along with widely critical comments from reporters afterward, summed up the Cannes press reaction to the much-heralded launch of the movie. When the credits ran, silence and a few whistles drove home the response.

The movie sticks to most of the book’s controversial religious elements…

Surprise, surprise. Read the rest of the story at Catholic News Service.

My esteemed co-author has posted the second installment of his considerations of the “historical Arthur.” With this viewing, he’s providing fresh, new translations of St. Gildas the Wise. And it’s all free of charge — though we won’t complain if you buy our book, The Grail Code, during your visit!

The New Testament bears ample testimony to the ancient faith of the Roman Christians. Rome marks the final destination of the Acts of the Apostles. Rome was the postal address of the first of St. Paul’s canonical letters.

And the ancient Romans treasured their heritage. They knew, with unerring Christian instinct, what the African Tertullian would say so eloquently in the third century: The blood of the martyrs is seed. If that is so, the Romans were blessed indeed to count among their martyrs the apostles Peter and Paul.

There is no legal document — not even a forged one — that names the successors of St. Peter as title-holders to the Church, bearers of the keys. But the ancient Christians required no other proof than the Scriptures and the apostolic tradition.

Writing probably in 69 A.D. (and surely no later than 96), St. Clement of Rome, the third successor of Peter, remonstrated the faraway congregation in Corinth, in Greece. Clement could do this because he spoke with Peter’s authority, which was granted by Christ Himself. As he concluded his letter, he urged the Corinthians to “render obedience unto the things written by us through the Holy Spirit.” And they did. A century later, the Greek church still hallowed Clement’s letter, as did other churches that counted it among the canonical scriptures and proclaimed its words in the liturgy.

Obedience to Christ in the person of His vicar: This is the common testimony of the Fathers. When the saints of East and West saw danger, they appealed to the pope. We find such pleas in the letters of St. Irenaeus (second century), St. Basil the Great (fourth century), St. John Chrysostom (early fifth century), and St. Cyril of Alexandria (mid-fifth century).

One and all, these were men with an encyclopedic knowledge of the Scriptures. So when they wished for an action that bore the authority of Jesus Christ, they knew where to send their petition. Sometimes they were disappointed by the papal response, but they maintained their faith in the papal office.

In the year 376, the greatest Scripture scholar in the ancient world, St. Jerome, addressed Pope St. Damasus I with a torrent of biblical seals of the papacy: “I speak with the successor of the fisherman and disciple of the cross. Following none but Christ as my primate, I am united in communion with Your Beatitude — that is, with the chair of Peter. Upon that Rock I know the Church is built. Whosoever eats a lamb outside this house is profane. Whoever is not in Noah’s ark will perish when the flood prevails.”

To be a Christian was — then as now — to obey Jesus Christ in the holy Scriptures. Thus, to be a Christian was to obey Jesus Christ in his vicar, the pope.

This was not just the teaching of churchmen who had a vested interested in papal power. It was the faith of the congregations.

The Roman people passed down many traditions of Peter’s ministry in their city. According to one story, during his imprisonment, the apostle preached to his jailers, who begged him for baptism. Finding insufficient water, Peter prayed and a pure spring bubbled up into the cell. Today we may see a most ancient testimony to this story on the walls of the Catacomb of Commodilla. There, the early Christians portrayed Peter as a new Moses, striking a rock wall and drawing forth water.

But, again, reverence for the papacy wasn’t just a Roman thing. A plate found in Montenegro depicts the prison baptism. A coffin in Arles, France, made around the same time, shows Christ handing on the Law to Peter.

Christ gave His Law to Peter with the grace of state. Peter passed it on to Linus, Linus to Cletus, Cletus to Clement, as John Paul passed it on to Benedict last year, while the whole world was watching.

Michael Barber has posted a moving and accurate profile of Bishop Donald Wuerl.

Chris Bailey has posted his soundings on the historical Arthur. He concludes this segment with St. Gildas the Wise, who usually made his appearances on the back pages of the old patrology manuals. Not to be missed! And if you like the blog, you’ll love the book: The Grail Code.

A fellow blogger of the Fathers has found a patristic connection for my untethered entry below.

I’m mourning the imminent departure of a dear bishop, Donal Wuerl, whom Pope Benedict has just named as archbishop-designate of Washington, D.C. Bishop Wuerl has been a great father to me, my family, and my neighbors. He’s been my bishop for most of my adult life.

