Outlander Looks Back on American History and Catholicism: Denying the Sacraments in The Fiery Cross

Every now and then it is good to get a perspective on history.  I find that the latter books of the Outlander series deal in some very interesting ways with pre-Revolutionary American history.  If it amuses me, at times, to think of Jamie Fraser as the ancestor of the Discovery Channel moonshiners, I have a different kind of reaction to the scene, from The Fiery Cross, in which a priest is arrested at the Gathering--presumably to prevent him from administering the Sacrament of Marriage, though Baptism was also on the agenda.  The scene is humorous, serious, and at times deeply irreverent, but poignantly, it reminds us that the recent threat to priests who would administer the Sacraments has some historical precedent:

     He bowed punctiliously. “You say you wish to speak with the clerical gentleman under arrest?”
     “Under arrest?” I affected great surprise at that. “A priest? Why, whatever can he have done?”
     The Sheriff and the magistrate exchanged glances. Then the magistrate coughed.
     “Perhaps you are unaware, madam, that it is illegal for anyone other than the clergy of the established Church— the Church of England, that is— to undertake his office within the colony of North Carolina?”
     I was not unaware of that, though I also knew that the law was seldom put into effect, there being relatively few of any kind of clergy in the colony to start with, and no one bothering to take any official notice of the itinerant preachers— many of them free lances in the most basic sense of the word— who did appear from time to time.
     “Gracious!” I said, affecting shocked surprise to the best of my ability. “No, I had no idea. Goodness me! How very strange!” Mr. Lillywhite blinked slightly, which I took as an indication that that would just about do, in terms of my creating an impression of well -bred shock. I cleared my throat, and brought out the silver flask and case of needles.
     “Well. I do hope any difficulties will be soon resolved. However, I should very much like to see Father Donahue for a moment. As I said, I am his physician. He has an … indisposition”— I slid back the cover of the case, and delicately displayed the needles, letting them imagine something suitably virulent—“ that requires regular treatment. Might I see him for a moment, to administer his medicine? I … ah … should not like to see any mischief result from a lack of care on my part, you know.” I smiled, as charmingly as possible.
. . . . .
     “She wants to see the priest,” Anstruther interrupted.
     Goodwin blinked at that, taken only slightly aback.
     “Priest. There is a priest here?”
     “A Papist,” Mr. Lillywhite amplified, lips curling back a bit from the unclean word. “It came to my attention that there was a Catholic priest concealed in the assembly, who proposed to celebrate a Mass during the festivities this evening. I sent Mr. Anstruther to arrest him, of course.”
     “Father Donahue is a friend of mine,” I put in, as forcefully as possible. “And he was not concealed; he was invited quite openly, as the guest of Mrs. Cameron. He is also a patient, and requires treatment. I’ve come to see that he gets it.”
. . . . .
     Now that I got a clear look at the priest, the impression of martyrdom grew more pronounced. He looked like Saint Stephen after the first volley of stones, with a bruise on his chin and a first-rate black eye, empurpled from browridge to cheekbone and swollen quite shut.
     The nonblackened eye widened at sight of me, and he started up with an exclamation of surprise.
     “Father Kenneth .” I gripped him by the hand and squeezed, smiling broadly for the benefit of whatever audience might be peeking through the flap. “I’ve brought your medicine. How are you feeling?” I raised my eyebrows and waggled them, indicating that he should play along with the deception. He stared at me in fascination for a moment, but then appeared to catch on. He coughed, then, encouraged by my nod, coughed again, with more enthusiasm.
     “It’s … very kind of ye to … think of me, Mrs. Fraser,” he wheezed, between hacks. I pulled off the top of the flask, and poured out a generous measure of whisky.
     “Are you quite all right, Father?” I asked, low-voiced, as I leaned across to hand it to him.
     “Your face …”
     “Oh, it’s nothing, Mrs. Fraser dear, not at all,” he assured me, his faint Irish accent coming out under the stress of the occasion. “’Twas only that I made the mistake of resistin’ when the Sheriff arrested me. Not but what in the shock of it all, I didn’t do a small bit of damage to the poor man’s ballocks, and him only doing of his duty, may God forgive me.” Father Kenneth rolled his undamaged eye upward in a pious expression— quite spoiled by the unregenerate grin underneath.
     Father Kenneth was no more than middle height, and looked older than his years by virtue of the hard wear imposed by long seasons spent in the saddle. Still, he was no more than thirty-five, and lean and tough as whipcord under his worn black coat and frayed linen. I began to understand the Sheriff’s belligerence.
     “Besides,” he added, touching his black eye gingerly, “Mr. Lillywhite did tender me a most gracious apology for the hurt.” He nodded toward the table, and I saw that an opened bottle of wine and a pewter cup stood among the writing materials— the cup still full, and the level of wine in the bottle not down by much.
     The priest picked up the whisky I had poured and drained it, closing his eyes in dreamy benediction.
     “And a finer medicine I hope never to benefit from,” he said, opening them. “I do thank ye, Mistress Fraser. I’m that restored, I might walk on water meself.” He remembered to cough, this one a delicate hack, fist held over his mouth.
     “What’s wrong with the wine?” I asked, with a glance toward the door.
     “Oh, not a thing,” he said, taking his hand away. “Only that I did not think it quite right to accept the magistrate’s refreshments, under the circumstances. Call it conscience.” He smiled at me again, but this time with a note of wryness in the grin.
     “Why have they arrested you?” I asked, my voice low. I looked again at the tent’s door, but it was empty, and I caught the murmur of voices outside. Evidently, Jamie had been right; they weren’t suspicious of me.
     “For sayin’ of the Holy Mass,” he replied, lowering his voice to match mine. “Or so they said. It’s a wicked lie, though. I’ve not said Mass since last Sunday, and that was in Virginia.” He was looking wistfully at the flask. I picked it up and poured another generous tot.
