Church stored them in a series of ancient tunnels that we’d found hidden in the plateau.’
The Austrian gasped. ‘The Catacombs of Orvieto?’
Vercelli nodded. ‘Over the years, the legend picked up a wave of momentum. What was nothing more than an underground mausoleum grew into a tomb of mythical proportions.’
‘Come, come,’ the Brazilian teased. ‘That isn’t true, and you know it. You have been telling the same story for so many years that you’re starting to confuse our fiction with the real facts.’ He turned toward the Austrian. ‘We have no one to blame but ourselves. If we had come clean in the very beginning, we would have ended the myth once and for all. The Italian cardinals wanted to protect the secrecy of Orvieto, just in case another schism occurred and we were forced back into hiding. The only way to do that was to pretend that they were never there. And it was that denial that got them into trouble.’
‘In what way?’ the Austrian asked.
‘In every way! We are the Catholic Church, not the U.S. Senate. We simply don’t know how to lie. I’m telling you, it will be our downfall.’
Everyone laughed, thankful for some humor in an otherwise tense meeting.
But Vercelli ended the levity. ‘The problem occurred when the families left Orvieto. They hoped to bury their ancestors in their family plots, just like they’d done for centuries. However, the decision makers at the Vatican felt it would be in everyone’s best interest if the bodies remained in the Catacombs, at least until the Church was sure that the schism was settled.’
The Brazilian chirped in. ‘Simply put, we kept the bodies as ransom. The families promised to stay quiet about Orvieto, and we promised to guard their loved ones for eternity. At least that’s what we told them. Two months later the main entrance collapsed, and we didn’t have the manpower to rebuild it. That’s when we decided to wash our hands of everything. From that point on, the Catacombs no longer existed to the Roman Catholic Church. We eliminated them from our records and denied that they had ever existed in the first place.’
‘Just like that?’ the Austrian asked.
The Brazilian nodded. ‘You must remember, all of this took place several hundred years ago, well before any of us were born. I’m sure the holy father had a good reason for his decision, one that undoubtedly helped us get through the greatest period of turmoil in our history.’
Vercelli glanced around the room, making sure no one had anything else to say. ‘The question we must ask ourselves is whether we need to keep this secret for any longer. I, for one, don’t understand why anyone would think that this story was worth a billion dollars. Furthermore, I don’t understand why Benito was unable to handle this problem on his own.’
He stared down the table at Benito. ‘As far as I can tell, you’re the only person who stands to lose anything here, since you put your reputation on the line years ago when you swore to the media that the Catacombs never existed… Isn’t that right?’
The temperature in the room seemed to rise several degrees as the cardinals waited for Benito’s retort. They knew he would say something — probably loud and persuasive — but none of them could’ve anticipated his response. Never in a million years did they expect Benito to turn on them and attack everything that they stood for. Never in their wildest dreams did they expect to hear something so scandalous that it made a billion dollars seem like the bargain of the century. Then again, none of them knew the secret that he possessed.
Or how long he had been waiting to use it.
53
Dr Boyd paced around Ulster’s office, trying to comprehend the mandrake carving on the archway. If Maria’s discovery was legitimate, then they were close to proving the biggest fraud of all time. Close to shattering an entire belief system. Close to killing the most popular religion on the planet. And the anxiety was starting to get to him.
‘Don’t you see what this means?’ he barked at no one in particular. ‘The
Payne said, ‘But why? Why would Tiberius do this? That
Boyd stopped moving. ‘Tell me, my boy, what do you know about organized religion?’
‘Religion? It’s a set of beliefs that a person has about God.’
Boyd nodded. ‘And what do you know about the origin of religion?’
‘Not much. I know the basics about Christ from Sunday school but nothing more.’
‘Actually, my boy, I didn’t mean Christianity. I was referring to the origin of religion,
‘Makes sense,’ Payne conceded.
‘Yes, it does. So much so that men of intelligence have been using this for centuries, wielding the wrath of God as a weapon and using it to achieve supremacy over the masses. Of course this method of control isn’t permanent, for the world has a way of changing everything over time. Evolution, war, and technology have played their parts during history, eroding the fabric of society just enough to make sure that nothing human is permanent.
‘Hundreds of years passed before ancient Egypt crumbled and with it its widespread belief that Ra was the creator of the universe. Then came the Greeks and their notion of Zeus. The Incas had Viracocha. The Mayans had Hunab Ku. The Vikings had Odin and the great hall of Valhalla. Each of these deities was revered for centuries by legions of devoted followers, yet today they’re viewed by society as antiquated notions from our uncivilized forefathers.’
‘Out of curiosity,’ Payne wondered, ‘what does any of that have to do with Tiberius?’
‘Everything, my boy, everything! You see, the religious structure of ancient Rome came directly from Greece, stolen from the heights of Mount Olympus. In fact, there’s a term,
Boyd looked around the room to make sure that everyone understood.
‘Of course this type of transition has an incubation period. Just because a government wants its people to follow its official religion doesn’t mean they’re going to do it — especially since most Roman citizens weren’t even born in Rome. You see, ancient Rome was the original melting pot, a merging of several different cultures under one imperial flag. Alas, unlike the United States where its people longed to come to America, most families in the Empire had no choice. The Greeks, Gauls, Britons, and Jews were all conquered and assimilated into the Roman culture, as were the Egyptians, Illyrians, and Armenians. My Lord, by the time Tiberius came into rule in 14 ad, the Empire stretched from the North Atlantic Ocean to the Red Sea.’
‘The lands of snow and sun,’ Maria stated. ‘That’s what Tiberius wrote in the scroll. He said Rome needed to do something drastic because the Empire had gotten too large for its own good.’
Payne asked, ‘And the something drastic was to fake the crucifixion of Christ?’
Boyd nodded, glad that Payne was starting to grasp the big picture. ‘As I mentioned earlier, men of intelligence have used the power of religion for centuries. It’s one thing to threaten the masses with punishments of the flesh; it’s quite another to threaten eternal damnation. Tiberius was never able to wield this ultimate power since most Roman peasants — especially those who lived on the fringes of the Empire — never believed in the same gods as he. Therefore, he never fully had control over them. Or their wealth.’
‘OK,’ Payne said, ‘now I’m beginning to understand. The only way he could unite everyone was to get them to support the same thing. And since they’d never unite for the sake of Rome, he knew he had to give them an alternative. Something they could believe in.’
Boyd nodded. ‘Tiberius started Christianity for one reason only: to gain control. He knew all about the unrest in Judea and figured the best way to placate the Jews was to give them the Messiah that had been prophesied.
