In fact that evil could spring from an innocent child in a loving family remained one of the paradoxes of the human soul.

She lay outside in the courtyard, staring up at the raindrops… feeling them hit her body… trying to guess where one would land next. The nuns called again, threatening that pneumonia might make an insufferably headstrong child a lot less curious about nature.

Medicine, electronic communications, space travel, genetic manipulation . . . these are the miracles about which we now tell our children. These are the miracles we herald as proof that science will bring us the answers. The ancient stories of immaculate conceptions, burning bushes, and parting seas are no longer relevant. God has become obsolete. Science has won the battle.

The information was kept hidden for the same reason we keep matches from children. In the correct hands, fire can provide illumination... but in the wrong hands, fire can be highly destructive.