Javier Cercas: "The Pope considers the clergy the cancer of the Church."

BarcelonaAfter writing three thrillers starring a Squadron Boy, Javier Cercas (Ibahernando, 1962) offers a unique variation in his new book, in which the detective is the author himself and the person under investigation is none other than Pope Francis. God's Fool at the End of the World –published by Random House Literature, after a period of the author in Planeta that began with Terra Alta (2019) – explains the writer's trip to Mongolia as part of the Supreme Pontiff's courtship with the aim of constructing a profound portrait. "I have had the privilege of being the first writer to whom the Vatican has opened its doors to write a book," he says. "When they made me the proposal, I immediately said to them: 'Don't you know I'm a dangerous guy?' But they didn't back down either. In fact, I have had absolute freedom to write whatever I wanted. Not even what I wanted. Not even. If it is read by the Vatican, they don't decide to excommunicate me."

Cercas believes that God's Fool at the End of the World It is "a non-fiction and hybrid novel" like some he has written on previous occasions. Quote Soldiers of Salamis (Tusquets, 2001), but also Anatomy of an instant (LRH, 2009) and The impostor (LRH, 2014). "It shares an idea that I tried to argue in the essay The blind spot (LRH, 2016), and which is the following: "All the novels that matter to me are detective novels, that is to say, at their heart they hide an enigma, a fundamental question," he says. In this case, the enigma is "colossal": to investigate the resurrection of the flesh and the life of a child that I have made. way: "Will the mother meet her late husband when she dies?" he says. "I posed this question to him being deeply atheist, anticlerical and a militant secularist," he continues. "In fact, writing God's Fool at the End of the World It has made me even more anticlerical than before."

A Pope against power

On this point, Cercas "fully agrees" with Pope Francis. "Jorge Mario Bergoglio is the first Jesuit pope, a Latin American, and also the first to choose a name, Francis, that evokes madness," he explains. "Francis of Assisi called himself God's foolIn the book, I accompany the Pope to the end of the earth, Mongolia, a country with 3.5 million inhabitants where Catholicism has fewer than 1,500 faithful." Cercas recalls that one of the current Pope's controversial points is that he considers "the clergy the cancer of the Church." They may be at the forefront of the flock of faithful, at the same time within it and even behind it, but in no case are they above it. The evils come from this misunderstanding. The sexual abuses that have occurred within the Church, for example, are ultimately abuses of power." The second aspect that has made the current Pope enemies has been his critical view of power: "When political power unites with the Church, catastrophes ensue. The message of Christianity is subversive. Power cannot support it. It is enough to remember Jesus Christ, who was punished because he was a revolutionary who could move the masses."

Cercas explains that he abandoned "the drug of Catholicism" after reading Saint Manuel Bueno, martyr, by Miguel de Unamuno, and by Gaia Science by Friedrich Nietzsche: since then, he replaced the "opium of the people" - in the words of Karl Marx - with "alternative drugs": "The most powerful, effective and enduring has been literature, but I have consumed many others, including alcohol, tobacco, marijuana, hashish and cocaine."

The writer has dedicated almost two years to the 500 pages of the volume. "Faith must be a kind of superpower, because to believe in the resurrection of the body or to go and work as a missionary you have to be somewhat insane," he says. "When I finally ask Pope Francis if my mother will meet my father when he dies, he gives me a completely unexpected answer. To find out, there is only one thing you can do."