A great man from Africa

It was easy to hear Wilfred Kwadwo Sewodie's voice each night as he moved through the quiet Dallas Theological Seminary hallways, scrubbing baseboards, collecting trash and doing his janitorial duties.

Sometimes he would dissect New Testament passages in Greek or meditate out loud on big questions inspired by his studies. Faculty members working late learned that, when they heard his voice, they could expect a visitor seeking answers. But most of the time the African simply sang hymns with a voice that was joyful, powerful and, ultimately, inspiring. His favorite was "Love Divine, All Loves Excelling" and he especially loved the second verse.

"Breathe, O breathe Thy loving Spirit, into every troubled breast!", he would sing, often repeating phrases for emphasis. "Let us all in Thee inherit, Let us find the promised rest. Take away our bent to sinning; Alpha and Omega be. End of faith, as its beginning, set our hearts at liberty."

Sewodie, 33, had one year left in seminary. He had one more year to envision his Tutukpene village school, to plan evangelistic crusades, to struggle to pay for long-distance calls to his young disciples in Ghana. It was nearly time to go home.

That isn't going to happen, at least not in the way everyone expected. Two weeks ago, he was killed when a driver who was being pursued by police ran a stop sign and struck his car. The other driver was charged with intoxication manslaughter. Now Sewodie's friends and professors are asking old, old questions.

"Why? Why would God bring a gifted Christian leader from Ghana to Dallas, take him through three quarters of the way through his degree program only to have his life suddenly snatched away?", asked New Testament professor John Grassmick, in an emotional farewell service. "What is God's purpose in all of this? How will He be glorified in all of this?"

Speaker after speaker concluded that God would redeem this tragedy. Another African student, Sewodie's cousin Evans Odei, said his kinsman's vision would live on if others were inspired to take his place.

"Yes, I think this will this be a testimony," said Odei, gazing down at the casket. "I think the body that is going home will be a testimony. It will be the word of the Lord. He died while he was preparing to witness to his own people. ... They are waiting for a body over there. But they are also waiting for us, in the future. ... Will you go?"

Sewodie was the third of 11 children in a poor rural family. He was the first child to finish secondary school and then earned a bachelor's degree in English and linguistics. He wanted to go into politics, but a powerful conversion experience steered him into ministry. While in college he helped translate the New Testament into his tribe's language. Last summer, he married his college sweetheart -- by proxy, since neither could afford an intercontinental plane ticket. Sewodie was weeks away from having enough money to bring Cynthia Odemo, a nurse, to Dallas.

Now, his friends face questions that aren't answered in seminary texts. How can they raise the money necessary to handle the many steps it takes to get a body from Dallas to Ghana? What can anyone say to the 5,000 mourners expected to gather today (May 2) for Sewodie's funeral in his home village?

Fellow student James Samra said he would offer the same message there that he struggled, through waves of grief, to deliver in Dallas. Sewodie's intensity, dedication and, above all, humility taught many Americans that there is more to ministry than big budgets and an impressive resume.

"If I could tell him one thing, ...it is that I know his heart's desire was to be a great man of God," said Samra, who is helping create a Sewodie memorial fund at the seminary (www.dts.edu). "We confuse greatness with popularity, with fame and prestige. ... But that is not what God necessarily considers great. I feel privileged and unworthy to go back to his home country with his body and tell his people what a great man he was."

Spring cleaning at the religion desk

The advertisement featured a photo of Stonehenge, with dawn's rays summoning worshippers to embrace old mysteries.

Who was invited? "Reformed Druids, Born-again Celts, Pentecostal Pagans, Recovering Christians, Christians seeking comfort from the storms of church bureaucracies and politics, lapsed Christians, committed Christians whose commitment is beginning to wane, Spiritual Desperados, folks looking for solace, seekers, rebels, rakes, the luckless, the abandoned, the forsaken, the vague and the clueless. Dress comfortably...." It wasn't an off-the-rack church ad, admitted the Rev. Canon Christopher Platt of St. Augustine's Episcopal Chapel at the University of Kentucky. But it didn't jolt people as much as one noting that if they didn't feel like going to Mass, they could always send money.

