Catholics

by Moore, Brian; Ellsberg, Robert;

  Kinsella rose, dripping, from the tub. In the evening air, already cool, the room misted like a steam bath. The towel was rough on his skin. He thought of the confessions; no one had mentioned the confessions. They were, he knew, the greatest danger.

  Forty minutes later, when the knock came on the door, he was waiting, dressed in his gray-green fatigues and his flying jacket. Old, grinning schoolboy face, hand clasping his sou’wester, keeping it firm on long gray locks, Father Manus entered the hall, scraping mud clots from the soles of his boots. “Terrible wind! I asked if I could come for you. I am heartsick.”

  “What?”

  “I offered up prayers at Benediction in penance for shouting at you like some wild man from Borneo. As Father Abbot pointed out, sure, I never gave you a chance to open your mouth.”

  “That’s all right.”

  “It is not all right. It’s a disgrace.” Father Manus blushed from the neck up, turning to hide his embarrassment, peering out at the gusty rain. “Pelting down. We’ll have to run for it. They are all waiting to meet you in the ref.”

  Slamming the guesthouse door, Kinsella kept close to his guide, half running, until they reached the monastery gate. Hurried along the cloister walk to the refectory where the community was assembled, clustered in twos and threes like conference delegates, all whispers and shy smiles as Father Manus led the visitor in. Coats were taken and hung up. The abbot came forward, genial, linking Kinsella’s arm, leading him around, introducing him.

  “Father John, Father Colum, Brother Kevin. And Brother Sean. Father Kinsella, from Rome. An Irish name that is? Yes. Is it true what we heard, that Padraig refused to take you on his boat this morning? It is? Oh glory be! And Father Terence, Father Kinsella from Rome. Terence is in charge of our farm here. Father Alphonsus, Father Kinsella. Did you come all the way from Rome now in that whirligig that landed here today? All the way from Rome, oh, did you hear what Father Alphonsus wants to know! Ah, for goodness sake don’t you know that’s a helicopter, it could not fly all the way from Rome. Ah, so you came in a bigger airplane, did you? I see. From Amsterdam to Shannon and then from Shannon by car. And the helicopter was only because of Padraig. So that was the way of it. Do you know, Father Kinsella, I hear tell there is not a village in Ireland that does not have some class of an airfield nearby. Isn’t that amazing. Yes, yes.

  “And this is Father Matthew, our master of novices. What novices are you talking about, Father Abbot, I think it would be better to introduce me as jack of all trades and master of none. Hardly so, Father Matthew. Anyway, I want you to meet Father Kinsella, from Rome. Indeed, I know he is from Rome. We all do. You are here because of the doings at Cahirciveen, isn’t that so? Yes. It is wonderful the response of the people there on Mount Coom. Wonderful. It would do your heart good to see the piety of the ordinary people. Indeed it would. And I hope—by the way, have you met Father Daniel?—Father Daniel, Father Kinsella, Father Daniel is our business manager. Excuse me, Father Matthew, you were saying? I was saying I hope you are not planning to change our ways, Father Kinsella. In what way, Father Matthew? The Mass, Father. I will be honest and tell you I have been saying a novena for weeks now, hoping that we will be allowed to go on with this holy work.”

  The abbot, smooth, led his visitor from danger. “If Father Kinsella would sit here, on my right? And this is Father Walter, my deputy. Sit on Father Kinsella’s right, will you, Father Walter, that way we’ll have him surrounded by the Muck Island Establishment, haha.” Great noise of refectory benches as twenty-six monks sat in to supper. All waited. The abbot rang a handbell. At once all eyes went to the kitchen door as the two old cook brothers, faces full in triumphal smiles, brought the salmon in. Three fish on three white china platters. Then great bowls of steaming boiled potatoes. Salt and butter dishes. Three big pitchers of buttermilk. When the food was on the table, the abbot stood. All stood. All prayed:

  “Bless us, O Lord, and these thy gifts, which, of thy bounty, we are about to receive, through Christ, our Lord, Amen.” Not, Kinsella noted, the approved Ecumenical grace, standard in all other monasteries of the order. Afterward, in continuing anachronism, all made the sign of the cross. All sat. The abbot served his guest, then himself. The platters were passed. All ate in silence, quickly, heads bowed to their food. It was the old rule. When the abbot rose, all rose. “We give thee thanks, O Lord, for all thy benefits, who livest and reignest, world without end. Amen. May the souls of the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen.”

