The GIft of Peter

Passion, in all its expressions, love of God, love of family, love of humanity and love of sex, drive Simon Ben Simon's life. At 17 he dons the mantle of responsibility and provides security for his mother and baby brother, Andrew. This births his zest for business and if ever there was a hard working Midas, it is Simon. His sexual needs cause him to take a mistress, Mary of Dana, before he marries Ilonia, the love of his life. Ilonia is frail but they have two daughters. Through Andrew he meets and becomes devoted to the spiritual teacher, Jesus of Nazareth, who renames him Peter the Rock, yet Peter denies him. His guilt fires his indomitable will to be the leader Jesus has chosen to carry His message of love to the world. With Ilonia's help he survives massacres, imprisonment, and beatings; he continues preaching and performing miraculous healings, even raising some from the dead. Peter is reborn as England's Henry VIII. Everything about this monarch is powerful, his physical size, his voice, his personality, his statesmanship, his sexual passion combined with the self-discipline to control it, and his prowess in sports, dance, music. He takes a second rate nation newly recovered from civil war and makes her great. He defies the Pope, and with the support of his people, who are fed up with the abuses of the Roman Catholic Church and its clerics, breaks from Rome and establishes the Church of England. His personal life is in continual upheaval. He returns to England again born to wealth and privilege as Sidney Herbert. He persistently uses his opportunities for the betterment of the common man, to ease starvation and the impoverishment of both the Irish and the English poor. Politically, he tries to diminish the atrocities imposed by the upper class. He meets Florence Nightingale, Ilonia come again. With his help she is head of nurses at the war front. They draw up a plan to reorganize the military, implementing lasting change.