The Appearance of the Names

Chapter One of An Everlasting Name

The names kept coming at him all morning. Names from all over the world, from languages he knew and those he didn’t understand. Names in English and French, German and Italian, names in Chinese and Urdu, Korean, Hindi, Farsi, and Vietnamese. Yet he knew how to spell each name, despite their unexpected letter combinations. He even had a sense of how to pronounce them. Deep in his spirit, Brother Francis knew they were actual names of real people. The names had been pressing in on him for several days now. Just a few at first that he wrote down on scraps of paper. Now he wrote each name in a heavy bound ledger because he felt there was some great significance in these names that needed to be respected. This morning there had been dozens of names that filled his head and sent his pen scribbling across the page. As the press of names slowly eased up and came to a stop, Brother Francis shut his eyes, breathed deeply, and carefully closed the ledger, placing his hands on top. He meditated on what these names could mean. Brother Francis recalled Job’s anguished cry:

Where shall wisdom be found? Where is the place of understanding?

He silently rebuked himself for his momentary lapse of faith in God’s will.

Recording the names this morning made him late for Lauds. Gray morning light already filtered through the unadorned blinds and white curtains that covered the room’s only window. Cold air hung around the cracks of the sash, pushed back by the warmth of the room. Brother Francis arose slowly from his desk. He slipped on his scapula and fastened it on both sides with stiff fingers, then slid his cowl over his head.

Brother Francis could hardly be described as an imposing man. His tall youthful frame became stooped over the years, but his pale gray eyes remained as soft and liquid as ever. His glances were never sharp and fell on men and objects with the same gentle gaze. A gray fringe around the base of this skull circled his nearly bald head, and the features of his face relaxed into an expression that bore an odd resemblance to a sheep. A sheep was actually a good animal to compare him to. “No No No,” he would often say to himself, hearing a lamb’s bleat in his imagination. Brother Francis had a carefree nature and enjoyed being wrapped in his own wool of earnestness.

Brother Francis, in his perplexity, wanted to hurry and find Brother Timothy and consult him about the names, sharing his apprehension, but he knew the younger monk struggled with his own difficulties, and the elder monk didn’t want him to also bear the old man’s hesitations. He wondered who are they; did something happen to them? It never crossed his mind that the names might be false. Why should God send them to him to record? He didn’t know; such insight eluded him. With great effort, he decided to keep his counsel and regain his sense of composure.

To still his agitation, he reflected on his namesake: St. Francis. When he took his final vows, so many years ago, he selected the name Francis for himself because he was captivated by Francis’s holiness and compassion, his love for the poor, his ability to commune with animals and see angels. He felt discomfort with St. Anthony who seemed so harsh and plagued with frightening visions. Jerome was too dogmatic, and Benedict too rigid: all prayer and work. He didn’t want to be a martyr like St. Sebastian. Like his namesake, Brother Francis would hold out his hand for the birds to alight upon his finger, but they never did. The animals didn’t speak to him either, but Brother Francis didn’t fret, his nature was too serene to be troubled by his lack of holiness. He tried to rest in his sense of goodness and the teachings of the Church.

The other monks had already convened for morning prayer, so the dormitory was enveloped in silence. Brother Francis slipped out of his cell. His shoes made a soft thud on the cold tile floor. The chilly hallway wouldn’t catch any warming rays of sunlight until early afternoon. Gloom hovered over gray limestone blocks, interspersed with the aging wooden doors of the monk’s cells, situated under an arched vaulted ceiling.

He went to wash his hands and face. Writing the names made his face flush and his hands sweat. At the end of the corridor, next to the night-stairs that monks of the past used to slip into the church for nighttime Vigils, was a small washroom installed for the current monks use.

Brother Francis shuffled down the hall, the weight of the names burdening him. In the washroom, he flipped on the dim yellow light and carefully cleaned his hands keeping his scapula and the sleeves of his tunic dry. Sometimes, the scene of Pontius Pilate washing his hands of Christ’s blood before the crowd came to his mind. In his imagination, he could see water dripping from Pilate’s fingertips as he declared himself innocent of Christ’s blood soon to be shed.

