City of Secrets and Beyond, An Interview with Patrice Chaplin

Residing in a London neighborhood is a remarkable woman who carries with her the burden of a city’s secrets. To pass her on the street one could make the mistake many make of dismissing those approaching their twilight years. Scores of people walk side by side with her and never know there is an author, actress, and chronicler of a Grail story a shoulder width’s away.

The woman I am referring to is Patrice Chaplin, author of City of Secrets. Patrice graciously made herself available for a phone interview with me from her London home this Sunday. Many of you living in the States might not be familiar with Patrice and her story. The potential impact of her work on the mysteries of Rennes-le-Chateau seems to have been glossed over as of yet. However, she is a living historian who has wondered into and out of the lives of those that might have held the very essence of Berenger Sauniere’s secrets.

I hate to give away too much for those of you who will pick up the book. Let’s just say that the Tour Magdala in Rennes-le-Chateau is a near exact replica of a tower in Girona. That is just the beginning of Patrice’s investigations into the connections of all things Rennes-le-Chateau…

Patrice’s story beings as a simple tale of teenage wanderlust. While traveling in 1955 with a friend, Patrice found herself in the Catalonian burg of Girona. As in many stories of teenagers looking for adventure, Patrice found herself involved with a dashing Catalonian named Jose. It is through her connection with Jose, she was introduced to a cast of esoteric and politically underground characters

Patrice and Jose shortly after they met in Girona

Patrice was thrust into the world of Franco Fascism mixed with the ever present undercurrent of the esoteric. Jean Cocteau, Salvador Dalí and Umberto Eco intermingle in the micro chasm of her association with Jose and his seemingly ordinary friends. Interspersed in their talk of the banal are hints of rituals, guardians, hidden societies, elusive “materials” and how they somehow connect to a Frenchwoman who lived in town.

Over the next fifty years, Patrice stepped into and out of the story of Girona. Each visit to the town or with its denizens brought her a little closer to piecing together their clipped conversations and sub-rosa activity. At the center of this wheel was always Jose. Patrice’s sometimes synchronistic meetings with Jose eventually brought into focus her understanding of how the activities of the “society” in Girona and their guardianship of a ritual that brings the Grail into our realm.

Notably, the “society” in Girona contained a cadre of women sometimes its avowed guardians. In many descriptions and crypto-historical accounts of secret societies, the role of females seems to be relegated to that of support or overlooked entirely. Patrice seemed to think that the veneration of the Magdalene and practical matters made women’s roles in so prevalent. Since many of Girona’s leading families were involved in the society, the men took on “traditionally” high profile social stations. This left their wives free to conduct the business of the society with less notice.

Patrice views her work as more of a journalist than an active participant in esoteric Girona. The people she had met over the years opened up to her because she was not viewed as an outsider. That trust seems to run both ways. Patrice commented that because of her long standing association with those involved, she has confidence in their story. “I’m a writer, I stand behind my work and what was told to me.”, she said.

So what’s next for Patrice? Currently she’s doing research into Salvador Dali’s connection to Girona, Mount Canigou and the Grail ritual. “The ritual changes people”, Patrice said. “Dali opened up a portal on the peak of Mount Canigou and went into another dimension.”

Best of luck with your new project Patrice, the Grail Seekers team will be waiting for it to come out.

Science and the Mystic

For anyone that has delved into any sort of crypto-history, the world is a wonderfully mysterious place. It seems natural that those interested in delving into underground streams, will eventually come across a litany of Fortean type phenomena. Psychics, ghosts, clairvoyants, mediums, past lives, synchronicity, and all other things mystical seem to float on the edge of many topics outside the “generally accepted”.

Trying to discern the validity of these events that fall outside of our everyday reality is something we all have pondered. What is even more curious to me is that there is a wedge between those that believe these phenomena are real and any talk of science. When one brings up a scientific reason for an unexplained event, the mystic tends to feel marginalized because there is a possible scientific explanation. Much in the same way a creationist gets a sour look on their face when one tries to link the Big Bang with God speaking the universe into existence with “Let there be light”.

I tend to be one that looks for a bridge between the mystical and scientific. Just as the scientist cannot explain the entire “why” for every normally occurring events, the mystic has faith in the unexplained. So why is there an invisible wedge between the two? Both groups are faced with the evidences of the unknown, but there seldom seems to be an attempt to come to a common solution.

Think about the reaction most have when learning that the Vatican operates an observatory. The tendency in most is to question why the world’s largest religious organization would have any interest in astronomy. The answer is as old as the true purposes of the alchemists. The true reason behind turning lead into gold was the search for the base material that God used to create the universe. Thus, the underlying search was for the divine itself. While the Vatican Observatory was created to create an accurate calendar for Easter, the underlying purpose is simply to seek evidences of God in the natural world.

The disconnect runs in the opposite direction as well. At a gathering a couple of years ago, I had a conversation with a friend that does tarot readings. The conversation wrangled its way around to past lives. She fully believed that in some regression sessions she had taken part of, that she could get in touch with those who had made up her past lives. She believed that this was possible because she had been reincarnated from those souls the regression sessions had shown her.

My question was how could she be so sure that these were reincarnated souls and not some form of genetic ancestral memory? One would have thought I had slapped her. I had introduced a possibility of giving a concrete explanation into her mystical experience. Her answer was firmly, “No the window I have is into those who have been reincarnated in me.”

The topic of genetic memory is simply a theory; and one not ascribed by many geneticists. The prevalent argument against memories being passed along ancestral lines is that DNA changes little over a person’s life span. The problem is that science has few clues into how memories are captured and stored within an organism. A recent study has shown that certain memories can be “erased” by blocking a certain protein in mice. If memories are electro-chemical reactions, why couldn’t they be replicated? Furthermore, there has been little work done in with “junk DNA”. These are DNA strands that have no protein-coding functions. This week a study was published that this “junk DNA” could be more important to the evolutionary process than anyone had ever considered. Could a genetic memory lie here?

The question is not if genetic memory is real or if reincarnation is spiritually valid. The finer point is that is there any less wonder attached to a phenomena if there is an explanation? Conversely, is there any reason not to try to explain the mysterious simply because it does not fit into a belief system? If the answer is yes, then we stymie our ability to grow both science and understanding of the mystical.

Dan Green Visits Royston Cave

Royston Cave, outside Hertfordshire UK, has long been thought to have been linked to the Templars. Researcher Dan Green has put together a video of his explorations into the cave and its unique carvings. You can catch up on Dan's theories of what the carvings mean in his article posted at Far Shores.