. . . . .
     “I have just been explaining to your husband, madame , that it is my regard for Mrs. Cameron’s interests that led me to attempt to regularize Mr. Donahue’s position, so as to allow his continued presence in the colony.” Mr. Lillywhite nodded coldly at the priest. “However, I am afraid my suggestion was summarily rejected.”
     Father Kenneth put down his cup and straightened up, his working eye bright in the lamplight.
     “They wish me to sign an oath, sir,” he said to Jamie, with a gesture at the paper and quill on the table before him. “To the effect that I do not subscribe to a belief in transubstantiation.”
     “Do they, indeed.” Jamie’s voice betrayed no more than polite interest, but I understood at once what the priest had meant by his remark regarding conscience.
     “Well, he can’t do that, can he?” I said, looking round the circle of men. “Catholics—I mean— we”—I spoke with some emphasis, looking at Mr. Goodwin—“ do believe in transubstantiation. Don’t we?” I asked, turning to the priest, who smiled slightly in response, and nodded.
     Mr. Goodwin looked unhappy, but resigned, his alcoholic joviality substantially reduced by the social awkwardness.
     “I’m sorry, Mrs. Fraser, but that is the law. The only circumstance under which a clergyman who does not belong to the established Church may remain in the colony—legally— is upon the signing of such an oath. Many do sign it. You know the Reverend Urmstone, the Methodist circuit rider? He has signed the oath, as has Mr. Calvert, the New Light minister who lives near Wadesboro.”
     The Sheriff looked smug. Repressing an urge to stamp on his foot, I turned to Mr. Lillywhite.
     “Well, but Father Donahue can’t sign it. So what do you propose to do with him? Throw the poor man in gaol? You can’t do that— he’s ill!” On cue, Father Kenneth coughed obligingly.
     Mr. Lillywhite eyed me dubiously, but chose instead to address Jamie.
     “I could by rights imprison the man, but out of regard for you, Mr. Fraser, and for your aunt, I shall not do so. He must, however, leave the colony tomorrow. I shall have him escorted into Virginia, where he will be released from custody. You may rest assured that all care will be taken to assure his welfare on the journey.” He turned a cold gray eye on the Sheriff, who straightened up and tried to look reliable, with indifferent results.
. . . . .
     Jamie cleared his own throat and drew himself up a bit. “Well, then,” he said. “I wonder whether I might make so bold as to ask …” He paused, seeming slightly embarrassed.
     “Yes, sir?” Lillywhite looked at him curiously.
     “I wonder whether the good Father might be allowed to hear my confession.” Jamie’s eyes were fixed on the tent pole, sedulously avoiding mine. “Your confession?” Lillywhite looked astonished at this, though the Sheriff made a noise that might charitably be called a snigger.
     “Got something pressing on your conscience?” Anstruther asked rudely. “Or p’r’aps you have some premonition of impending death, eh?” He gave an evil smile at this, and Mr. Goodwin, looking shocked, rumbled a protest at him. Jamie ignored both of them, focusing his regard on Mr. Lillywhite.
     “Yes, sir. It has been some time since I last had the opportunity of being shriven, ye see, and it may well be some time before such a chance occurs again. As it is—” At this point , he caught my eye, and made a slight but emphatic motion with his head toward the tent flap. “If ye will excuse us for a moment, gentlemen?”
     Not waiting for a response, he seized me by the elbow and propelled me swiftly outside.
     “Brianna and Marsali are up the path wi’ the weans,” he hissed in my ear, the moment we were clear of the tent. “Make sure Lillywhite and yon bastard of a sheriff are well away, then fetch them in.”
     Leaving me standing on the path, astonished, he ducked back into the tent.
     “Your pardon, gentlemen,” I heard him say. “I thought perhaps … there are some things a man shouldna quite like to be saying before his wife … you understand?”
     There were male murmurs of understanding, and I caught the word “confession” repeated in dubious tones by Mr. Lillywhite. Jamie lowered his voice to a confidential rumble in response, interrupted by a rather loud, “You what?” from the Sheriff , and a peremptory shushing by Mr. Goodwin.
     There was a bit of confused conversation, then a shuffle of movement, and I barely made it off the path and into the shelter of the pines before the tent flap lifted and the three Protestants emerged from the tent. The day had all but faded now, leaving burning embers of sunlit cloud in the sky, but close as they were, there was enough light for me to see the air of vague embarrassment that beset them.
     They moved a few steps down the path, stopping no more than a few feet from my own hiding place. They stood in a cluster to confer, looking back at the tent, from which I could now hear Father Kenneth’s voice, raised in a formal Latin blessing. The lamp in the tent went out, and the forms of Jamie and the priest, dim shadows on the canvas, disappeared into a confessional darkness.
     Anstruther’s bulk sidled closer to Mr. Goodwin.
     “What in f@%$’s name is transubstantiation?” he muttered.
     I saw Mr. Goodwin’s shoulders straighten as he drew himself up, then hunch toward his ears in a shrug.
     “In all honesty, sir, I am not positive of the meaning of the term,” he said, rather primly, “though I perceive it to be some form of pernicious Papist doctrine. Perhaps Mr. Lillywhite could supply you with a more complete definition— Randall?”
     “Indeed,” the magistrate said. “It is the notion that by the priest’s speaking particular words in the course of offering his Mass, bread and wine are transformed into the very substance of Our Savior’s body and blood.” “What?” Anstruther sounded confused. “How can anyone do that?”
     “Change bread and wine into flesh and blood?” Mr. Goodwin sounded quite taken aback. “But that is witchcraft, surely!”
     “Well, it would be, if it happened,” Mr. Lillywhite said, sounding a bit more human . “The Church very rightly holds that it does not.”
     “Are we sure of that?” Anstruther sounded suspicious. “Have you seen them do it?”
     “Have I attended a Catholic Mass? Assuredly not!” Lillywhite’s tall form drew up, austere in the gathering dusk. “What do you take me for, sir!”
