Feuilleton

✥ We ask our readers to pray for the repose of the soul of Gregory K. Hillis, who died on October 8, the vigil of the feast of Saint John Henry Newman. Greg was a beloved husband, father, and teacher whose charity and good humor will be remembered by all who knew him. In an era in which “dialogue” was rightly dismissed as a cant phrase, he was a model of good-faith conversation, always curious and self-effacing. Greg detested cruelty in all its forms. The furthest thing from a traditionalist, after the recent motu proprio he nevertheless argued forcefully on behalf of the Old Mass and those attached to it in the pages of America and Commonweal. Here and elsewhere we can sincerely hope that “the Eternal Master found / The single talent well employed.”

✥ Speaking to a congregation of Jesuits in Belgium in October, Pope Francis was asked, “In Western Europe we are familiar with secularization. Our societies seem far from God. What can be done?” He gave this response:

Secularization is a complex phenomenon. I realize that sometimes we have to confront forms of paganism. We do not need a statue of a pagan god to talk about paganism: the very environment, the air we breathe is a gaseous pagan god! And we must preach to this culture in terms of witness, service and faith.

A gaseous pagan god!

✥ Just in time for Halloween, we reprint the chilling end of the Brothers Grimm tale “Godfather Death”:

“If I could only deceive death for once,” thought the physician. “He will be angry, of course, but because I am his godson he will shut one eye. I will risk it.” He therefore took hold of the sick man and laid him the other way around, so that Death was now standing at his head. Then he gave the king some of the herb, and he recovered and became healthy again.

However, Death came to the physician, made a dark and angry face, threatened him with his finger, and said, “You have betrayed me. I will overlook it this time because you are my godson, but if you dare to do it again, it will cost you your neck, for I will take you yourself away with me.”

Soon afterward the king’s daughter became seriously ill. She was his only child, and he cried day and night until his eyes were going blind. Then he proclaimed that whosoever rescued her from death should become her husband and inherit the crown.

When the physician came to the sick girl’s bed he saw Death at her feet. He should have remembered his godfather’s warning, but he was so infatuated by the princess’s great beauty and the prospect of becoming her husband that he threw all thought to the winds. He did not see that Death was looking at him angrily, lifting his hand into the air, and threatening him with his withered fist. He lifted up the sick girl and placed her head where her feet had been. Then he gave her some of the herb, and her cheeks immediately turned red, and life stirred in her once again.

Death, seeing that he had been cheated out of his property for a second time, approached the physician with long strides and said, “You are finished. Now it is your turn.”

Then Death seized him so firmly with his ice-cold hand that he could not resist, and led him into an underground cavern. There the physician saw how thousands and thousands of candles were burning in endless rows, some large, others medium-sized, others small. Every instant some died out, and others were relit, so that the little flames seemed to be jumping about in constant change.

“See,” said Death, “these are the life-lights of mankind. The large ones belong to children, the medium-sized ones to married people in their best years, and the little ones to old people. However, even children and young people often have only a tiny candle.”

“Show me my life-light,” said the physician, thinking that it still would be very large. Death pointed to a little stump that was just threatening to go out, and said, “See, there it is.”

“Oh, dear godfather,” said the horrified physician, “light a new one for me. Do it as a favor to me, so that I can enjoy my life, and become king and the husband of the beautiful princess.”

“I cannot,” answered Death. “One must go out before a new one is lighted.”

“Then set the old one onto a new one that will go on burning after the old one is finished,” begged the physician.

Death pretended that he was going to fulfill this wish and took hold of a large new candle, but, desiring revenge, he purposely made a mistake in relighting it, and the little piece fell down and went out. The physician immediately fell to the ground, and he too was now in the hands of Death.