  Afterward, the community hovered respectfully, hoping to engage the visitor in further conversation. But the abbot did not linger. “We will go up now to my parlor for a cup of tea. We are early to bed and early to rise, here. Fishermen and farmers of a sort, as we are, we must use the light God gives us. So, if you will come this way, Father?”

  “Good night. Good night. Off so soon? Good night, Father. Sleep well.” They watched him go, cheated by this abrupt departure: they had few visitors. Their long-skirted lines parted in polite reluctance as the abbot, purposeful, led Kinsella back through the cloister, into the sacristy, and up the winding stone staircase to the parlor.

  On the abbot’s desk, Brother Martin had left a pot of tea and, incongruously, a plate of lemon puff biscuits. The abbot took one of the biscuits, holding it up between forefinger and thumb. “Martin is trying to bribe you,” he said. “Whenever he wants to soften somebody up, he parts with a few of these. His married sister sends them to him, all the way from Manchester.” He munched the biscuit and, munching, moved to pick up the Ecumenical order of mission. Frowning, he read it once again. “Sit down, Father. Make yourself comfortable.” The Ecumenical order was tossed on the desk, discarded. Again the general’s letter. Read, how many times now? Reread again, then held up, as though in exhibit. “Is there something I could say that might change your, and our father general’s, opinion of these events?”

  “Well, I wouldn’t know, would I? As you haven’t said anything yet.”

  The abbot laughed as though this were some extremely subtle joke. “Do you know what they are calling you, over there in the refectory, Father?”

  Kinsella waited, smiling at his host.

  “The inquisitor.” The abbot laughed. “I thought that was good.”

  “Hardly an inquisitor.”

  “Why not? Didn’t the Inquisition come around to seek out doctrinal error and punish it?”

  “My mission is not punitive.”

  “Not yet. But what if the heresy continues?”

  “Look,” Kinsella said, slightly irritated. “This is the end of the twentieth century, not the beginning of the thirteenth. How can we even define what heresy is today?”

  “Yesterday’s orthodoxy is today’s heresy.”

  “I wouldn’t say that, Father Abbot.”

  “Then what have you got against us saying the Mass in the old way?”

  “We are trying to create a uniform posture within the church. If everyone decides to worship in his own way—well, it’s obvious, it would create a disunity.”

  “Exactly,” the abbot said. “Breakdown. The loss of control. Look, I agree. There must be discipline. Dish of tea?”

  “Thank you, yes.”

  “Milk and sugar?”

  “Black.”

  The abbot poured and passed the bowl of tea to his guest. “Explanations,” the abbot said. “Father general seems to feel they would be in order. Very well. I will try to explain why we kept the old Mass here. Will I tell you why?”

  “Yes, I would like it—yes, please do.”

  “Did you know that Ireland used to be the only country in Europe where every Catholic went to Mass of a Sunday? Every one, even the men?”

  “Yes. I was here some years ago. In Sligo.”

  “Were you, now? Well, anyway, when this new Mass came in, we tried it, we did what we were told. But we noticed that the men would come into Cahirciveen with their families and stand, smoking and talking, outside the
church. When Mass was over, they took their women home. Now, I thought that was a bad sign. I mean, this is Ireland, after all. I wrote our father provincial about it. He wrote back that the new Mass was popular everywhere else. Well, I did not know what to do. We were losing our congregation, hand over fist. I said to myself, maybe the people here are different from the people in other places, maybe they will not stand for this change. After all, what are we doing, playing at being Sunday priests over there on the mainland, if it’s not trying to keep the people’s faith in Almighty God? I am not a holy man, but, maybe because I am not, I felt that I had no right to interfere. I thought it was my duty not to disturb the faith they have. So, I went back to the old way.”