"We try to be an equal-opportunity offender," he said.

It's time once again for spring cleaning at the religion desk, when I pick through my extraneous e-mail and snail mail. I don't make this stuff up.

* Ads are getting spiritually stranger. The creators of the new VW Beetle note: "If you sold your soul in the 80s, here's your chance to buy it back." This echoes recent ads claiming that Volvos "can save your soul." No offense intended, a Volvo spokesman told the Washington Times. "We're using the term soul in the metaphysical sense, in the secular sense, before the religious meaning, before the Christian meaning."

* Someone sent me a junk e-mail ad for holy water. Price: $25 for a 1.4-ounce jar, with delivery in four to six weeks. The big question: Where did these entrepreneurs get it?

* "The squeal of electric guitars calls the faithful to prayer," began a Los Angeles Times feature. "The ballplayer- turned-pastor hugs people streaming off shuttle buses. ... As a microphone-waving singer at the altar ... sways to a tune titled 'My Life in You, Lord,' collection plates fill with checks." It's Sunday at the Yorba Linda Friends Meeting House -- the Quakers.

* Bill Gates III's Catholic wife has offered him a deal. If he returns to church, he can take their daughter to the pew of his choice. Gates told Time he would prefer one with "less theology and all," such as the United Church of Christ. But, "in terms of the allocation of time resources, religion is not very efficient. There's a lot more I could be doing on a Sunday morning."

* Try to picture this odd couple. The scene is a protest rally near the White House, during Chinese President Jiang Zemin's visit. Religious Right strategist Gary Bauer of the Family Research Council taps actor Richard Gere on the shoulder. The veteran Tibet activist turns around and, according to Fred Barnes of the Weekly Standard, exclaims: "Gary! My main man!"

* Here's a candid quote from pundit Andrew Sullivan on why he opposes Catholic teachings on homosexuality: "I know I'm telling the truth about who I am. I know that the people around me are telling the truth. If we're telling the truth, then the church's position has to be wrong." Meanwhile, Episcopal Church spokesman Jim Solheim offered this explanation for why traditionalists are so upset: ``What really bothers them is relativism in sexuality, the ordination of gays and lesbians and the blessing of gay unions. They are convinced that biblical standards of morality must be enforced." Yes, that would explain a lot.

* Here is this year's best ecclesiastical light-bulb joke. "How many United Methodists does it take to change a light bulb? This statement was issued: 'We choose not to make a statement either in favor of or against the need for a light bulb. However, if in your own journey you have found that a light bulb works for you, that is fine. You are invited to write a poem or compose a modern dance about your personal relationship with your light bulb (or light source, or non-dark resource), and present it next month at our annual light-bulb Sunday service, in which we will explore a number of light bulb traditions, including incandescent, fluorescent, three-way, long-life, and tinted -- all of which are equally valid paths to luminescence.' "

* A British bookseller has struggled with clergy stealing his wares. Thus, he posted this prayer: "For him that stealeth a Book from this Library, let it change into a serpent into his hand and rend him. Let him be struck with Palsy, and all his Members blasted. Let him languish in Pain crying aloud for Mercy and let there be no surcease to his Agony till he sink in Dissolution. Let Bookworms gnaw his Entrails in token of the Worm that dieth not, and when at last he goeth to his final Punishment, let the flames of Hell consume him for ever and aye."

So there.

* Thus spake Homer Simpson: "The answer's to life's problems aren't found at the bottom of a bottle, they're found on TV."

Ten years of reporting on a fault line

Back in the 1980s, I began to experience deja vu while covering event after event on the religion beat in Charlotte, Denver and then at the national level.

