"Norman Spinrad - Journals of the Plague Years 1" - читать интересную книгу автора (Spinrad Norman)

entirely insulated from party politics. The director would be chosen in the
manner of Supreme Court justices-nominated by the president, approved by the
Senate, serving for life, removable only by impeachment.
After the president signed the bill, he called me into his office and
pleaded with me to accept the appointment. It was my amendment. I was the only
political figure who had the confidence of both Plague victims and blue-carders.
All that, I knew, was true. What was also true was that many insiders
blanched at the thought of a Bigelow presidency. This was the perfect political
solution.
It was the most important decision of my life and the most difficult.
Elaine had had her heart set on being First Lady. "You just can't let them take
the presidency away from you like this," she insisted. Ministers and black-
carder groups and politicians of my own party, some sincere, some otherwise,
begged me to accept the lifetime directorship of the FQA. For weeks, they all
badgered me while I procrastinated and prayed.
It seemed as if the voices of God and the Devil were speaking to me
through my wife, party leaders, men of God, men of power, saints and sinners,
battling for possession of my soul. But which was the voice of God and which
the voice of Satan? Which way did my true duty lie? What did God want me to
do?
Finally, I went on a solitary retreat into the Utah desert, into Zion
National Park. I fasted. I prayed. I called on Jesus to speak to me.
And at length a voice did speak to me, in a vision. "You are the Moses I
have chosen to lead My people out of the wilderness," it told me. "Have I not
commanded you to become a leader of men? Those who would deny you power are the
agents of the Adversary."
But then another stronger and sweeter voice spoke out of a great white
light and I knew that this was truly Jesus and whose the first voice had really
been.
"I saved you from the Plague and your own sinful desire in your hour of
need," He told me. "I raised you up from the pit so that you might do God's
will on Earth. As I gave up My life to save Man from sin, so must you give up
worldly power to save the people from their dark natures. As God chose Me for
My Calvary, so do I choose you for yours."
I returned from the desert to Washington and I obeyed. I put the thought
of worldly glory behind me. There were those who snickered when I accepted this
appointment. There were those who laughed when I told the nation that I had
done it at the bidding of Jesus.
Even my wife told me I was a fool, and a breach was opened between us that
I knew no way to heal. We became strangers to each other sharing the same
marriage bed.
Oh yes, I paid dearly for my obedience to God's will. But while I may
have lost my chance at worldly power and hardened my wife's heart against me, I
remained steadfast and strong.
For God had saved me in that dormitory room with Gus and granted me Grace
and salvation. And Jesus spoke truth to me in the desert in the presence of the
Adversary and saved me again. And so in my heart I knew I had done right.

DR. RICHARD BRUNO