     “Now, Randall, I am sure the Sheriff means no offense.” Goodwin put a placatory hand on his friend’s arm. “His office deals with more earthly matters, after all.”
     “No, no, no offense meant, sir, none at all,” Anstruther said hurriedly. “I was meaning more, like, has anybody seen this kind of goings -on, so as to be a decent witness, for the prosecution of it, I mean.”
     Mr. Lillywhite appeared still to be somewhat offended; his voice was cold in reply.
     “It is scarcely necessary to have witnesses to the heresy, Sheriff, as the priests themselves willingly admit to it.”
     “No, no. Of course not.” The Sheriff’s squat form seemed to flatten obsequiously. “But if I’m right, sir, Papists do … er … partake of this— this transubwhatnot, aye?”
     “Yes, so I am told.”
     “Well, then. That’s frigging cannibalism, isn’t it?” Anstruther’s bulk popped up again, enthused. “I know that’s against the law! Why not let this bugger do his bit of hocus-pocus, and we’ll arrest the whole boiling lot of ’em, eh? Get shut of any number of the bastards at one blow, I daresay.”
     Mr. Goodwin emitted a low moan. He appeared to be massaging his face, no doubt to ease a recurrent ache from his tooth.
     Mr. Lillywhite exhaled strongly through his nose.
     “No,” he said evenly. “I am afraid not, Sheriff. My instructions are that the priest is not to be allowed to perform any ceremonial, and shall be prevented from receiving visitors.”
     “Oh, aye? And what’s he doing now, then?” Anstruther demanded, gesturing toward the darkened tent, where Jamie’s voice had begun to speak, hesitant and barely audible. I thought perhaps he was speaking in Latin.
     “That is quite different,” Lillywhite said testily. “Mr. Fraser is a gentleman. And the prohibition against visitors is to insure that the priest shall perform no secret marriages; hardly a concern at present.”
     “Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.” Jamie’s voice spoke in English, suddenly louder, and Mr. Lillywhite started. Father Kenneth murmured interrogatively.
     “I have been guilty of the sins of lust and impurity, both in thought and in my flesh,” Jamie announced— with what I thought rather more volume than was quite discreet.
     “Oh, to be sure,” said Father Kenneth, suddenly louder too. He sounded interested . “Now , these sins of impurity— what form, precisely, did they take, my son, and upon how many occasions?”
     “Aye, well. I’ve looked upon women with lust, to be starting with. How many occasions— oh, make it a hundred, at least, it’s been a time since I was last to confession. Did ye need to know which women, Father, or only what it was I thought of doing to them?”
     Mr. Lillywhite stiffened markedly.
     “I think we’ll not have time for the lot, Jamie dear,” said the priest. “But if ye were to tell me about one or two of these occasions, just so as I could be formin’ a notion as to the … er … severity of the offense  …?”
     “Och, aye. Well, the worst was likely the time wi ’ the butter churn.”
     “Butter churn? Ah … the sort with the handle pokin ’ up?” Father Kenneth’s tone encompassed a sad compassion for the lewd possibilities suggested by this.
     “Oh, no, Father; it was a barrel churn. The sort that lies on its side, aye , with a wee handle to turn it? Well, it’s only that she was workin’ the churn with great vigor, and the laces of her bodice undone, so that her breasts wobbled to and fro, and the cloth clinging to her with the sweat of her work. Now, the churn was just the right height— and curved, aye?— so as make me think of bendin’ her across it and lifting her skirts, and—”
     My mouth opened involuntarily in shock. That was my bodice he was describing, my breasts, and my butter churn!
. . . . .
     Jamie stopped abruptly as we fumbled our way inside. Then I heard him say quickly, “And sins of anger, pride, and jealousy—oh, and the odd wee bit of lying as well, Father. Amen.” He dropped to his knees, raced through an Act of Contrition in French, and was on his feet and taking Germain from me before Father Kenneth had finished saying the “Ego te absolvo.”
     My eyes were becoming adapted to the dark; I could make out the voluminous shapes of the girls, and Jamie’s tall outline. He stood Germain on the table before the priest, saying, “Quickly, then, Father; we havena much time.”
     “We haven’t any water, either,” the priest observed. “Unless you ladies thought to bring any?” He had picked up the flint and tinderbox, and was attempting to relight the lamp.
     Bree and Marsali exchanged appalled glances, then shook their heads in unison.
     “Dinna fash, Father.” Jamie spoke soothingly, and I saw him reach out a hand for something on the table. There was the brief squeak of a cork being drawn, and the hot, sweet smell of fine whisky filled the tent, as the light caught and grew from the wick, the wavering flame steadying to a small, clear light.
     “Under the circumstances …” Jamie said, holding out the open flask to the priest.
     Father Kenneth’s lips pressed together, though I thought with suppressed amusement, rather than irritation.
     “Under the circumstances, aye,” he repeated. “And what should be more appropriate than the water of life, after all?” He reached up, undid his stock, and pulled up a leather string fastened round his neck , from which dangled a wooden cross and a small glass bottle, stoppered with a cork.
     “The holy chrism ,” he explained, undoing the bottle and setting it on the table. “Thank the Virgin Mother that I had it on my person. The Sheriff took the box with my Mass things.” He made a quick inventory of the objects on the table, counting them off on his fingers. “Fire, chrism , water— of a sort— and a child. Very well, then. You and your husband will stand as godparents to him, I suppose, ma’am?”
     This was addressed to me, Jamie having gone to take up a station by the tent flap.
     “For all of them, Father,” I said, and took a firm grip on Germain, who seemed disposed to leap off the table. “Hold still, darling, just for a moment.”
     I heard a small whish behind me; metal drawn from oiled leather. I glanced back to see Jamie, dim in the shadows, standing guard by the door with his dirk in his hand. A qualm of apprehension curled through my belly, and I heard Bree draw in her breath beside me.
     “Jamie, my son,” said Father Kenneth, in a tone of mild reproval.
     “Be going on with it, if ye please, Father,” Jamie replied, very calmly. “I mean to have my grandchildren baptized this night, and no one shall prevent it.”
     The priest drew in his breath with a slight hiss, then shook his head.
