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Many of his old parishioners are
interested in it, he said.
The book, Karoor noted, was reviewed in the July 20 Catholic
Review.
Carrion said he has not received a copy and can not yet form
an opinion of its merits, but he said there are many books the
St. John store does not carry.
Belief in women
The novel was the culmination of Karoor's years of observing
women in subordinate roles.
As a child growing up in India, he saw his mother walk three
paces behind his father. He heard both his grandfather and
father use passages from the Bible to put down women.
He found that wrong.
He has seen his sister become a lawyer and his nieces treated
as equals. But the Catholic Church, he contends, still won't
grant women the equality they deserve.
The book argues that women should be ordained as deacons, an
idea being studied by the Catholic Church, he said.
The lost moonflower of the book's title is Phoebe, a woman
mentioned in the Bible in Paul's letter to the Romans.
In the novel, both Peter and Paul endorse Phoebe, a strong,
educated woman, as a leader in the church.
She and Luke, author of the gospel of Luke, fall in love, but
she chooses the path of celibacy.
The novel shows what struggle celibacy can be, Karoor said.
"If they think it is romantic, they haven't lived
it," he said.
A labor of love
For five years, Karoor spent his spare time on the novel,
researching it with a friend, Marian Carr, now deceased.
He wanted to bring the first century world alive for readers,
conveying the sights, sounds and smells of the ancient Roman
Empire.
He wanted the characters, taken from the Bible, to be living,
full-bodied people.
He and Carr traveled to cities mentioned in the Bible,
including Corinth, Rome and Jerusalem. They even grew a
moonflower, a symbol of how women's early flourishing as church
leaders has closed up as the moonflower closes up at night.
And Karoor took at least five creative writing classes at
Johns Hopkins University to polish his manuscript.
Carr edited the book, double-checking every fact.
Karoor was told by publishers to cut the book's length, so he
did.
"It was like doing surgery on your own child," he
said.
When Tate Publishing, a small press in Mustang, Okla., picked
up his novel, he had to sign a statement agreeing that the Bible
is the word of God.
An audio version of the book will be released soon, he said,
with a male voice reading the parts from Luke's perspective and
a female voice reading from Phoebe's perspective.
Traditional and progressive
"I'm a traditional pastor but a progressive
theologian," Karoor said.
Theologians are the church's visionaries, he said, pushing
the church towards the future, while pastors should uphold the
present interpretation of scripture.
He doesn't preach in favor of women deacons from the pulpit,
he said.
What he does in his official capacity is organize Bible
studies, an activity encouraged by Vatican II.
"Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ," he
said, quoting St. Jerome. "Without Scripture, we are
nowhere."
At St. John, about 200 attended his Bible study, he said.
"The people at St. John loved him a lot," said his
friend, Jack Carr, widower of Marian Carr and a parishioner at
the church.
Reach staff writer Diane Reynolds at 410-857-7873 or reynoldsd@lcniofmd.com
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