Christopher Golde
“He was clothed with a robe dipped in blood and his name is called ‘The word of God’.”
John: Revelation 19.13 -New Testament
Date: 20th December 1975 Location: Vatican City
Nigel Stansen stood in front of the giant wooden doors to the office of the head of the Roman Catholic Church feeling some nervous anticipation of how his meeting might go. It was not his first time here and the grandiose nature of the Vatican itself did not make him nervous, but what he was about to tell the pontiff, was at the least disturbing and he was not sure how the Holy Father would take it.
At last, the Pope's Camerlengo arrived and motioned for Nigel to wait, indicating with one finger that it would not be much longer. The Camerlengo was the Pope's personal assistant, a priest in his early forties that spoke perfect English and would be doing most of the translation for his boss when Nigel had his audience.
Nigel had met with the Camerlengo many times and they had a reasonable and affable relationship, even though Nigel was not a great believer and for that matter, not even a Catholic. They would often openly debate the philosophies of the church, versus those of science. Nigel had a deep respect for the man and his faith.
Soon the door opened again and the Camerlengo put his head around the corner and motioned for Nigel to enter. Nigel had seen some grand rooms and palaces in his last ten years of travelling the globe, meeting with leaders of all the different countries, but the Papal office never failed to impress him.
In his opinion, it was probably only second in grandeur to the entrance of the Kremlin in Russia, with its red marble floors, incredibly ornate high ceilings and walls lined with ancient frescos. As he entered, he could see a small figure behind a huge desk at the opposite end of the room and approached to within a respectable distance. He then bowed, as only an English gentleman could, his arm across the front of his body, his eyes to the floor, slow and dutifully, making sure he offered the appropriate respect warranted to the office and person, who is the most powerful and influential religious figure in the world.
The Pope stood and walked forward, a kindly smile on his face and both arms outstretched. When he got to Nigel, he grabbed his arm and held it affectionately in both hands.
“Mr Stansen, Bonjorno, it is good I see you again, come sit with me.”
Nigel smiled, feeling genuine warmth for the old man, who since their first meeting, almost three years ago, had always greeted him and treated him with such kindness and openness.
“Why thank you excellence, it is indeed a pleasure to see you again,” Nigel said sincerely, “I always look forward to our meetings with anxious anticipation. You look very well your grace, how are you feeling?”
The old man walked Nigel over to an ornately decorated seat with gold armrests and beautiful red velvet linings, holding his arm all the way and then offered Nigel to sit.
“I am well thank you,” he said slowly with his heavily accented English, “and how have you been Mr Stansen.”
Nigel stood by his seat, waiting for the Pope to move to a seat near him and when the elder man began to sit slowly, he also sat, making sure the Pope had lowered himself first.
“I am well your grace, but perhaps a bit tired from so much travel of late.”
Nigel was being completely honest in saying this and took the opportunity to get on with what he needed to discuss with the Pontiff.
“So much travel, for reasons that bring me here to see you today.”
While they sat, the Camerlengo had positioned himself standing at the right-hand side of the Pope and was listening intently, ready to interpret anything that the Englishman said that his boss might not understand.
“Mr Stansen,” said the Pope looking deeply into the face of Nigel, “I am aware of the purpose of your visit, so please continue and if I have difficulty, I will stop you.”
Nigel knew what he meant and took a deep breath preparing himself for what he must now reveal.
“Your Grace,” he began, “I have, as is customary, given to the Camerlengo a summary of what I wished to talk to you about and it was in truth correct, but I have left out some important details, which I know its not the normal protocol, but was necessary as you will see in this case.”
Nigel took another deep breath and thought to himself.
‘I wonder how that went down.’
To not follow protocol was almost a sin when meeting with the Pope. The Camerlengo said nothing and the Pope continued to stare at Nigel; so he assumed that all was understood, thus continued.
“First, let me outline what I had told you previously. You know that we had discovered a burial chamber in Egypt underneath the Temple Abu Simbel. You also know that we believed it to be the resting place of Moses, which I also know you are not totally convinced of and asked us not to tell the world about until it was somehow proven. You also know about the stone tablet with what we believe are the ‘Ten Commandments’ on them and we have been gracious enough to turn that tablet over to your own archivists for examination. That was all eight years ago.”
The Pope turned his head to the side of the Camerlengo and in turn the younger priest whispered something into his ear.
When they seemed ready Nigel continued.
“I am here today to confess something to you that we have known since when we gave you the stone tablet. We did not tell you, as until now, we had no proof of its existence or the true meaning of what we knew all those years ago,” Nigel felt his face flush but continued, “and now that we have found something that may confirm our theories, we thought it proper, considering this new find, that we should now inform you and also seek some advice.”