     “Aye. And if you kill someone, I hope there’ll be time for me to shrive you again before they hang us both,” he muttered, reaching for the oil. “If there’s a choice about it, try for the Sheriff, will you, man dear?”
     Switching abruptly to Latin, he pushed back Germain’s heavy mop of blond hair and his thumb flicked deftly over forehead, lips, and then— diving under the boy’s gown in a gesture that made Germain double up in giggles— heart, in the sign of the Cross.
     “On-behalf-of-this-child-do-you-renounce-Satan-and-all-his-works?” he asked, speaking so fast that I scarcely realized he was speaking English again, and barely caught up in time to join with Jamie in the godparents’ response, dutifully reciting, “I do renounce them.”
     I was on edge, keeping an ear out for any noises that might portend the return of Mr. Lillywhite and the Sheriff, envisioning just what sort of brouhaha might ensue if they did come back to discover Father Kenneth in the midst of what would surely be considered an illicit “ceremonial.”
     I glanced back at Jamie; he was looking at me, and gave me a faint smile that I thought was likely meant for reassurance. If so, it failed utterly; I knew him too well. He wanted his grandchildren baptized, and he would see their souls safely given into God’s care, if he died for it— or if we all went to gaol, Brianna, Marsali , and the children included. Of such stuff are martyrs made, and their families are obliged to lump it.
     “Do-you-believe-in-one-God-the-Father-the-Son-and-the-Holy-Ghost?”
     “Stubborn man,” I mouthed at Jamie. His smile widened, and I turned back, hastily chiming in with his firm, “I do believe.” Was that a footfall on the path outside, or only the evening wind, making the tree branches crack as it passed?
     The questions and responses finished, and the priest grinned at me, looking like a gargoyle in the flickering lamplight. His good eye closed briefly in a wink.
     “We’ll take it that your answers will be the same for the others, shall we, ma’am? And what will be this sweet lad’s baptismal name?”
     Not breaking his rhythm, the priest took up the whisky flask, and dribbled a careful stream of spirit onto the little boy’s head, repeating, “I baptize thee, Germain Alexander Claudel MacKenzie Fraser, in the Name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, Amen.”
     Germain watched this operation with profound interest , round blue eyes crossing as the amber liquid ran down the shallow bridge of his nose and dripped from its stubby tip. He put out a tongue to catch the drops, then made a face at the taste.
     “Ick,” he said clearly. “Horse piss.”
     Marsali made a brief, shocked “Tst!” at him, but the priest merely chuckled , swung Germain off the table, and beckoned to Bree.
     She held Jemmy over the table, cradled in her arms like a sacrifice. She was intent on the baby’s face, but I saw her head twitch slightly, her attention drawn by something outside. There were sounds on the path below; I could hear voices. A group of men, I thought, talking together, voices genial but not drunken.
     I tensed , trying not to look at Jamie. If they came in, I decided, I had better grab Germain, scramble under the far edge of the tent, and run for it . I took a preparatory grip on the collar of his gown, just in case. Then I felt a gentle nudge as Bree shifted her weight against me.
     “It’s all right, Mama,” she whispered. “It’s Roger and Fergus.” She nodded toward the dark, then returned her attention to Jemmy.
     It was, I realized, and the skin of my temples prickled with relief. Now that I knew, I could make out the imperious , slightly nasal sound of Fergus’s voice, raised in a lengthy oration of some kind, and a low Scottish rumble that I thought must be Roger’s. A higher-pitched titter that I recognized as Mr. Goodwin’s drifted through the night, followed by some remark in Mr. Lillywhite’s aristocratic drawl.
     I did glance at Jamie this time. He still held the dirk, but his hand had fallen to his side , and his shoulders had lost a little of their tension. He smiled at me again, and this time I returned it.
     Jemmy was awake, but drowsy. He made no objection to the oil, but startled at the cold touch of the whisky on his forehead, eyes popping open and arms flinging wide. He uttered a high-pitched “Yeep!” of protest, then, as Bree gathered him hastily up into his blanket against her shoulder, screwed up his face and tried to decide whether he was sufficiently disturbed to cry about it.
     Bree patted his back like a bongo drum and made little hooting noises in his ear, distracting him. He settled for plugging his mouth with a thumb and glowering suspiciously at the assemblage, but by that time, Father Kenneth was already pouring whisky on the sleeping Joan, held low in Marsali’s arms.
     “I baptize thee, Joan Laoghaire Claire Fraser,” he said, following Marsali’s lead, and I glanced at Marsali, startled. I knew she was called Joan for Marsali’s younger sister, but I hadn’t known what the baby’s other names would be. I felt a small lump in my throat, watching Marsali’s shawled head bent over the child. Both her sister and her mother, Laoghaire , were in Scotland; the chances of either ever seeing this tiny namesake were vanishingly small.
     Suddenly, Joan’s slanted eyes popped wide open and so did her mouth. She let out a piercing shriek, and everyone started as though a bomb had exploded in our midst.
     “Go in peace, to serve the Lord! And go fast!” Father Kenneth said, his fingers already nimbly corking up bottle and flask, frantically whisking away all traces of the ceremony . Down the path, I could hear voices raised in puzzled question.
     Marsali was out the tent flap in a flash, the squalling Joan against her breast, a protesting Germain clutched by the hand. Bree paused just long enough to put a hand behind Father Kenneth’s head and kiss him on the forehead.
     “Thank you, Father,” she whispered, and was gone in a flurry of skirts and petticoats.
     Jamie had me by the arm and was hustling me out of the tent as well, but stopped for a half-second at the door, turning back.
     “Father?” he called in a whisper. “Pax vobiscum!”
     Father Kenneth had already seated himself behind the table, hands folded, the accusing sheets of blank paper spread out once more before him. He looked up, smiling slightly, and his face was perfectly at peace in the lamplight, black eye and all.
     “Et cum spiritu tuo , man,” he said, and raised three fingers in parting benediction.