I kept seeing a fascinating cast of characters at events centering on faith, politics and morality. A pro-life rally, for example, would feature a Baptist, a Catholic priest, an Orthodox rabbi and a cluster of conservative Methodists, Presbyterians, Episcopalians and Lutherans. Then, the pro-choice counter-rally would feature a "moderate" Baptist, a Catholic activist or two, a Reform rabbi and mainline Methodists, Presbyterians, Episcopalians and Lutherans.

Similar line-ups would appear at many rallies linked to gay rights, sex-education programs and controversies in media, the arts and even science. Along with other journalists, I kept reporting that today's social issues were creating bizarre coalitions that defied historic and doctrinal boundaries. After several years of writing about "strange bedfellows," it became obvious that what was once unique was now commonplace.

Then, in 1986, a sociologist of religion had an epiphany while serving as a witness in a church-state case in Mobile, Ala. The question was whether "secular humanism" had evolved into a state-mandated religion, leading to discrimination against traditional "Judeo-Christian" believers. Once more, two seemingly bizarre coalitions faced off in the public square.

"I realized something there in that courtroom. We were witnessing a fundamental realignment in American religious pluralism," said James Davison Hunter of the University of Virginia. "Divisions that were deeply rooted in our civilization were disappearing, divisions that had for generations caused religious animosity, prejudice and even warfare. It was mind- blowing. The ground was moving."

The old dividing lines centered on issues such as the person of Jesus Christ, church tradition and the Protestant Reformation. But these new interfaith coalitions were fighting about something even more basic -- the nature of truth and moral authority.

Two years later, Hunter began writing "Culture Wars: The Struggle to Define America," in which he declared that America now contains two basic world views, which he called "orthodox" and "progressive." The orthodox believe it's possible to follow transcendent, revealed truths. Progressives disagree and put their trust in personal experience, even if that requires them to "resymbolize historic faiths according to the prevailing assumptions of contemporary life."

That's what I was seeing at all of those rallies and marches. And that's why, whenever I covered separate meetings of Catholics, Jews, Baptists, Episcopalians or whatever, I almost always found two distinct camps of people fighting about the same subjects.

About the same time Hunter began "Culture Wars," I began writing this column for the Scripps Howard News Service. The column turns 10 years old this week and, almost every week, I have seen evidence that Hunter has found a fault line that runs through virtually every set of pews in contemporary religious life.

Ask any big question and this issue looms in the background. Is the Bible an infallible source of truth? Is papal authority unique? Do women and men have God-given roles in the home and the church? Can centuries of Jewish traditions survive in the modern world? Can marriage be redefined? Is abortion wrong? Can traditionalists proclaim that sex outside of marriage is sin? Are heaven and hell real? Do all religious roads lead to the same end? Is there one God, or many? What is his or her name or names?

Many in the orthodox camp disagree on some of the answers, but they are united in their belief that public life must include room for those who insist eternal answers exist. Meanwhile, progressives are finding it harder to tolerate the views of people they consider offensive and intolerant. This is not a clash between religious people and secular people, stressed Hunter. This is a battle between two fundamentally different approaches to faith.

"We may soon reach the point when religious conservatives will long for the time when real, live, secular humanists ran the show," he said. "At least those people believed in something specific. At least they believed in reason and universal principles."

Today, secularism just doesn't sell in the marketplace. This approach to life has been tried and found wanting. People hunger for spirituality, miracles and a sense of mystery. But the core question remains: Should believers defend eternal truths or follow their hearts?

"The momentum is toward experience and emotions and feelings," said Hunter. "People are saying, 'I feel, therefore I am.' This is how more and more people are deciding what is real and right and true."

Communion: Drawing doctrinal lines?

As President Bill Clinton recently discovered, there is no more complex and emotional issue in Christendom than Communion.

This issue is even more divisive than church issues linked to sexuality, which always grab headlines. The reality is that today's doctrinal earthquakes about sex are only important to the degree that they crack the rock on which altars stand. Churches argue about sex. Churches split over issues linked to Communion.

Cardinal John O'Connor of New York urged his listeners to see the big picture, as he explained why President Bill Clinton, a Southern Baptist, and Hillary Rodham Clinton, a United Methodist, should not have received Holy Communion in a Catholic parish in South Africa.

