Page 463 - Enders_Game_Full_Book

"My sister told me that yes, Father baptized me shortly after birth. My mother was a Protestant of a faith that deplored infant baptism, so they had a quarrel about it." The Bishop held out his hand to lift the Speaker to his feet. The Speaker chuckled. "Imagine. A closet Catholic and a lapsed Mormon, quarreling over religious procedures that they both claimed not to believe in."
Peregrino was skeptical. It was too elegant a gesture, for the Speaker to turn out to be Catholic. "I thought," said the Bishop, "that you Speakers for the Dead renounced all religions before taking up your, shall we say, vocation."
"I don't know what the others do. I don't think there are any rules about it-- certainly there weren't when I became a Speaker."
Bishop Peregrino knew that Speakers were not supposed to lie, but this one certainly seemed to be evasive. "Speaker Andrew, there isn't a place in all the Hundred Worlds where a Catholic has to conceal his faith, and there hasn't been for three thousand years. That was the great blessing of space travel, that it removed the terrible population restrictions on an overcrowded Earth. Are you telling me that your father lived on Earth three thousand years ago?"
"I'm telling you that my father saw to it I was baptized a Catholic, and for his sake I did what he never could do in his life. It was for him that I knelt before a Bishop and received his blessing."
"But it was you that I blessed." And you're still dodging my question. Which implies that my inference about your father's time of life is true, but you don't want to discuss it. Dom Crist o said that there was more to you than met the eye.
"Good," said the Speaker. "I need the blessing more than my father, since he's dead, and I have many more problems to deal with."
"Please sit down." The Speaker chose a stool near the far wall. The Bishop sat in his massive chair behind his desk. "I wish you hadn't Spoken today. It came at an inconvenient time."
"I had no warning that Congress would do this."
"But you knew that Miro and Ouanda had violated the law. Bosquinha told me."
"I found out only a few hours before the Speaking. Thank you for not arresting them yet."
"That's a civil matter." The Bishop brushed it aside, but they both knew that if he had insisted, Bosquinha would have had to obey her orders and arrest them regardless of the Speaker's request. "Your Speaking has caused a great deal of distress."
"More than usual, I'm afraid."
"So-- is your responsibility over? Do you inflict the wounds and leave it to others to heal them?"