And if this looks lazy of me, since there is no analysis, let me just say that inserting all of those hard returns and indents was pretty tedious!


Gabaldon, Diana (2002-10-01). The Fiery Cross (Outlander). Random House Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

Fiery Cross: Dignity in Suffering

Sometimes, when focusing on just one aspect of a work, we get bogged down.  I am interested in the treatment of reproductive issues in the Outlander books, but I am completely bogged down by them, because there's so much there, and because I've written about it at such length already.  So... as I continue to read (and I admit to being bogged down a little bit in the series; at this point, I'm sort of just waiting for the next book, and for Rick Riordan's The House of Hades in paperback or some other discounted format...), I am putting things off for later.  I did this with Voyager, and never came back, but sometimes that's what has to be done.  And putting it off for later analysis is definitely easier with the Kindle format.  When I am reading a paper copy, I don't want to flip too many pages past the passage that I want to analyze because I'm not marking the copy.

As I was reading during my lunch hour today, I came across a scene that struck me as being true--and that I believe speaks to the reader in a particular way.  At the Gathering of the Clans that begins in Drums in Autumn (a poor title, really) and continues into The Fiery Cross (which arguably contains the content that the title of Drums was referring to), Roger MacKenzie, whom I see as participating in the weakened masculinity of the 20th Century as much as Frank in the earlier books, makes the rounds of certain families to enlist their help in an attempt by the governor to prevent revolt.  While making the rounds, he encounters a strong woman, "Auld Joan," who has become the head of her family because of the inability of her brother to assume the role:

     “A bhràthair, here’s Captain MacKenzie,” she said, reaching out a hand to the man that lay on a pallet of dry grass under the blanket’s shelter. Roger felt a sudden shock at the man’s appearance, but suppressed it.

     A spastic, they would have called him in the Scotland of Roger’s own time; what did they call such a condition now? Perhaps nothing in particular; Fraser had said only, He has nay speech.

     No, nor proper movement , either. His limbs were bony and wasted, his body twisted into impossible angles. A tattered quilt had been laid over him, but his jerking movements had pulled it awry, so that the cloth was bunched, wrenched hard between his legs, and his upper body was left exposed, the worn shirt also rumpled and pulled half off by his struggles. The pale skin over shoulder and ribs gleamed cold and blue-toned in the shadows.

 Nevertheless, his sister involves him in the decision to send men of the family to this skirmish or to withold them, and the revelation to Roger, and to the reader, that follows is quite profound, and sheds light on previous events in the series involving life, death, and dignity:

     Joan Findlay cupped a hand about the man’s cheek and turned his head so that he could look at Roger. “This will be my brother Iain, Mr. MacKenzie,” she said, her voice firm, daring him to react. 

     The face too was distorted, the mouth pulled askew and drooling, but a pair of beautiful—and intelligent —hazel eyes looked back at Roger from the ruin. He took firm grip of his feelings and his own features, and reached out, taking the man’s clawed hand in his own. It felt terrible, the bones sharp and fragile under skin so cold it might have been a corpse’s.

     “Iain Mhor,” he said softly . “I have heard your name. Jamie Fraser sends ye his regards.”

     The eyelids lowered in a graceful sweep of acknowledgment, and came up again, regarding Roger with calm brightness.

The expressiveness of the eyes immediately puts to rest any thought that this man is not a participant in the life of his family--and that fact exists quite apart from the care with which his sister has kept him alive and preserved his dignity and his place in the family.

In our own time, we have debates about the quality of life of severely disabled individuals.  On the one hand is the abstract notion of "quality of life," and the assumption that if one's life does not meet certain criteria, the misery of that knowledge or that state of being, or its limitations, make death preferable.  On the other hand is the--perhaps equally abstract notion of "dignity of life," a notion which seems to be contradicted by the undignified position of the severely disabled.  This scene cuts through all of the abstraction, however, and shows the reader what is at stake--and what is at stake is the soul, which is very much alive.

I have not mentioned them before now, but I have maked "for future discussion," if you will, scenes in which a main character--Claire most often, or in one case, Dougal MacKenzie--was the agent of death for someone who was suffering.  In three cases, it was not so-called "passive" euthenasia, though once Claire did simply withold treatment from a man who was bleeding to death with the knowledge that he would die a horrible death from infection if he survived the boar attack.  In two cases, Claire administered drugs--in a 20th Century hospital, and in the event of a near-lynching.  Dougal acted more in a more direct manner, speeding the death of a kinsman with his sword--unlike the medically assisted examples, it is not an "easy" death.  But each case was cast as a mercy killing, and each does, indeed, put an end to earthly suffering.  At no time during these scenes does the narrative evoke dignity in suffering.

Here, however, there is suffering, and there is also dignity.  The suffering is not man-made suffering resulting from violence.  Nor is it represented as a terminal illness--though it is likely degenerative.  It is a narrative moment when the author's Catholic background shines through, and it is one to notice, and perhaps to ponder against the examples of mercy killings in the other books of the series.

Gabaldon, Diana (2002-10-01). The Fiery Cross (Outlander) (Kindle Locations 2645-2646). Random House Publishing Group. Kindle Edition. 

Voyager: Candles before Images

At the beginning of Lent, and at the beginning of my blogging about Voyager, I suggested that the novel was somehow Purgatorial, because in many ways, the action was either waiting or stasis, and when movement happened, it was a going forward that stood in direct contrast to the stasis and waiting.  The novel is also full of punishment, deprivation, and prayer.  As I have wound my way slowly through, lingering on more moments than I anticipated, the Purgatorial thread has been obscured while others presented themselves to the reader.