“Not of you, not of you my Lord,” Brother France would reflexively mutter. His hand washing wasn’t the same. Wash away Pilate’s or Barabbas’s actions, he thought sometimes. Then he would sigh. Nope, that’s not Christ’s way. Here in the monastery, Brother Francis was relieved that he didn’t have to make these decisions. Who was saved; who was damned. He switched off the light.

He turned to join the morning prayers when he saw a small animal by the door to the night-stairs. His face and eyes shined when he realized it was a rabbit.

“Hi, little Bunny,” he said in a silly childish voice that amused himself. “May the Lord greet you with love and affection.” Small animals made Brother Francis feel giddy and gregarious.

The rabbit didn’t act afraid of the elderly monk; instead, it flicked his ears and hopped toward the door.

“What little trail did you follow to get in here this morning? Did someone leave the door ajar and you got stuck behind it?”

The monks didn’t use this door anymore since they no longer used the sanctuary that it led to.

Brother Francis cupped his mouth with one hand and whispered: “young Brother Cole must have left the door open. He sneaks in there sometimes.”

He walked over to the door. Before he opened it, Brother Francis bent forward opening his arms, and said: “if you jump into my arms, I can snuggle your face and kiss your ears.”

The rabbit flicked its ears again and waggled its tail, but didn’t leap. Brother Francis would’ve been surprised if the rabbit did jump into his arms.

Brother Francis kept a big smile on his face and pushed open the door. The rabbit quickly hopped down the darkened steps. “Have a good day little fellow,” he said to the rabbit. “I’m so happy you came to visit me this morning.”

Seeing the rabbit in the dormitory changed his mood. He felt the oppressive weight of the names lift, to be replaced with a joyful and buoyant feeling. After waving goodbye to the rabbit and making a private prayer for his safety, Brother turned and went in the opposite direction along a row of tall rectangular windows that lined the opposite wall.

As he walked down the corridor, his step a little lighter than before, he stopped for a moment to look out one of the unadorned windows with a view into the cloister below and the courtyard at its center. From spring to fall, the courtyard flowered with color, but now he peered down at the brown gardens and twisted fruit trees, leafless and bare. Brother Francis surveyed the ground, searching under the trees to locate any wild rabbits lingering about in the wintertime courtyard. They had to be hungry; he told himself. Out in the naked winter fields, they were exposed to preying owls and an occasional hunting fox or feral cat. Inside the courtyard, they were safer. Throughout the recent cold months, he left them little bits of carrots and leftover salad scavenged from the kitchen following lunch. Brother Francis mischievously thought about how he would sneak in and slip out something the rabbits might like, some fresh veggies for the bunnies. The brother that ran the kitchen had a tendency to be stingy with leftovers, even if they were destined for the chickens. Brother Francis believed the birds could spare some of their complimentary morsels.

Brother Francis continued on his way with his mischievous thoughts. He would sneak out some salad in the pockets of his tunic when Brother Carl engaged the abbot with his most recent apologetic drawn from the Church theologian he was currently reading. Probably Aquinas, who Brother Francis thought was tedious.

He didn’t hurry as he walked the empty hall. As one of the older monks, no one would question his tardiness, assuming he had something important to attend to. He was tasked with overseeing the spiritual attainment of their guests, which amounted to minimal work, and the spiritual guidance of some junior monks, especially his beloved Timothy that he carried out with the utmost seriousness.

When he reached the broad stairway that curved downward to the small chapel below; he glided down the steps. He received a silly childish pleasure from walking down steps in an elegant manner: like a grand hostess appearing before her guests. As he descended the stairs, he could hear the bass and treble voices of the other monks singing the Benedictus:

Through the tender mercy of our God:
whereby the day-spring from on high hath visited us;
To give light to them that sit in darkness, and in the shadow of death:
and to guide our feet into the way of peace.

Brother Francis returned to a serious state of mind, genuflected, and then entered the chapel. The few remaining guests sat yawning drowsily on the backbenches. He bowed to the altar and joined the singing.