The Pontiff held up his hand slightly and Nigel stopped. He turned again to the Camerlengo, who in turn spoke for a considerable time into the old man’s ear. When the pope looked back to Nigel, he had a frown on his brow and Nigel knew he had got the gist of what he had been saying, so continued.
“Now it may please you,” Nigel said, trying to put up a positive, “and it may suit your cause to disprove the tablets divinity, but I can tell you now that there was something else on, or I should say in the tablet that we had discovered.”
Nigel could see the look of anxiousness on both the faces of the Pope and his assistant but continued to tell them about the hieroglyphics around the border of the stone tablet and the x-rayed content that had brought him into the picture. Occasionally the Pope would indicate for Nigel to stop and the Camerlengo would again whisper into his ear.
He told them about the strange numbers and how they had finally been deciphered as what is known as a Transverse Mercator number, which simplified is a metric conversion of the coordinates of longitude and latitude. He explained how it had only taken them a few months to discover the meaning of the numbers and that when they had sent a team to investigate the location of the coordinates, they had found it to be at the centre of a massive glacier on Finsteraarhorn, one of the highest peaks in the Swiss Alps.
“Until just recently, we had no way of knowing what was in the glacier, or what the numbers were intended to show us, so we spent the next eight years going over evidence and putting together the Council of States that would ultimately decide what we would do when we did know what it all meant.”
Nigel took a pause in what he was saying to give the Camerlengo a chance to update the Pontiff and then continued with what he knew would have the most impact.
“Recently, a joint venture mining for Manganese at enormous depths in the Pacific Ocean developed a technology which allowed them to take sub-bottom profiles using a vertically-orientated low-frequency acoustic beam,” Nigel paused while Camerlengo interpreted this to the best of his ability, “we have now borrowed the technology from the joint venture and have used it on the glacier at Finsteraarhorn We have found that one hundred metres below the surface ice, there is an object that is about half the size of this room and is made of a substance that appears to be metallic.”
The Camerlengo whispered excitedly in the Pontiffs ear, both men looked back with somewhat grieved expressions, most likely wondering what was about to be said by the scientist.
“I have come to tell you that we are about to remove this object from the ice and we have no idea what it is, apart from the fact that from core samples we have taken by drilling to those depths in the ice it has been there for over three thousand years and in fact, we believe it found its way there about the time when Moses walked the earth.”
The two religious men looked at each other, in only what Nigel could read as astonishment.
“Your Holiness, I seek your guidance on what you would like us to do in the likelihood this object has something to do with Moses, or the tablet with the ‘Ten Commandments’ and we pledge that we will not only keep you informed but we will always allow the church to have first input into decisions arising from what we do find.”
This had not been Nigel’s opinion of how it should be done, but many of the member states of the council were deeply tied to the Catholic Church and insisted that this was the way it would be.
To Nigel, there was no doubt in his mind that whatever they did find, would have an impact on mankind’s beliefs and he guessed it was fair enough to seek some spiritual guidance, as long as it did not interfere with scientific progress.
The Head of the largest religious empire on earth looked at Nigel seriously then spoke slowly and earnestly.
“My son, my belief in God has never been and never will be in doubt, you will find whatever you will find and we appreciate your intention to involve the church in your findings, but I am sure whatever you find will be the truth and in God’s way, it will confirm his intentions for mankind.”
The Pope stopped and raised himself from his chair, Nigel followed immediately. The old man now seemed somewhat more fragile to Nigel and moved around the chair, as the Camerlengo stepped back out of his way. As he walked towards his desk, he spoke slowly and softly, but Nigel could hear it so clearly, he thought for a minute it was a whisper in his ear from some invisible presence in the room.
“If mankind is to discover our origins and our destiny, it will be with the will of God and all that will be discovered, will be his divine intention. I am here to advise, and I will if requested, but our existence is at the behest of the Lord and what destiny lies before us, is his most divine plan that I cannot question.”
The pope turned and sat at his desk with his head down as if to read.
“Thank you for coming to see us Nigel Stansen and may God be with you on your journey and your quest and may you always be honourable in your intentions, that is all we ask of you.”
At this, the Camerlengo turned to Nigel and the Englishman knew his audience had come to an end. He bowed again.
“Your grace,” he said, and turned leaving through the large wooden double doors with the Camerlengo behind him.
Once outside he turned to his friend, the priest who was the personal assistant to the head of the church.
“Is he okay,” Nigel asked, with genuine concern?
“He is a great man, with a great many burdens and this is another one for him to bear,” said the Camerlengo, “but he will and he will give you his thoughts along the way, as true as if God had thought them himself, of that, I have no doubt.”
Chapter twenty five
The Pontiff