Chapter Seven
Woe is me for my hurt! My wound is severe. But I say, "Truly this is an infirmity, and I must bear it."
Jeremiah 10:19
Once again, Silas slept throughout the day. He knew Diggory would be back to sew up the wounds before the end of the week but moving around too much could make them start bleeding again. It was best to lie down. Besides, he always felt sleepy during the day at the moment. He put it down to the after-effects of shock.
When he woke up in the late afternoon, he felt strange. He was anxious and restless. He almost automatically reached for the discipline that was no longer there.
Why did he want to use the discipline when he now knew without any doubt that it was an insult to his Saviour? The drive to use it was so strong, it felt overwhelming.
To distract himself, he got up and made himself a sandwich. He was always hungry by late afternoon having slept through lunch time. He avoided the TV and went over to Sennett's bookshelves.
He found a whole shelf on linguistics and ancient languages. Another shelf was full of history texts; yet another shelf was full of books on Biblical archeology and anthropology. There were dozens of books of theology and a handful of books on the lives of certain Saints. There were also authors he didn't recognize because they were not Catholic – Dorothy Sayers, Joy Davidman, Philip Yancey and C S Lewis plus many others. Church history was another subject that took up a whole shelf by itself.
There was also fiction but most of it was classics obviously left over from Sennett's girlhood. Silas had never heard of Alice in Wonderland or the Wizard of Oz or Anne of Green Gables or Little Women. There were a lot of books by Enid Blyton and a whole series about a place called Narnia written by that C S Lewis theologian. There were quite a few adult books by Jane Austen and someone called Miss Read.
Silas' reading level had improved dramatically since joining Opus Dei. Being on the streets from the age of seven had meant his education had been neglected, to say the least. There were still huge gaps in it. There were still entire subjects he knew next to nothing about – history, science, the arts and higher maths for example. He had read a great deal of theology and been taught Latin in Opus Dei but other than that, he had never caught up. It had been enough of a challenge to bring his reading age up to adult level after so much neglect for so long.
Silas felt excited by the choice of books but intimidated too. Had Sennett read all these books? He had read a lot too in the past ten years at Opus Dei but nothing like what this book collection suggested.
Silas began to feel curious about Sennett's work. She was a celibate outside the authority of the Church who prayed in Latin and had an impressive collection of Christian books. That was all he knew about her. He had no idea where she went every day. He was beginning to wonder.
Sennett got home at her usual time.
"How are you feeling?" she called out to him as she came in.
He was hunched up on the couch with C S Lewis' 'Mere Christianity'. The title had made him curious and now he was hooked.
Silas frowned. He wasn't used to being asked how he was feeling. How was he feeling? Like he was suspended from real life for a short time was really the closest explanation.
"I feel well," he finally answered self-consciously.
"Good," she replied as she went through to her room to change.
They sat down to dinner an hour later.
"Where do you work?" he asked curiously as they ate.
"At Oxford University," Sennett replied without hesitation.
"What do you do?" he persisted.
"I work in the Arts Faculty. I'm working on some research projects and do some tutoring in linguistics and history," she explained.
"What degrees do you have?" he asked.
"I have a Bachelor of Arts majoring in Ancient History, Church History and Linguistics. Then I did my Masters degree in Medieval History, Ancient Texts and Theology. I'm finishing my Doctorate now, finally," she said, looking wry.
"What languages do you know?" Silas asked fascinated, his pale eyes fixed on her face.
"Mainly the ancient ones – Greek, Latin, Aramaic and Hebrew. I wanted to be able to read ancient texts in their original language," Sennett said.
"I learned Latin at Opus Dei but that's the only ancient language I know quite well," Silas said almost enviously, "I'd like to learn Greek and Aramaic and Hebrew too one day," he added wistfully.
"If you joined the right Order, you could," Sennett said off-handedly.
Silas lowered his eyes. "I don't think I can go back to the Church now," he said in a low voice.
"Depends on which part of the Church. It's very big you know, Silas. You couldn't go back to Opus Dei or any monastery with ties to it but would you want to?" Sennett said conversationally.
"No – but I thought the whole Church would reject me now," he said quietly, pushing his food around on his plate with a fork.
"There are enemies of Opus Dei within the Church," Sennett said frankly. "There are people within the Church who would protect you from Opus Dei if they knew your story. The Catholic Church is very diverse with a very broad range of views and opinions and ways of practicing the faith."
Silas looked up from his plate and stared at her with his strange eyes. Could it be true? His view of the Church had come to him solely through the lens of Opus Dei. He had assumed the whole Catholic Church was like them. They had never hinted that there was any other way to practice the faith other than theirs'. Could there still be a place within the Church for him somewhere, where he was safe from the tentacles of Opus Dei?
