The last years of the twentieth century have also been filled with long-overdue attempts to locate looted art and return it to its rightful owners. Also overdue was the public exposure of Nazi collaborators: Swiss banks and a number of American and European corporations. Demands for reparations from surviving victims of the Holocaust and their families were met with arrogant derision and stonewalling on the part of Swiss banks until recently when international pressure has led to a modest effort to compensate owners or heirs of the accounts.

There was also an Emperor Henry IV who was kidnapped. All of the other historical shenanigans involving Popes (three claiming the spot at one time) and emperors is true. And of course, there was an Emperor Constantine who put an end to spiritual squabbling with bureaucratic decrees enforced by the blade of a sword. It has been true throughout religious history—regardless of religion—that matters of faith are decided by political expediency rather than affairs of the spirit. The sections of this book dealing with the Nicean Conference and the events and religious controversies leading up to it are true and far better documented than any of the scriptures in the Hebrew or Christian Bible or the Muslim Koran.

I’m fairly sure that the parts about Sophia as a flesh-and-blood woman are my imagination, created as they were from fragments of intriguing research about the early Christian church and the seminal roles that women played in it; roles that the male-dominated spiritual revisionists have tried to excise. They have been largely successful, but significant references remain—just read Proverbs or the Song of Solomon—where Wisdom is given her due.

To this day, the Catholic Church and other faiths—especially the Greek and Russian Orthodox Churches—are still ambivalent about a mythical Sophia. Some, particularly those who follow Gnosticism, say she is the prime creator of all the universe. Others believe in her as the feminine part of an androgynous God. And still others identify her as the embodiment of Wisdom or even the Logos of the Christian Trinity before it was thoroughly masculinized. There is no question that for the vast part of human existence, God was viewed as a woman.

Sophia has a place in history, but where is still to be determined.

The Catholic Church is not alone among modern religions in its abject fear of women and rejection of them in spiritual or dominant roles. Most of the Roman Catholic characters in this book could have easily been cast from among the leaders of Judaism, most Protestant religions, and Islam. All of these (save an unfortunately very few) would kill before admitting that a woman could be an equal, much less a savior.

It is also a matter of public record that Pope Pius XII turned a blind eye and a deaf ear to the atrocities of the Third Reich. As to the Pope’s motives, one can only speculate, but certainly his silence at the time does seem at odds with his perceived role as a moral authority. His unwillingness to raise his voice in protest against Nazi policies is, and no doubt shall remain, a mystery. With its millennial apologia, the Catholic Church has confessed and apologized for a few of the mortal sins it has committed in the name of God and Christ. While only a small step, it does set a good example that the rest of Christendom as well as Judaism and Islam should emulate.