"The Eucharist is the sum and summary of our faith," said O'Connor, speaking on Palm Sunday at St. Patrick's Cathedral. "Holy Communion means not only our union with Christ in the Eucharist, but our union with other Catholics holding the same beliefs. ... To receive Holy Communion in the Catholic Church means that one believes one is receiving, not only a symbol of Christ, but Christ Jesus Himself."

When it comes to Catholic teachings about sacraments, he said, there is a controlling legal authority that gets to make and interpret the laws. Except under extreme circumstances, Communion is reserved for those who faithfully follow the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church. This high standard, noted O'Connor, should be a hurdle for millions of unrepentant and unorthodox Catholics, as well as non-Catholics.

This issue lurks behind many bitter squabbles. Many ask the obvious question: Are all of these Catholics really in Communion with one another and with Rome?

Catholics are not alone. Many United Methodists wonder if they should be in Communion with bishops and pastors who reject church teachings that sex outside of marriage is a sin. In the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), some liberal administrators and educators wonder if they should stay on board after the defeat of a law offering more flexibility for gays and lesbians. Many Episcopalians wonder if they should remain in Communion with bishops who embrace or refuse to condemn rites that honor gods other than the God of the Bible or who reject or redefine core doctrines such as the resurrection. The list goes on and on. These days, even Southern Baptists face occasional fights over sexuality.

Can anyone draw doctrinal boundaries in an age that welcomes spirituality, but not doctrine? President Clinton became a symbol of these disputes as he knelt to receive Communion in a church whose teachings he often actively opposes.

Meanwhile, it remains unclear exactly what happened on March 29 at Soweto's Regina Mundi Church. White House officials insist that they asked in advance whether the Clintons could receive Communion and were assured that they could, because of a "more ecumenical" policy adopted by the South African Conference of Bishops. The president's staff said the priest, Father Mohlomi Makobane, gave his blessing beforehand.

But the priest -- whose sermon in this Mass focused on the sin of adultery -- remembers the encounter differently. The result is a confusing "they said, he said" conflict. Father Makobane said he was told that the president probably would not receive Communion. The priest told reporters he was surprised when the Clintons came forward to receive the sacrament.

"Here you have the most powerful man in the world, and I can't embarrass Mr. Clinton by saying, "No, you go and sit down,' " he said.

The Vatican appears to be seeking clarity about what South African bishops have or have not said. But O'Connor and others have stressed that this is irrelevant, because regional bishops cannot override centuries of church tradition and explicit Vatican directives.

Meanwhile, embattled White House spokesman Mike McCurry this week faced a barrage of challenging questions about sin, grace, confession, Catholic law and, yes, Communion.

McCurry said the Clintons received Communion in the spirit of the prayer by Jesus recorded in John 17:21. This New Testament passage reads: "That all may be one, even as thou, Father, in me and I in thee, that they also may be one in us, that the world may believe that thou hast sent me."

Carter's 'We love God' resolution

For generations, Southern Baptists used a simply strategy to control any truly dangerous outbreaks of controversy.

No matter how bad things got at the Southern Baptist Convention, a respected patriarch or matriarch could always go to a microphone and propose a surge of prayer, church planting, foreign missions or evangelism. The motion would pass quickly, hot issues would vanish into a committee and everyone would hug and pose for photographs.

Insiders referred to these as "We love God" resolutions. Who could vote "no"?

It's been a long, long time since anyone managed to get one of these to fly. However, former President Jimmy Carter -- a veteran of long-odds diplomacy -- recently convinced a diverse circle of Baptists to sign their names on a declaration of cooperation.

While "unresolved issues" remain, these Baptists expressed a common desire to set aside differences that might prevent a "spiritual awakening in our nation and around the world." They urged believers to share a "common prayer effort in a spirit of Christian love" and to follow St. Paul's call to "Be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you." They pledged to demonstrate mutual respect in "our personal devotions and public acts."