  “Then what happened?”

  “Nothing happened.”

  “But it must have been noticed. There must have been talk in the diocese?”

  “I suppose there was. But people are not well informed on liturgical matters. I think the people thought because we are an old order we had some special dispensation to do things the old way. Anyway, the old way became very popular, after the word got around.”

  “And, soon, you had thousands coming to Mass every Sunday.”

  “That is not so,” the abbot said. “For a number of years we did not have many extra people. Some older people from parishes about. But it was just lately it caught on. It was the tourists. Ireland is choked with tourists now in the summer months. I blame those new planes, those Supers, or whatever you call them.”

  “So, it was only last summer that you moved out of the priory in Cahirciveen and began saying Mass on Mount Coom?”

  “You are well informed. I am not surprised. Our father provincial, in Dublin, is not what you would call an admirer of mine.”

  “On Mount Coom,” Kinsella said. “You decided to say Mass on the Mass rock. According to my reading, the Mass rock, in Penal times, was associated with rebellion. Mass was said there, by outlaw priests, in secret, with some member of the congregation on the lookout in case the English soldiers came.”

  “The Mass rock was a mistake,” the abbot said. “At the time I did not think of the connection. I was just trying to accommodate the crowds.”

  “You accepted a gift of loudspeakers from the merchants of Cahirciveen.”

  “It is customary to accept gifts that aim at enhancing worship.”

  “But, loudspeakers,” Kinsella said. “Surely, it has occurred to you that Mount Coom has become a place of pilgrimage?”

  “Do you mean a sort of Lourdes?”

  “As Lourdes used to be. Lourdes is no longer in operation.”

  “We are not at all like Lourdes. There are no miracles. We just say Mass.”

  “And hear private confessions. Which is not known even now, in Rome. I only found it out by accident, myself, the other day in Cahirciveen. As you know, private confessions have been abolished, except in cases of special need where the sin is so grave that private counsel is necessary.”

  The abbot frowned. “All mortal sins are mortal to the soul. I find these new rulings difficult to apply.”

  “To begin with, as you know, the category of mortal or venial sin is no longer in use.”

  “But what am I to do?” The abbot seemed suddenly distraught. “The people here still think it is a special sin to molest a child, to steal a mans wife, to marry in sin—ah—a whole lot of things! What am I to do if the people still believe that sin is mortal?”

  “I know it must be difficult. But the retention of private confessions would be a serious mistake. The idea of Catholics confessing their sins in private to a priest has been distasteful to other groups within the Ecumen brotherhood. Now that the easier form has been sanctioned by Vatican IV—you have read the debates, surely?”

  “I have, indeed,” the abbot said. “I know that I am not in step, in the matter of confessions. But, remember, I tried to limit the confessions to people from our parish. It was all part of the same thing. We did not want to disturb the faith of the local people. Still …” The abbot paused and looked searchingly at his visitor. “You said yourself that Rome did not know about the private confessions. You were not sent here because of that?”

  “No.”

  “Why were you sent, Father Kinsella? What, in particular, caused this—?” The abbot picked up father general’s letter.

  “American television is planning to do a special one-hour program on what has happened here. Did you know that?”

  “So that’s it!” The abbot made a fist of his right hand and hit the top of his desk. “The damned television! I did not want television here. I will ban them. I was dead against it from the start.”

  “Even the president of the United States can’t ban American television. If the networks want to televise what’s going on here, it will be done. And it will be seen all over the world.”

  “I warned our monks and I told the merchants at Cahirciveen the selfsame thing, I said don’t have anything to do with those telly people, just tell them it’s none of their concern. I refused them permission for any filming on church property.”

  “It didn’t do much good, did it? Don’t you see that even your action in refusing to let these ceremonies be filmed can lend a significance to them that you never intended? A program in the wrong hands, about this subject, could be made to look like the first stirrings of a Catholic counterrevolution.”

  “Ah, now begging your pardon, Father Kinsella, I find that very far-fetched.”

