Paradise or Perdition

I lay in bed, and mulled the words of Brother Conrad, with equal parts trepidation and rising hope.

He spoke so eloquently on a new life, a different life. A life without the restrictions that I found so uncomfortable, with no way out.

I was betrothed to a man I did not wish to wed.

I was Christian, not these “Protestant” heretics.

And yet…

I had no feelings for the man my father had chosen. Not that I had ever expected to, since I had never met him, but I had no feelings for any man. Ever. Even the thought of breeding gave me the grues in a fearsome way, and Mother had made my teaching of expected domestic chores a surety. I was taught all the ways to keep a manor running smoothly, as befits my station.

I would fain wish to become a nun, but though I am quite young, I am not naive. I know why Nunnery Lane is named thus, and what naughtiness young men and women can create. I would not mind the monastic life in a cloistered cell, but my father forbids it. I am his only daughter, and he will treat me like chattel, selling my body at a dearer price than any pimp or brothel.

I do not wish that type of forcement on my body. I do not wish for children. I have brothers, and they seem more than eager to continue the family line, whether by matrimony or by bastards. It is all the same to me; let them procreate, and leave me alone to contemplate the higher things.

But no. My third brother is for the monastery, will he or won’t he, and I am to be sold.

But I heard Brother Conrad Beissel today. He spoke at the town square.

A quiet, contemplative life. Simple white clothing. Hard work, but hard prayer to balance. Discipline, but varied and diverse tasks performed throughout the day. Farming, spinning, weaving, but also papermaking and calligraphy and milling. Things I could do. Things I was useful for.

Things where I did not have to treat my body as if it belonged to anyone else but God.

But – he is a Protestant.

The enemy. Of faith, of my very life, encouraged and urged by my traditional-thinking parents. If this being was a devil in disguise, and led me astray, I would be disowned. There was no return or forgiveness for the action I was contemplating.

He, and his followers, did not look like devils.

They did not look at him greedily, either. How do I explain? That bright look of love and lust combined, the mark of a true devil-follower, looking for more and more souls to follow him blindly. To act without thinking, to obey without questioning, to do things to and for him against their own reserved nature.

One of them actually stopped him mid-speech, and corrected him! And he stopped, and thought, and agreed! And corrected his speech! I… I don’t know what to say to such a thing.

And truly, celibacy sounds like Heaven on Earth to me.

Yes, people can marry within this sect. But they are not expected to engage in relations.

That is my deciding.

Now, how to implement?

I can leave my room without fuss. I have been quite biddable, so my father has not thought to put a guard on me. I only have one maid, and she snores like my father’s overweight guard dogs when the meal is fatty beef or mutton. Just thinking about a simple gourd or pumpkin for supper makes me salivate. I don’t know what to think of a wooden box for a pillow, sleeping on a work bench, but it still seems better than my silks and velvets and smothering coverlets.

I did not take my clothing. I took a few jewels to pay my way in. Everything belonged to my father, so I only took what I was worth as a bride price. It seemed fair.

I was not used to the streets after dark. It was a strange world, shrouded in cloaked figures who strode along in a circle of torchlight, or scuttled away from the same light like a frightened roach.

One torch-bearer led a small procession in the way I needed to travel. Also in my cloak, pulled tight against my layered chemises, I attached myself to the end. A tiny shadow in a world of darkness.

I prayed I was drawn to the correct light.

I did not hesitate till the very last moment, and then, I was sore afraid. I had never been to the Protestant’s "church," and I had heard the most horrid and fearsome stories of their ways. Our church was direct on the town square, tall and proud and erect. Theirs was a little ways off. And my unknowing protectors were now taking a different path than mine, leaving me to fend for myself on the last blocks.

I almost did not do it.

I almost turned and ran home.

But my body ached for a freedom that I could not describe. Freedom from persuasion, from the duty of a wife to a husband, from unwelcome advances.

I gulped, gasped a prayer, and ran.

I was not molested, though I drew some few eyes for my sudden movements. But none were close enough to catch me as I fairly flew to to an unsteady haven. Would they take me? Was this all in vain?

I stared at a heavy oaken door, lit with a faint radiance of a small lamp.

And the door opened before I could touch it.

It was him.

“I felt a strange urge to leave my prayers, and open the door,” he murmured as he held out a hand. “Welcome, Brother, to our humble home. Would you join us?”

His words were thickly accented, reflecting his German descent. Being of Irish descent, it lay strangely on my ears, but I could understand him. I wanted to belong.

I reached out, and my cloak shifted. He smiled as he saw my features clearly in the light his own candle-cast. “Ah, my apologies. Welcome, Sister. Would you join us in Ephrata, at our cloister?”

“Yes, please, it is my will to do so. But not my father’s.”

“Then come in, and we will smuggle you to a better life.”

I thrust the bag of jingling gold at him. “It is all I have, but if it will buy-”

“Nah, nah, the Kingdom of Heaven is not to be bought. Like Simon the Magus, I would be struck dead. But I will take your offering as a donation, and we will use it to the betterment of our community. Come in, come in out of the dark.” And he took me inside, where both men and women sat around a communal table, breaking simple fare and partaking in a late meal. Plain clothing, wisps of song on their lips, and open and honest faces.

Heaven. On Earth.

I stepped inside. The door closed behind me, safely ensconcing me within.

Ephrata Cloister: https://ephratacloister.org/about/history/