Paul Moorcraft - The Anchoress of Shere

Helene started to cry, while young William clapped his hands.

“Now, let me try again-by your leave, Christine,” said the priest, a little less portentously, “but this is learned Latin. I have laboured in the church an hour or more to comprehend the words before I came to this house.

“‘Therefore, we who strive for the salvation of the souls of her and all mankind with fervent longing, wishing to take care of her soul send ye, according to the rules of the Church, absolution for her, by authority of the Lord Pope, from the excommunication usually promul…promul…’” Father Peter coughed nervously and tried again: “‘Promulgated against such persons. In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, in the manner of a good father of a family rejoicing in the finding of a lost sheep, the said anchoress shall come humbly to ye within the space of four months from this our order that she shall re-enclose herself in the same place, lest by wandering any longer about the world she be exposed to the hunger of the rapacious wolf and, which Heaven forbid, her blood be required at your hands.’”

Christine sat down, and covered her face with her hands. The priest cast a quick glance at her before returning to the complexities of the document: “‘After she has been re-enclosed there and has for some time conducted herself in worthy manner, and after she has made salutary penance in proportion to her sin, she will be accepted wholly into the Church. If these requirements be not met then she will lapse into the sentence of excommunication, and this present dispensation shall be absolutely of no moment.

“‘Given at Avignon, the sixth day of the Kalends of August, in the sixteenth year of the Pontificate of the Lord Pope.’”

The priest’s chest swelled with pride: “This is the Lord Pope speaking to us. Well, speaking to us through the Bishop of Winchester and then the Dean of Guldenford, but it is about our Christine-our sister again in the Church.”

Father Peter then translated the attached letter by the Bishop of Winchester, enjoining the Dean of Guldenford to guard against Christine being torn apart again by the attacks of the Tempter.

“This was given at Farnham, the tenth day of the Kalends of November in the year of Our Lord 1332.”

The family and the priest sat in silence for a full minute.

William was the first to speak: “We all thank our bishops for their pleas to the Lord Pope. I thank ’ee Father Peter. We will talk of this during perhaps one of our last family meals together with Christine. Father, will you take food with us now? Will you sit with us for our humble meal? And will you say a prayer?”

“Aye, with pleasure, but I will ask Christine to say a prayer over the bread. The Lord Pope has honoured her, not me.”

Christine looked at the priest in horror. “It is not right, Father,” she said. “I cannot lead a prayer in front of a priest, and fully ordained at that.”

“Do what the Father says, Christine. He is honouring our house. I have lost one daughter, but I have regained another.”

The priest laid both his hands on William’s shoulders, and said solemnly: “No, Will, the Church has regained your daughter. She will return to her cell, and, with the Pope’s blessing, for her natural life. Thanks be to God. Amen.”

Christine now felt elated, justified and proud, but also a tinge of fear crept into her heart. The Pope himself had granted her absolution, but Hell’s torments would be doubled were she to leave her cell again. For his part, William thought of the coldness of her stone cell, not the fires of damnation.

John, Bishop of Winchester, was reluctant to officiate at the re-enclosure. Only three or so years earlier he had conducted the first such ceremony in the whole of the Suthrige, the district later known as Surrey. These were strange times indeed, he thought, as he made the arduous journey to Shere. Winchester ruled the richest diocese in all England, and he was a busy man, with much to do in his own palace. He did not like to travel far at his age, and, with only four armed escorts, he fretted about the wild robbers who roamed in the woods. The Pope, however, had sanctioned the re-enclosure, and so it had to be done.

Father Peter had readied St. James’s church and himself for the visit of the sternest of bishops. In deference to the superior status of Winchester, the senior clerics of Guldenford had been invited to witness the re-enclosure, but not all were expected to attend, although Abbess Euphemia had declared her intention to see the re-sealing of the godly woman.

Christine’s family and all of the village were preparing, too, for an act ordained by the Holy Father himself. Simon could not attend; he would break out in tears, just like Mistress Anna, he told William, and the carpenter understood well the lover’s pain.

The night before the ceremony, Father Peter organised a small feast to honour the bishop’s visit. John of Winchester was a guest of Vachery Manor, as the new lord had been eager to sanction Christine’s respectability; William and Father Peter had sought and gained his permission for the ceremony. One feast was held for gentlefolk at the manor, and another for the villagers near the church.

Scot-ales were plentiful, although not so abundant as to induce drunkenness, but Noah Flood, whom everyone called Ark, became intoxicated on two ales and mocked the riches of the Church by dressing up as the village “pope,” pretending to grant special indulgences to the revellers. A visiting pardoner rebuked him, and swore that no holy favours or relics would be sold in Shere for a year, whereupon the villagers threw the pardoner into the Tillingbourne. The wet and angry pardoner threatened to complain to the bishop, but Father Peter interceded, soothed the man, and prevented any disruption of the episcopal ceremonies.

Meanwhile, Christine had been summoned to the manor to speak to the bishop. It was troubling for her to retrace her steps along the Stations of the Cross she had endured those years before. Wearing her new habit, the gift of the Abbess Euphemia, she was led by the chamberlain to the bishop’s rooms.

The Bishop of Winchester, tired after his long journey, made it plain that his spiritual counsel would be brief. Previously his patience and kindness towards Christine had been stimulated by her usefulness in the bitter legal conflict with FitzGeoffrey. Nevertheless, he had honoured his promise to assist with a papal indulgence, no small matter when letters to Avignon could take many months, if the messengers survived the journey.

Bishop John told Christine to kneel at his feet.

“My child, the Holy Father has been bounteous in his mercy,” he said with due reverence to Avignon, but also a marked irritation because he had a cold and, ever concerned for his health, had been forced to leave his apothecary behind in Winchester.

He sneezed loudly before continuing, “You must know that this indulgence is rare. If you repeat your crime against God, excommunication is inevitable. A second transgression of this kind will make you a heretic. It will affront God and the Papacy, as well as make a mockery of my two visitations here. You can seek out God, or you can face the stake and flames. It is a simple choice which should cleanse your mind of worldly thoughts, of family, of village. Your duty is to God, not man. Compare your eternal life with a score of years wallowing in the mud and dirt of the hovels of your kin. Have you comprehended this, with no doubt?”

Christine, kneeling, spoke humbly: “I have, my lord bishop. I cast aside all, except the Holy Mother Church. My life is devoted to the final mortal ecstasy of finding oneness with God, if it be granted me by faithful prayer and constant devotions.”

The bishop made the sign of the cross: “Then so be it. You will spend the night alone in prayer at the altar of St. James’s. In the morrow I will find you on your knees and lead you to your cell, with all the rites. May God be with you.” He dismissed her in haste, and went to join his host for a supper of roast swan and heron.