The list of signatories includes major names from both sides of a denominational civil war that began in the late 1970s, while Carter was in the White House. Bitter theological and political fights have continued ever since, in recent years fueled in part by disputes about another Southern Baptist, President Bill Clinton. A group of "moderate" Baptists traveled to the Carter Center in Atlanta last November, while "conservatives" went in February. Carter prepared a consensus document and submitted it to participants for their suggestions.

The Rev. Tom Elliff, the SBC's current conservative president, signed it and so did the Rev. Daniel Vestal, leader of the progressive national network, the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship. Southern Baptist Sunday School Board President Jimmy Draper signed, as did SBC Executive Committee President Morris Chapman. On the other side are leaders such as the Rev. Jimmy Allen, the last "moderate" SBC president, and Clinton-camp insider James Dunn of the Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs. One name will cause more raised eyebrows than any other -- the Rev. Paige Patterson of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, one of the creators of the conservative movement that seized the SBC reins in 1979.

The document's final statement pledges: "We will seek other ways to cooperate to achieve common goals, without breaching our Baptist polity or theological integrity, in order that people may come to know Christ as Savior, and so that God may be glorified in ever increasing measure."

Who could vote "no"? Of course, this document may simply mean that some "moderates" recognize that the national battle to control America's largest non-Catholic flock is over and that they have more to gain by negotiating a pledge of civility. Conservative leaders may be ready to put a softer edge on their public image, since they need increasingly independent-minded local churches to support national SBC programs.

It's crucial that this updated version of a "We love God" resolution addresses only two social issues -- pledging united efforts to promote racial reconciliation and to "end religious persecution in all nations and to encourage unfettered religious liberty for all peoples." It avoids references to abortion and sex outside of marriage. It is silent on the issue that has so divided Southern Baptists -- "biblical inerrancy," or the belief that the Bible is without errors of any kind. References to these issues would have torpedoed the project.

Carter told the Associated Baptist Press, the news agency supported by "moderate" Baptists, that it's embarrassing that Southern Baptists have become so infamous because of their arguments.

"I think it hurts our missionary work overseas. I think it hurts our personal testimony," he said. "Even in the early church days there were sharp differences on theological and even organizational matters, but they worked side by side in the name of Jesus. ... I think 95 percent of individual Baptists deplore the differences that have arisen."

'Titanic' -- The '60s as sacraments

Soon after "Titanic" opened in the United States, director James Cameron ventured into cyberspace to field questions from waves of stricken fans.

One mother described how her young daughter sat spellbound through the three-hour-plus romance between a first-class girl trapped in a loveless engagement with a cruel fiance and a starving artist who liberates her, then surrenders his life to save her in the icy North Atlantic. As they left the theater, the mother said her daughter noticed older girls weeping.

"It's OK, don't worry," the child said, giving one girl a hug. "Rose is with her Jack now."

"That's so sweet," wrote Cameron. Nevertheless, he told another participant in the Online Tonight session that he wouldn't answer one common question: Did the now-elderly Rose die in the last scene, to be reunited with her lover aboard the Titanic in a vision of heaven, or was she merely dreaming?

As he immersed himself in Titanic lore, Cameron said he reached one conclusion. "I think I discovered the truth of its lesson -- which is all you have is today." In another public statement, he described his film in more sweeping terms. "'Titanic' is not just a cautionary tale -- a myth, a parable, a metaphor for the ills of mankind. It is also a story of faith, courage, sacrifice and, above all else, love."

With receipts of $1.1 billion and rising, "Titanic" has filled a hole in the hearts of millions of romance-starved moviegoers. Whether Cameron intended to or not, Hollywood's most successful movie of all time also has changed how at least one generation views one of this century's most symbolic events.

For millions, the Titanic is now a triumphant story of how one upper-crust girl found salvation -- body and soul -- through sweaty sex, modern art, self-esteem lingo and social rebellion. "Titanic" is a passion play celebrating the moral values of the 1960s as sacraments. Rose sums it up by saying that she could abandon her old life and family because her forbidden lover "saved me in every way that a person can be saved."

