Francisco de Zurbarán, Saint Serapion, 1628.
Father Thatcher was the newly ordained priest. He was the best-looking man a rural town like Franklin had ever seen. Women said he could give Hollywood studs a run for their money. And men—through gritted teeth—agreed.
Twenty-five. A shade over six feet. Square jawline. Deep, probing eyes. Skin tanned. Hair dark and glossy. Big, burly, bearlike, more Mediterranean than English.
He’d been sent to replace Father Hanks, now too old and fading.
“God didn’t create the world,” Thatcher remarked on his first official mass. “God is the world. And the world is God.” People gasped and fled the church in horror. But not all. Some young women—and men—remained. Father Thatcher went on to say he not only believed in God, but also in the earthly pursuit of love. More than that, he was convinced celibacy was not holiness, but hubris. A gate to perversion.
Once mass was over, Father Hanks walked out calmly, a rage bubbling up slowly within him. After serving God for over fifty years, never once had he inspired the same awe Thatcher had in one sermon.
By nightfall, the word had spread like the flu. Everybody in town was talking about Father Thatcher’s sermon. Was he right or wrong? Was he good or bad?
For Franklin’s most devout the answer was easy: change equaled subversion. New ideas were like tigers out of their cages—dangerous. If Thatcher was right, then they had lived wrong. Impossible. Better get rid of the infection right away. Cut the limb before it spreads to the body.
They mounted the speediest crusade in history.
At sundown, two hundred marched toward the house of God, torches and sticks in hand, chanting:
“Thatcher’s done, evil gone!”
When a group of kindred spirits snuck in to warn Father Thatcher…
…they found him dead.
A cross had been carved into his chest. Another on his forehead.
Outside, Father Hanks addressed the angry rabble:
“Tonight… a miracle was enacted. By the hand of God himself—we’ve been rid of an enemy of the truth!” The crowd roared. His habit, soaked crimson, shone under the flickering torches.
“He brought this unto himself by way of vanity, lewdness… philosophy! But to cleanse evil for good out of this town…” He gestured toward Thatcher’s quarters, “we must also purge the vermin still in hiding.”
He extended his trembling arms as the ravenous throng surged past him.
“The Lord must punish those who will not kneel,” he whispered, looking skyward, then made the sign of the cross.
Inside, Thatcher’s body lay limp. But on his wounded forehead, a crown had formed from the dried blood. Slowly, one by one, the townsfolk began to gather around him.
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The last paragraph perfectly tied the story together. I loved the image of the blood drying into the shape of a crown around his forehead.
Yo, this was really good. You came out swinging. I didn't know where it was going to go. You have that intrepid cadence in your writing, real horsepower. I hope to read more from you!