Now that it is the Easter season, I have reached Jamie's brief parting conversation with his son.  In this scene, as Jamie prepares to make a sacrifice, forsaking his own feelings and removing himself from Helwater for the child's sake, we find a simple and elegant explanation of a much-maligned Catholic practice (and Gabaldon has a knack for giving simple, elegant explanations of Catholic practices):

     “What’s that little candle for?” Willie asked. “Grannie says only stinking Papists burn candles in front of heathen images.”
     “Well, I am a stinking Papist,” Jamie said, with a wry twist of his mouth. “It’s no a heathen image, though; it’s a statue of the Blessed Mother.”
     “You are?” Clearly this revelation only added to the boy’s fascination. “Why do Papists burn candles before statues, then?”
     Jamie rubbed a hand through his hair. “Aye, well. It’s  …   maybe a way of praying— and remembering. Ye light the candle, and say a prayer and think of people ye care for. And while it burns, the flame remembers them for ye.”

The scene culminates in a declaration by Willie, an "emergency" baptism, by which Willie is made a "stinking Papist, too" (239), and the gift of a rosary--in short, all of the trappings of Catholicism that can be conjured in a stable.

Gabaldon, Diana (2004-10-26). Voyager (Outlander). Random House, Inc.. Kindle Edition. 

Voyager: Translation and Torment (A Literacy Moment)

This post is sort of a side note in two different ways--it is a side note to the last post because it discusses a literacy context that frames the scene in which Jamie waits anxiously in the house as his sister Jenny gives birth.  It is also a side note to the literacy theme of Voyager (and if I haven't said it before, I think that Voyager has more of a literacy sub-text than the others--at least up to this point in the series).

As Jamie enters the house to wait for Jenny to give birth--and to be with her in spirit, if not actually in the room--he surprises a neighbor, who is reading to the children from the Bible:

     “ ‘ And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression,’  ” read Mrs. Kirby. There was a loud, rolling scream from upstairs, that seemed to go on and on. Mrs. Kirby paused for a moment, to allow everyone to appreciate it, before resuming the reading. Her eyes, pale gray and wet as raw oysters, flickered toward the ceiling, then rested with satisfaction on the row of strained faces before her.
     “ ‘ Notwithstanding, she shall be saved in childbearing, if she continue in faith and charity and holiness with sobriety,’  ” she read. Kitty burst into hysterical sobbing and buried her head in her sister’s shoulder. Maggie Ellen was growing bright red beneath her freckles, while her elder brother had gone dead-white at the scream. (66)

It is an interesting literacy moment because of the type of literacy represented.  First of all, it is didactic.  There is both an implicit and an explicit lesson.  The words that Mrs. Kirby is reading indict every female in the guilt of Eve--not an uncommon argument, even in contemporary Abrahamic religions--and that childbearing saves women.  Implicitly, pain in childbirth is punishment (a point that is explicit in Genesis 3:16), and Jenny--for some of them, their own mother--is an exemplar of this.  (I do wonder what a literal reading of the Biblical passages would mean for women who opt for an epidural... No pain, no heavenly gain?)

I do take issue with this scene, as it assumes that women in the 18th Century would not have had pain management techniques.  A well-prepared woman need not scream, even without modern medicine, and Jenny would have had the wisdom of her midwife, of women around her, and of her own previous births, as well as the endurance of a woman who was used to having to endure other pain and discomfort in daily life!  But then, this vision of childbirth goes along with an agenda that is subtly apparent throughout the books--the danger, hardship, and pain of childbearing.  The combination of this Bible verse and childbirth in this particular novel suggests childbearing as a Purgatorial act for women--although the context (the cruelty of Mrs. Kirby's didacticism; Jamie's intervention) argues strongly that if Christianity teaches that childbirth is Purgatorial, that this is evidence of Christian teaching about women being skewed.

The other reason that it is interesting is because of the text, which is from 1 Timothy 2:14-15.  No, I'm not that good.  That's what Google is for.  The text also appears to be taken from the King James Version, which is another thing I need to ponder.  The King James Version, while poetic, is a notoriously bad translation, as a semester of Ancient Greek made clear.  Just for fun, here's a sample from Catholic apologist Jimmy Akin. I'm a little fuzzy on whether an 18th Century Scottish Catholic household would have a Bible in English, much less the King James Version (albeit the nod to the Stuarts).  I don't have a source that I can check for this a the moment, only the internet (I could go over to the library databases of the university for which I work, and in order to answer the question sufficiently, I would have to do more research than that...), but for now, I simply have the question:  To what extent was the King James Version of the Bible adopted by Catholics in/by the 18th Century?  I would expect that, in Scotland, the Bible would have been in Latin, or if possible, Gaelic, with an alternate translation being the third choice.  The dominant Catholic translation would have been the Douay-Rheims.  Jamie might have had a French Bible.  The question is an interesting one.  In the meantime, here are some parallel translations of the line in question.

Incidentally, here's the Douay-Rheims:

{2:14} And Adam was not seduced; but the woman, being seduced, was in the transgression.{2:15} Yet she shall be saved through child bearing; if she continue in faith and love and sanctification with sobriety.

The language is much more Catholic.

Jamie enters in this mist of this troubling literacy moment, disperses the crowd and confiscates the Bible in displeasure.  It is a nice detail that Jenny’s bookshelf is "battered and scarred from the last incursion of Redcoats, three months ago." (67)  When he hears the sounds of Jenny's suffering, he unwillingly turns to the words in the book he holds--not verses this time, but records:

Hearing a prolonged moan from above, he glanced down involuntarily at the Bible in his hand. Not really wanting to, still he let the book fall open, showing the page at the front where the marriages, births, and deaths of the family were recorded. (67)

What follows in the novel is a text-based reminiscence of Jamie's family history, beginning (in a way) with the birth of his older brother, William:

     The entries began with his parents’ marriage. Brian Fraser and Ellen MacKenzie. The names and the date were written in his mother’s fine round hand, with underneath, a brief notation in his father’s firmer, blacker scrawl. Marrit for love, it said— a pointed observation, in view of the next entry, which showed Willie’s birth, which had occurred scarcely two months past the date of the marriage.