Millions are walking their children down theater aisles, often making many such pilgrimages, in support of this cathartic message about the power of romantic love. Major religious groups that have greeted similar films with howls of protest are silent. A few people wonder why.

"'Titanic' reminds me of the distinctions between people of faith and secularists," said conservative commentator Elizabeth Farah. "While all agree that death is inevitable and very often unexpected, the religious and secularists do not agree on the behavior life's fragility should promote. Those of faith know they may meet their Maker at any moment, at which time they will account for their sins. Their fear and deep love for God inspires them in their constant struggle for righteousness. To the secularist, life is short -- get what you want - when you want it, and in whatever way necessary."

The heroes of this modern "Titanic" fit into this latter category, said Farah. Their sins become virtues, because they are rebelling against people who are portrayed as even worse. This isn't just a bad movie, she added, it is "manipulative" and "fundamentally immoral."

Father Patrick Henry Reardon, a philosophy professor and Orthodox priest, goes even further in the next issue of the ecumenical journal Touchstone. He calls the movie "satanic." The people who built the Titanic were so proud of their command of technology that they boasted that God couldn't sink their ship. Today, the creators of the movie "Titanic" substitute romantic love as the highest power. Jack becomes Rose's savior and he does more than save her life.

"Had that been all that happened, I would not have complained," said Reardon. "But they made that Christ symbol into a very attractive anti-Christ. The line that set me off I believe also to have been the defining line of the film: the assertion that the sort of saving that Jack did was, ultimately, the only kind of saving possible. If that was the thesis statement of the film, then I start looking for the cloven hoof and sniffing for brimstone."

Celtic Comeback II -- seeking roots in Irel

There is nothing unusual about a man with a name like Geoffrey O'Riada serving as a priest in Belfast.

But this particular clergyman will cause raised eyebrows next year when he returns to the land of his ancestors to start a mission. For Geoffrey O'Riada is a very unusual name for an Eastern Orthodox shepherd and Belfast is an unusual place to gather an Eastern Orthodox flock.

O'Riada is convinced his mission makes perfect sense when viewed through the lens of Celtic history. He also believes today's revival of interest in Celtic spirituality is a sign that many are searching for ancient roots and rites.

"The Celts had their own unique and beautiful approach to the Christian faith and were part of the one, undivided church before the split between Rome and the East," he said. "Now, a growing number of people like me believe it's time for Orthodoxy to return to the West, including to lands such as Ireland where it once thrived and produced generations of saints."

O'Riada's "Celtic Orthodox Christianity home page" on the World Wide Web features an icon of a bishop wearing green vestments and gold Celtic crosses, along with a famous prayer linked to St. Padraig, or Patrick. "May Christ be in the mouth of everyone who thinks of thee, Christ in the mouth of those who speak to thee, Christ in every eye that seeks thee, Christ in every ear that hears thy words, O blessed Padraig, our father."

The goal of O'Riada's research is to cover the history of Christianity in the British Isles -- from the viewpoint of Eastern Orthodoxy -- through the crushing of the Celtic church in the Norman Conquests of the 11th and 12th centuries. The site includes pages of essays, biographies of saints, prayers and a timeline of the bloody and convoluted history of Christianity among the Irish, Scottish, Welsh and English peoples. This timeline is 18 pages long and doesn't even address the rise of Protestantism.

When he reaches Belfast, O'Riada will almost be starting from scratch. There is one Eastern Orthodox parish in all of Ireland and that's a Greek parish, with a multi-ethnic congregation, in Dublin. A recent survey found 80 self-identified Orthodox Christians in Northern Ireland. There is, however, a Greek restaurant in Belfast that sells icons.

O'Riada himself is a Canadian of Irish and English descent. His father's side of the family emigrated from County Mayo in Ireland during the potato famine of 1845. He currently is a deacon and finishing his studies at Holy Cross Orthodox Seminary in Brookline, Mass.

