Fr. David Sherry
District Superior of Canada

Dear Reader,

There is a difference between the imaginative and the imaginary. That at least was the opinion of C.S. Lewis. Both are the work of the imagination, but whereas ‘imaginary’ literature does not describe reality, ‘imaginative’ literature does. Macbeth, stricken by guilt for the sin of murder is imaginative; Father Rodrigues in the movie Silence being encouraged by God to apostatise is imaginary.

You would reckon then that any work of literature based on a true story would be imaginative, not imaginary. You might be wrong. I recently came across an advertisement for The Pope’s Exorcist. It says that the movie is “inspired by the actual files of Father Gabriele Amorth, Chief Exorcist of the Vatican as he investigates a young boy’s terrifying possession.” Excellent, I thought, I remember reading those memoirs. Provided Hollywood hasn’t snuck in some gratuitous glorification of sin or immodesty which makes it an occasion of sin, this could be a good movie. I read on. “Amorth ends up uncovering a centuries-old conspiracy the Vatican has desperately tried to keep hidden.” Ah, of course. The Vatican conspiracy. I somehow couldn’t recall reading that in the memoirs. Perhaps I was distracted by my simultaneous perusal of one of Dan Brown’s chefs d’oeuvre.

Another drama “based on a true story” is Doctor Faustus by Goethe. The doctor, tired of boring science (who isn’t?), turns to the devil and sells his soul for magical power and worldly pleasure, accompanied no doubt by despair and hatred and presumably ending with eternal fire. Among other crimes, the medic turned magician seduces a virgin and leads her into sin. The true story that episode is based on? That would be the story of a fourth century magician of Antioch called Cyprian. He used his magical powers to get money and to serve his ambitions and passions. He was indeed smitten by a beautiful virgin and sought to deploy his spells to get her. But it was not the old magician who seduced the virgin; it was she who converted him. And Saints Cyprian and Justina went together to meet the bridegroom on September 26th 304. Imagine that.

Fr. David Sherry