CHAPTER 1

LOURDES, 1095

Three initiates, bare from the waist up, lay facedown on the marble floor. At the head of each stood a disciple wielding a flagellum bearing nine cords embedded with bits of sharpened bone.

"Renounce your own will for the salvation of your soul," the Grand Master intoned from his place in the outer circle of two dozen followers. Emblazoned in blood-red on the breasts of their brown hooded cassocks was the symbol of the Sacred Order of Via Dei: a T-shaped cross topped by a circle, within which a blazing sun shot two beams downward to form a pyramid superimposed against the cross.

Grand Master Jean Fournier continued his recitation from The Order of Sanctity, by which all members of Via Dei— the Disciples of the Way— were to conduct their lives.

"Strive everywhere with pure desire to serve the Holy Trinity of Via Dei, the Catholic Church, and Jesus Christ. Feel now the pain of the scourging received by our Lord."

The disciples whipped their flagella against the bare backs of the initiates, leaving red stripes.

"This I will do, so help me God," the initiates responded, their voices strained with pa ... read full excerpt from Armor of God ebook