"Our approach in this mission will not be to poach sheep from other flocks," he said. "We intend simply to live and worship as Orthodox Christians, manifesting a spiritual and liturgical life that is organically connected to the early church and to the life of the early Irish saints. ... Our desire is to invite western Christians -- Protestants and Roman Catholics -- to discover their roots. ... We want to become a beacon, a light on a hill."

Millions of Roman Catholics are, of course, convinced they already have solid roots into the Irish soil and most Protestants will simply see the Orthodox as another brand of Catholicism. Meanwhile, a surge of Western converts, especially in the United States, is raising questions for Orthodox leaders.

It will be impossible to take academic lessons learned from archeology and manuscripts and turn them, overnight, into a living faith practiced by people in a modern land, said O'Riada. The mission will be able to use many ancient Celtic prayers, honor Celtic saints and to embrace a legacy of Celtic art. There are ancient hymns and chants that can be blended with English-language versions of Orthodox rites.

"We are talking about trying to recover a tradition that was handed down from generation to generation. That will take time," he said. "But we can begin. We need to begin. ... The explosion in interest in Celtic Christianity reflects a profound dissatisfaction with the rationalistic and juridical forms of Christianity which have dominated the West. There is a deep thirst today for ancient, authentic faith."

Celtic comeback I -- searching for roots

It happened every year in the weeks just before St. Patrick's Day.

"Without fail, publishers would start putting out the same drivel. You'd see books of Irish blessings and Irish stories and Irish saints and Irish whatever and all of it would be green. Everything would be green -- the covers, the printing, everything," said Catholic writer Thomas Cahill, author of the 1995 bestseller, "How the Irish Saved Civilization."

In a strange way, it's getting harder to spot this annual surge. Somewhere along the way, the tartan tide washed in and never receded. These days, the Celts are on the march year round. There's more to this than St. Patrick's Day parades, a legacy of great literature and tenors singing songs that make people cry in their ale.

For things Celtic, this is a new age. Visit most music stores and, instead of a few offerings by the Chieftains, shoppers will find racks of new Celtic music, from ethereal lullabies to foot-stomping reels. There has been a similar surge of interest in Celtic history, fiction, art and spirituality. The latter can appeal to everyone from those seeking pop-pagan mysticism to Christian pilgrims searching for their roots in the bloody soil of Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Cornwall, Brittany and the Isle of Man.

Some people become interested in Celtic spirituality because they want to reject what they perceive as traditional Christianity, said Cahill. Others become fascinated with the Celtic past because they are seeking traditional Christianity.

"One reason Celtic spirituality is so attractive is that it's foreign, but not too foreign. It's familiar, but not too familiar. It's Western, but there is this sense of the Eastern to it, as well," he said. "The Celtic church offered a Christianity that was whole and undivided. It came before the division of East and West, let alone the division between Protestant and Catholic."

But there's a problem. Today, Celtic Christianity is -- quite literally -- in ruins. It's hard to join a church that can best be seen in the fallen remnants of ancient abbeys and in priceless, handwritten manuscripts on museum shelves. Interest in Celtic Christianity may be on the rise, but modern seekers won't be able to find congregations bearing that label in a telephone book.

Where should they go? Truth is, several churches can lay claim to some piece of the shattered Celtic cross and their claims often clash. Church history in England is as complex as a Celtic knot.

Celtic bishops took part in the first Christian councils, soon after the era of the apostles. Their churches were influenced both by missionaries from Roman Britain, such as St. Patrick, and Eastern monasticism. Celtic pilgrims traveled to Rome, but also to Jerusalem, Antioch and Constantinople. As Cahill's book notes, Celtic scribes and missionaries played a pivotal role in the preservation of Western culture and the spread of Christianity during the chaotic era after the fall of Rome. The Church of Rome gained control of England in the Norman Conquest of 1066, soon after the bitter 1054 division of Christianity into the Catholic West and the Orthodox East. Then the Church of England successfully broke with Rome in 1533. Yet, Anglicanism and its children were born out of a compromise between Rome and those who were protesting the teachings of Rome. Instead of returning to Celtic traditions, Anglicanism blended many of Rome's structures with the innovations of the surging Protestants.