"Let me tell you something, Silas," Sennett said seriously, putting down her fork and looking at him directly, "Opus Dei is only a very, very small part of the Catholic Church. It represents a very extreme form of Catholicism, regardless of what their PR agents may say to try to make them sound more main stream. The majority of Catholics would find the Opus Dei way of practicing the Christian faith bizarre and unhealthy and rather suspicious. There are still a lot of options open to you if you still want to live the life of a Religious. If you want to be a monk, there are many Orders to choose from who have nothing to do with Opus Dei and whose way of life is nothing like that of an Opus Dei numerary. There are Orders where you can have a say in how you live within the community, where you can have a great deal of freedom, where you can choose which path you wish to follow in your work."
Silas listened with wide eyes. It sounded almost too good to be true. Surely there was more of a price to pay for the shelter of an Order? Opus Dei had always extracted such a heavy price from him in allowing him to belong there. Could there really be Orders where he could live a life of contemplation, prayer and work that he liked without suffering? Perhaps he would not have to go back to the streets after all.
"How are you coping without the discipline, Silas?" Sennett suddenly asked quietly, watching his reaction carefully.
Silas almost jumped. How had she known he had been anxious about it only that afternoon? He frowned and tried to say something but no words came out. How did he explain to her that he missed it? That he missed pain? It sounded really sick and sad. He didn't want to admit how fretful he felt without it.
"Let me show you something," Sennett said and pushed up the long sleeves of her top to the elbow. She reached over to the light on the wall and angled it right over the small table. Then she lay her forearms on the table, the inner arm right under the light. "Look closely," she said.
Silas leaned closer and examined the skin of her forearms.
"There are scars!" he said with a profound feeling of shock.
"From a razor blade," Sennett said bluntly, "I made them myself at 17."
Silas' mind reeled. The scars were very faint now but some of them had obviously been quite deep. Some of them ran the entire length of her arm.
"I know what its like to want to hurt yourself, Silas. It's been a long time since I've done it but I remember quite clearly the anxiety that used to drive me to it. It's a way of distracting yourself, isn't it? If your body is hurting enough than you don't have to think about how much you're hurting inside. In some ways, it's a relief. Sometimes, it feels like it's the only real relief you have from whatever is bothering you," Sennett quietly.
Silas' eyes were fixed on the vulnerable flesh of her inner forearms. It didn't matter how long he stared at it, he still found it hard to believe. Was it possible someone like Sennett really did understand? Was he really not the only person in the world who found relief in physical pain?
"It's a common problem, Silas. You're not alone. There are a lot of people who self injure in order to cope. What I can tell you for sure is that it's possible to get well, possible to stop and possible to find other ways of coping," she said.
"How did you know?" he asked, his voice slightly hoarse.
"It takes one to know one, Silas," Sennett said flatly, "That's all it is."
"That's why you reacted the way you did," he said carefully as she pulled her sleeves back down.
"Yes and no. I still think that from the point of view of atonement, using corporal mortification is wrong and an insult to the Saviour. I think it's a sign of how far I've come that what you were doing to yourself did upset me so much. Once upon a time, I probably wouldn't have reacted much at all because I would have understood all too well," Sennett said honestly.
"I didn't know it wasn't just me. I thought I was the only one…" Silas said and then his voice trailed off as he realized that he wasn't so alone after all. He was silent for a few moments and then said, "I wouldn't have thought someone like you would need to do this to cope."
Sennett could see he was struggling for words.
"I mean, you're well-educated and pretty and successful. You came from a stable family.." he continued.
"Did I?" Sennett said ironically, "That's not true. There was a lot of abuse, neglect and violence in my home growing up. There was a lot of chaos and cruelty. It was not a safe place."
Silas looked at her in bewilderment. It sounded just like his family.
"Then how…?" he began.
"How did I end up at Oxford? Because I didn't run away; because I put up with it; because I knew running away would only make things worse and that it wasn't a solution; because I was lucky enough to have at least one responsible parent when it came to my education - even they were totally self-absorbed and neglectful in every other way. But I still suffered through that situation for years on end and I still wasn't coping and I still learned unhealthy ways of surviving," Sennett said candidly.
Silas absorbed all this in silence. He couldn't believe a woman who looked so perfect and unruffled on the surface could be hiding so much turmoil and confusion within. She was just like him or he was just like her, underneath all the surface differences.
"What memories and stress are you using self injury to help you cope with?" Sennett asked him but it was a rhetorical question. She obviously didn't expect an answer.
The real question, Silas thought, was what memories and stress was self injury not helping him cope with? He didn't have any happy memories, they were all bad. Even Opus Dei now only held bad memories of betrayal and abuse of trust. The only way to escape the blackness in his mind was through physical pain or sleep.
Sennett was right. He needed to find a new way.