Mention of William, and the record of his niece's death, encourage his consideration of all of the uncertainties, from the "what if" of his own inherited role as laird after his brother's death, to the "what if" of his inability to provide:

Closing the book, his eye caught the last entry— Caitlin Maisri Murray, born December 3, 1749, died December 3, 1749. Aye, if. If the Redcoats had not come on December 2, would Jenny have borne the child too early?  If they had had enough food, so that she, like the rest of them, was no more than skin and bones and the bulge of her belly, would that have helped?

Literacy, in these moments, causes introspection and torment.

Gabaldon, Diana (2004-10-26). Voyager (Outlander) Random House, Inc.. Kindle Edition.

Voyager: Adoration

Thinking about Voyager as a Purgatorial novel, while appropriate to Lent, also helps me to bring together the observations I've been making to myself as I read the novel.  While in Outlander and Dragonfly in Amber, there are references to Claire's Catholicism, they are generally dismissive.  Jamie's Catholicism is either part of his naiveté and innocence, or heavily flavored by Celtic paganism.  Jamie's Catholicism becomes somewhat modulated as be loses his innocence, and it always retains that Celtic pagan element.  Claire's Catholicism never becomes anything more than a very casual, occasional marker of her character.  And yet, in Voyager, she engages in Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, which is one of the more profoundly--perhaps weirdly, certainly mystical--spiritual practices that appear in the novels. It is also one of the most quintessential Catholic spiritual practices in the novels or outside of them, since it is based on theology that the Eucharist is, indeed, the actual, literal, Body of Christ.

Adoration is present in at least two Outlander novels--and I think in all three of the first ones:  Outlander, Dragonfly in Amber, and Voyager.  In Outlander, Claire is introduced to the practice as she hopes for Jamie's healing after profound physical, psychological, and sexual abuse.  The account of Adoration is a rather remarkable one--and certainly rings true for me as someone who has engaged in adoration of the Blessed Sacrament.  It helps Claire find peace, and there is the hint of an answer to her prayers for Jamie in the stillness of the chapel.

It was a disappointment that there was never more than the hint of religious feeling in Claire following the experience of Adoration.  I was excited when she seemed moved, and thought that there might be some subtle entry of religious feeling--or understanding for Jamie's religious feeling.  Rather, the novels seem to suggest that Claire's personality, ambition, modernism (in the bad sense), upbringing, or carnality are completely incompatible with Christian belief.  Frequently, instead of having the spouses seek perfection together, love for Claire puts Jamie at odds with God (because his love for her is greater than anything--not an uncommon sentiment, and very human) ...except at those moments when his love for her will redeem him, as when he tells Claire at the end of Dragonfly that his love for her will stand as his account of himself before God.

Be that as it may, Adoration appears in Voyager as Claire's escape from Frank--a place she finds peace, but not a place where she goes to pray, per se:

I sat there without moving, watching the flickering glow of the candle flames in the gold surface of the monstrance, until the soft footsteps of the next adorer came down the aisle behind me, ending in the heavy creak of genuflection. They came once each hour, day and night. The Blessed Sacrament was never left alone. (40)

Beyond the peace and stillness, and occasional acknowledgment of a Presence, I wonder what role Adoration has in the Outlander novels.  It seems privileged because of how prominent the scenes of Adoration are--it is impossible to ignore them completely.  They stand out from the narrative as something different.  (Which is as it should be...)  On the other hand, they fail to become thematic (even if, as I propose, Voyager is convincingly Purgatorial).  But neither do they become blended with the pagan forms of spirituality.  In this, at least, Catholicism--Catholic Christianity--is exceptional.

Gabaldon, Diana (2004-10-26). Voyager (Outlander) (p. 40). Random House, Inc.. Kindle Edition

Dragonfly: Saintly Ghosts

Looking back on Outlander as I finished the novel, I thought about a curious scene in which a seemingly ghostly Jamie looks in on Claire in 1945.  I will return to ghosts as I work through the rest of the novels, because while I don't necessarily see them functioning in the same way in each instance, the spirits of the dead remain with the characters in ways that become familiar.

In Dragonfly in Autumn, remembering the untimely death of his older brother and holding the small snake his brother carved for him when he was a child, Jamie describes how he talks to his brother:

"I talk to Willie, sometimes, in my mind," Jamie said. He tilted the snake on his palm.  "If you'd lived, Brother, if ye'd been laird as you were meant to be, would ye do what I've done? Or would ye find a better way?" (551)

There is a specific connection here to Jamie's own self-doubt, and feeling of humility at having inherited a role that should have belonged to his brother.  In a quite different way, he is also aware of his father's presence at unexpected times:

"I hear my father's voice sometimes, in the barn, or in the field.  When I'm not even thinkin' of him, usually.  But all at once I'll turn my head, as though I'd just heard him outside, laughing wi' one of the tenants, or behind me, gentling a horse."  (552)

There is obligation and responsibility that accompanies Jamie's memories of both his father and brother, but the interactions are different--his brother seems a confidante and guide; his father a trusted companion.

While Jamie's conversations register as manifestation of memory (mostly), but as Claire recounts her own experience of talking to the dead, there is a kind of shift from memory to a presence, particularly when she imagines her mother after her miscarriage:

"I do the same," I said softly, after a moment.  "With Uncle Lamb.  And my parents.  My mother especially.  I--I didn't think about her often, when I was young, just every now and then I'd dream about someone soft and warm, with a lovely singing voice.  But when I was sicker, after... Faith--sometimes I imagined she was there.  With me."  A sudden wave of grief swept over me, remembrance of losses recent and long past. (551)

The presence of Claire's mother beside her bed, as she coalesces after miscarriage, is of course the mother connection of childbearing women, but also hints at Claire's closeness to death.

