The Parchment

Book excerpt: It is A.D. 70, and Evardus, a wine merchant from Gaul, has encountered a dying rabbi on a road outside of Jerusalem. With his final breaths, the old man urgently tells Evardus that Jewish priests have spirited sacred objects and records away from Herod's Temple in the hope of keeping them out of the hands of Roman soldiers--who are, at that very moment, attacking Jerusalem and destroying the Jews' most holy site. The merchant learns of a copper scroll hidden beneath the Holy of Holies and a map that leads to the holy objects. A thousand years later, while on a Crusade to Palestine, a descendant of the merchant finally uncovers those secrets below the temple. They include an astonishing parchment that threatens the very foundations of the Church and Christianity. The grand master of the Templars develops a scheme to advance the interests of his order, but the plan has devastating consequences. The parchment survives, however, and for nearly a millennium remains hidden in plain sight. With the dawning of the twenty-first century and pivotal world events, two American professors discover the document while researching a book. Like those before, they are tempted to use it for their own purposes. The course they pursue leads to unforeseen consequences that affect events in the Middle East and a crucial turning point for the Vatican. Gerald McLaughlin shows us a rich, haunting tableau that spans two thousand years. We are given a timely glimpse into the often-disastrous ways that we tend to deal with faith when confronted by fear and ambition, and how moral choices are made in the face of the continuing battle between good and evil--both in ourselves and in the world. Ultimately, the author shines a light of profound hope and faith into the darkest recesses of the human soul, our modern life, and world events.