Our nation’s capital, though, has gained a capital patrologist. Something in my memory tells me that young Donald Wuerl studied under Johannes Quasten at Catholic University of America. In the early 1980s, as Msgr. Wuerl, he wrote a lovely introduction to patristics, aptly titled Fathers of the Church. His catechism, The Teaching of Christ, co-authored with the great patrologist Thomas Comerford Lawler, is a model for integration of the Fathers in modern catechesis. A few years ago, in an interview in Pittsburgh’s diocesan paper, Bishop Wuerl let slip that the Church Fathers remain his favored spiritual reading.

May he prosper in his new home. Rejoice, all you lands of the Beltway.

A few weeks back I posted notice of the Maltz Jewish Museum’s exhibit titled “Cradle of Christianity: Treasures from the Holy Land,” which includes authentic artifacts from the lives of Caiaphas and Pontius Pilate.

Now I see that Cleveland also recently played host to Prof. Lawrence Schiffman, a leading authority on the Dead Sea Scrolls. Schiffman is author of Reclaiming the Dead Sea Scrolls: The History of Judaism, the Background of Christianity, the Lost Library of Qumran. His ventures in Ohio were reported by the Cleveland Jewish News.

According to Schiffman, the Scrolls, which were discovered in caves in Israel in 1947, have given us “a picture of Judaism that was practiced at that time that we simply didn’t have before … We’re talking about people who were all Sabbath observers and who followed the commandments … They had very strict purity laws and acted as if they were living as priests in the (Jerusalem) Temple.” Members of the Qumran sect observed ritual bathing and wrote of a ritual banquet at which a messianic priest offered bread and wine. Some men of Qumran practiced celibacy.

For Christians, the Dead Sea Scrolls have provided a glimpse of the Church’s deep roots in Judaism. They also may help us to understand a bit about the religious life of the Holy Family, the apostles, and their contemporaries. Prof. Schiffman, an Orthodox Jew, has been a critic of common Christian interpretations of the Scrolls. But his own scholarship has itself illuminated the religious life of that long-ago time and place.

A small portion of the Temple Scroll from Qumran is currently on display at the Maltz Museum as part of “The Cradle of Christianity” exhibit.

If you would like to see a great Christian scholar’s (very early) analysis of the Scrolls, grab yourself a copy of Cardinal Jean Danielou’s The Dead Sea Scrolls and Primitive Christianity. A more integrated (and recent) approach to Christianity’s Jewish origins is Oskar Skarsaune’s In the Shadow of the Temple: Jewish Influences on Early Christianity.

The wages of sin can seem lavish when we look at the lifestyles of celebrities. Some openly profess to hate God, others merely flout His law, and yet they have won media renown and amassed tremendous fortunes. To a Christian struggling to pay the bills and live by the Church’s precepts, the situation can seem unjust. Then, bitterness and envy can creep in and impoverish a soul that was once rich in grace. St. John Chrysostom (d. 407 A.D.), preaching on 1 Corinthians, warns us away from such evil thoughts.

When you see an enemy of God wealthy, with armed attendants and many flatterers, do not be downcast, but lament, weep, call upon God, that He may enroll him among His friends. And the more he prospers being God’s enemy, so much the more should you mourn for him. For sinners we ought always to weep, but especially when they enjoy wealth and good times, even as one should pity the sick when they eat and drink to excess.

But some who hear these words are made so unhappy that they sigh bitterly and say, “Tears are due to me. I have nothing.” You said it well — “I have nothing” — not because you lack what another has, but because you think that things will make you happy. For this you are worthy of infinite lamentations. It is as if a healthy person should call “happy” a man who is sick and lying on a soft couch. The latter is not near so wretched and miserable as he, because he has no sense of his own advantages. Such is the result in these men’s case as well, and thus our whole life is confounded and disordered. For these sayings have undone many, and betrayed them to the devil, and made them more pitiable than those who are wasted with famine.

Archeologists in Jerusalem announced the discovery of hiding places of the Jews who revolted against Roman rule in A.D. 66-70.

JERUSALEM Mar 13, 2006 (AP)— Underground chambers and tunnels used during a Jewish revolt against the Romans nearly 2,000 years ago have been uncovered in northern Israel, archaeologists said Monday. The Jews laid in supplies and were preparing to hide from the Romans during their revolt … “It definitely was not spontaneous,” said Yardenna Alexandre of the Israel Antiquities Authority. “The Jews of that time certainly did prepare for it, with underground hideaways here and in other sites we have found.”

An early Church Father, St. Epiphanius, records that the Christians of the city received a prophecy of the coming destruction. So they fled to the city of Pella. When they returned after the devastation, they found Jerusalem reduced to rubble, except for the building that housed their “little church of God,” the upper room, which had been miraculously preserved.

ABC provides the rest of the story on the more recent news.