  “Far-fetched? To the enemies of the church, won’t it seem that you have acted in direct contradiction to the counsels of Vatican IV?”

  The abbot stared at the fire. In the reflected light of the flames, his features seemed gray as a plaster cast. “I didn’t think of myself as contradicting Rome. God forbid.”

  “I am sure you didn’t. And I have been sent here, simply, to clarify things. To explain father general’s concern. And to ask you, for the greater good, to stop this Mass, and these private confessions, at once.”

  The abbot, hitching the skirts of his robe, leaned toward the fire, staring at the flames. Kinsella stood. He began to speak, a pulse trembling in his throat, his voice loud in the room, the voice of a believer, telling his true creed. “Father general, in his letter, mentioned the apertura with Buddhism, which, of course, you’ve read about. Perhaps it seems to you that this has nothing to do with life here on this island, but, believe me, it has. Father general is president of the special Ecumenical Council that will inaugurate the Bangkok talks next month. It is the first time an order head has been so chosen and any scandal about the Albanesians at this time could, as you can guess, be extremely embarrassing to father general at the talks. He was anxious that you understand he is in a very delicate stage of these negotiations. The bonze demonstrations at Kuala Lumpur are, we feel, only a beginning of the opposition tactics.”

  The abbot swiveled in his chair, staring up at his visitor. He did not speak. Then, rising, he walked to the windows of his parlor. The faded light of an Irish summer’s evening washed a late northern brightness into the room. Through narrow windowpanes, the abbot stared at the sky. Gray storm clouds sailed west toward America. The sky, abandoned, was bled white by a hidden sun. “I envy you,” the abbot said. “I have been a priest for forty-odd years but I have never been sure why. It must be very rewarding to feel that one’s actions might actually change something in this world of ours. If I ask you a question, I hope you won’t be offended. But, when a young fellow like you kneels down in church, do you pray. Do you actually say prayers, things like the Hail Mary, the Our Father, and so on?

  “Are you asking me what do I believe?”

  “Yes, if you wish. There is a book by a Frenchman called Francis Jeanson, have ever you heard of it? An Unbeliever’s Faith, it is called.”

  “I have not read it.”

  “It is interesting. He believes there can be a future for Christianity, provided it gets rid of God. Your friend, Father Hartmann, has mentioned Jeanson in his own
writings. The idea is, a Christianity that keeps God can no longer stand up to Marxism. You have not heard of the book?”

  “Yes, I have heard of it,” Kinsella said. “But I have not read it.”

  “A pity. I wanted to ask you—the Mass, for instance. What is the Mass to you?”

  Kinsella looked at the abbot, as the abbot stared out at the evening sky. Now was the time for truth, if only a cautious part of the truth. “I suppose, the Mass to me, as to most Catholics in the world today, is a symbolic act. I do not believe that the bread and wine on the altar is changed into the body and blood of Christ, except in a purely symbolic manner. Therefore, I do not, in the old sense, think of God as actually being present, there in the tabernacle.”

  The abbot turned from the window, head cocked on one side, his hawk’s features quizzical. “Isn’t that remarkable,” the abbot said. “And yet you seem to be what I would call a very dedicated young man.”

  “In what way is it remarkable, Father Abbot? It’s the standard belief, in this day and age.”

  “Or lack of belief,” the abbot said. “I think I was born before my time. A man doesn’t have to have such a big dose of faith anymore, does he?”

  Kinsella smiled. “Perhaps not.” He had been about to add that today’s best thinking saw the disappearance of the church building as a place of worship in favor of a more generalized community concept, a group gathered in a meeting to celebrate God-in-others. But decided that, perhaps, the abbot was not ready for that step.

  “Yes,” the abbot said. “I see now why the old Mass is non grata. And why you’re here to tell us to cease and desist.”

  “My job is, primarily, to explain the situation—including the special problems facing the order at present—and, of course, to help handle any transitional problems that might arise with tourists or press.”

  “You mean when we give up the old Mass?”

  “Yes.”

  “And if I choose to retain it?”