6 quoted lines
Matthew Weber: Using the word "rood" to signify a cross or crucifix is a way of distancing the phenomenon;
if he merely said "cross" or "crucifix" it would seem very cozily Christian to us. But the BotNS is set
in a far future in which Christianity may be only a distant, mythic memory--or perhaps it's a distant past
in which Christianity has not yet appeared. So calling it a rood rather than a crucifix or cross renders it
intelligible and retains a slight whiff of Christianity (as a survival of long ago?) without suggesting that
the denizens of Urth practice what we understand to be the Christian faith.
My view exactly. Although I must admit, Wolfe's interview quotes, his choice of archaic verbiage, archaic saint
names and the word Urth (past) all conspire to push my interpretation to "past universe" rather than future of
Earth.