Jamie crystallizes what they are both feeling:

"I think sometimes the dead cherish us, as we do them." (551)

In this particular exchange, with the descriptions of Claire and (especially) Jamie, I can't help hearing a kind of echo of Tevye talking to God in Fiddler on the Roof, but of course, without the conversation partner being God.  I also remember how, growing up, I imagined relatives I had never met, who died before I was born, looking down on me and watching over me.  Eventually, this is how I came to understand the Catholic concept of the Communion of Saints--not sure if I picked up on this from relatives who had been Catholic, or if it was just a child's way of theorizing death.  Either way, I see these ghostly memories, these presences, as being particularly saintly.  It is a comforting way of viewing the dead, and one that Gabaldon makes the most of in the Outlander series, beginning, in a way, with this conversation between Claire and Jamie.

Dragonfly: Where is God in Time Travel?

There are definitely questions about which I'm not interested in speculating. These are mostly questions that resolve themselves within the novels, or questions that do not resonate outside of the novels.  They are interesting, but there is no need to elaborate.  One such question asserts itself in Dragonfly in Amber, in the chapters titled "Untimely Resurrection" and "The Royal Stud": the question of Jamie's vengeance upon Jack Randall, and whether Claire is right to make him postpone that vengeance.  It could be that I think Claire is more wrong about preventing Jamie from killing Jack Randall on this particular occasion than she is to make him betray his country and kin to prevent the Battle (and devastation) of Culloden.  I'll never tell.  But it's also true that Gabaldon brings the matter around very neatly, giving Jamie the ability to reclaim some of his own by determining his own reason for postponing vengeance (and getting in some nice foreshadowing as well).  It's a lovely narrative card that she plays, and well worth giving a nod.  (See pp. 401-403 in the small, Dell paperback version with the orange cover.)  But--it is part of the narrative, and in terms of Jamie's justification, what he does or does not owe Claire, the question of conscience, or anything involving their feelings about other characters, it works itself out, and doesn't really require speculation or further analysis of motivations.  I like to leave the characters to themselves, and allow their motivations to emerge through the action of the story rather than through my own suppositions and psychoanalysis.  It's why criticism is (or should be) sort of the anti-fan-fiction.  (Just for fun, check out Diana Gabaldon's Fan Fiction Policy.)

What is interesting in the maneuverings of Claire to prevent Jamie from killing Jack Randall too soon is (first) that the question is never the morality of the vengeance.  That is taken for granted, and I'm glad.  Moralistic posturing would do no one any good in this case.  Claire's conscience is evoked, rather neatly, to turn the guilt of preventing Frank's birth (indirectly, by the death of Jack Randall) to Claire's decision to abandon Frank for Jamie--at least, that is how Jamie casts Claire's decision not to pass again through the stones: "it's one thing to abandon a man, and another to condemn him to death" (401).  Non-birth/prevention of conception is not quite death, but we'll let that go for the moment.  Jamie's conscience is never an issue, except insofar as killing always leaves a mark:  "I remember the face of every man I've killed, and always will" (400).  And that's just fine.

But the deeper implications of the maneuverings leave some room for consideration.  If this novel is instrumental to the series, it may well be--first and foremost--the working out of what a time traveler can and can't accomplish with reference to history that gives it it's highest value in the big picture.  (I have other considerations of time travel here and here.)  The reason I drag God into it in my title is because the question of conscience was right in front of me in the narrative.  Brother Anselm and his theology, the moral implications of preventing someone from being born.  But a larger question emerges:  could anything Jamie and Claire have done prevent the beginning of the bloodline that eventually produces Frank Randall, Claire's husband in the year 1943?

It's something like the question my son asked of his 4th grade teacher at the fourth-rate Catholic school that he went to for most of that year:  if Adam and Eve hadn't sinned, would any of us exist?  Need I say that the teacher didn't know how to answer the question?  I consulted a deacon friend of mine, and came up with the response that our existence in God's plan didn't depend on sin.  We simply don't know how things would have worked out without it.  There is something tangentially related to this question happening in Perelandra, the second book of C. S. Lewis's Space Trilogy.  An alien world is experiencing its own Creation, and Lewis's Ransom is a spectator and intercessor, preventing the successful temptation of the newly-Created female of the alien species so that the world might emerge without the taint of Original Sin.  The idea is--Sin or no Sin, our existence as individuals is part of God's plan.

So is this worldview somehow reflected in Gabaldon's novel?  At first glance it may seem not to be.  Clearly, it is absent from the Back to the Future movie trilogy--things change, people disappear.  But there's nothing about God in those films.  Religion is simply not part of the picture(s).  By contrast, there's Catholicism all over the place in the Outlander series.  You can't get around it, the novels have a Catholic consciousness, whatever their orthodoxy.  You might say that it proceeds from what has been called "the Catholic imagination," though I wouldn't quote Andrew Greeley for orthodoxy's sake...

Without saying how, I will say that Frank's bloodline works itself out.  It works itself out with Jack Randall alive, but it does so in a way that his survival has precious little to do with the birth.  Clever.  So does that mean Predestination?  I'm not sure.  Although there is implied argument between Predestination and Free Will in the novels (especially with reference to Roger Wakefield in some of the later books), there seems to be quite a bit of room for Free Will--or really, would readers enjoy the books so much?  But characters' Free Will seems to feed directly into what they know to have been going to happen.  (I'm absolutely playing with verb tense there.  Too bad I'm not writing in a romance language!)  In other words, the characters end up proving their own instrumentality to the events that will unfold--or have unfolded--or will have unfolded.  Everything fits neatly into place.  Some would consider this as evidence for God in the Outlander worldview--or in its representation of time travel.  I think there's evidence, at least, that the man who was Frank Randall was "meant" to exist--which does, in fact, suggest some greater intentionality beyond the machinations of Claire and Jamie.