Celtic Christianity remained buried in the rubble left by invaders and reformers.

"The Celtic church was suppressed and suppressed and, finally, it was crushed," said novelist Stephen Lawhead of Oxford, who is best known for weaving Celtic history and myths into his "Pendragon" cycle and "The Song of Albion" trilogy. "But that is part of the whole appeal of this. Celtic Christianity is like the fly caught in amber. It's frozen in time. It died before it could mutate into something else. This is why so many people yearn for it. This also speaks to the rootlessness that so many Americans feel."

The South: Heat, sweat, rust, bugs, mud and sin

Most movies about the South look like they were filmed in Southern California.

What's missing is heat, sweat, rust, bugs, mud and another messy reality called "sin." These movies contain sinful behavior, but nobody calls it "sin" or says folks should do anything about it. This is strange, since the real South contains zones in which people still wear Sunday clothes, carry ragged Bibles and say prayers before meals in restaurants.

"Most folks in New York and out here in California just don't know what to do with life below the New Jersey shore," said Robert Duvall, who has spent several weeks doing waves of interviews trying to explain his film "The Apostle" to whole media world. "They just can't seem to get it right. ... Everything ends up looking and sounding all wrong."

Lots of people understand that sinners can do good and that saints don't win all their battles with their demons. It's the people who really believe in sin who understand that sin, repentance and redemption are often messy subjects, said Duvall, who recently received an Oscar nomination for this performance as the flawed, but faithful, preacher E. F. "Sonny" Dewey.

"There really are preachers in jail. I've met guys like that who have done all kinds of bad things, even murder and rape," said Duvall, who wrote "The Apostle" script in long hand and directed it himself. "These guys are real people and they struggle with the good and the bad that's in their own souls. They're human. I wanted to show the reality of that struggle. ... My guy makes mistakes. But he's more good than bad. He hangs on to his faith, because it's real."

Duvall's Pentecostal preacher sums it all up one night in a showdown with God, just after losing his wife and church to a younger preacher. "I love you Lord. I love you, but I am mad at you," he shouts. "I know I'm a sinner, every once and a while, and a womanizer. But I'm your servant. I have been ever since I was a little boy and you brought me back from the dead."

A few scenes later, he bashes his rival with a baseball bat in a fatal flash of rage and flees. He's the kind of man who shouts "Glory! Glory!" as he sinks his getaway car into muddy waters and then re-baptizes himself as a reborn apostle. He defends his new interracial church with his fists, while the people sing "There's wonder-working power in the blood." As he gives a final altar call, with police-car lights flashing in the church parking lot, he tells a convert: "I'm going to jail and you're going to heaven. ... Glory be to God on high."

This character's roots run back 25 years, to a time when Duvall began visiting a church in Arkansas while doing research. He wrote the script in 1984 and spent 13 years wrestling with Hollywood's principalities and powers, trying to get it on film. Finally, he invested $5 million of his own money. Many of the people in the movie weren't acting, including a Pentecostal pastor who fasted for 24 hours before going on camera. Duvall is the star, but it's easy to spot the real preachers. Their voices soar, while the director often has the good sense to just stand and watch.

Meanwhile, Duvall is getting used to answering questions about his own faith. The son of a Methodist father and a Christian Scientist mother, he calls himself a believer, even if others on the gospel road might consider parts of his life unconventional. The key, said Duvall, is that he respects the role faith plays in the lives of millions of Pentecostal and fundamentalist believers, even if these people scare the living daylights out of Hollywood.

"A lot of the people who are praising this movie would never set foot inside one of these churches," he said. "They tell me, 'These people frighten me.' And I say, 'Why? These are good, moral people. You'd be in a lot more danger walking around in parts of New York City than you would be hanging out in these kinds of churches.' "