Priest
Matt snuck into the church and took a seat at the back. He recognised the voices of the stalwarts in the congregation, always there no matter what, all convinced of their place in heaven. He knew that some of them would not make it through the pearly gates and he had to wonder quite how honest they’d been when confessing to the new priest. The children were there – scrubbed bright and shiny and watched over by the younger Sisters. A couple of the old hands snuck in after a last-minute cigarette and emergency mint. He thought the day-in day-out carers giving their lives were all more likely to make the grade than the more ostentatious believers. But what did he know, he was just the Devil.
New people filled out the pews. A change always brought in some of the lapsed. Some curious, some – perhaps – looking for something that hadn’t been offered before. Depending on the message some stayed, some left again still looking for a spiritual home that would welcome them. And there were some who seemed genuinely curious about faith. Matt had read the reports about church attendance going up. He wasn’t sure if this was genuine growth or just another example of experience culture hedonists wanting to be told off for having a good life while others suffered. Why go all the way to the swamis in India when you could get incense and mysticism in the US of A?
He wasn’t the last, not quite. A nudge at his shoulder and he slid along the hard seat of the pew. Sister Margaret Grace took his previous place and whispered how it was a good place to see without being noticed in return. He was about to say something back about her spotting him but the bell rang from the door of the sacristy and the congregation stood as the procession made its way to the altar.
Matt knew the details and had vague memories of seeing the green chasuble worn by priests in ordinary time. His Grandma had been the real Catholic he like to tell people. She made him sit quiet and still through mass after mass even though the words went over his head. She’d instilled in him a respect for the faith that continued even when he’d stopped observing the mechanisms of it at Columbia. It seemed the new guy had arrived with new vestments, slightly more modern than his predecessors if the murmuring that followed his progress was any indication.
The details of the embroidery might have been lost on Matt Murdock, but the impact of the man wearing the robe was not. Foggy might have teased him about having a ‘type’; he was allowed, he’d picked up the broken pieces of his friend more than once. Karen was allowed too. They’d had a shot at being a thing – and he did really love her – but somehow the chemistry hadn’t been there. And the night work. That hadn’t helped.
For all the people rescued, all those kept from harm, and bad guys given to the police the night work didn’t do much for his daytime hours. It hadn’t seemed to matter to Karen that the man in black, the man who saved her, the man called the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen was the same man in the office along from hers. At least that confession had been offered up voluntarily. He was trying to be honest with her. Much better to find out that way than stumbling over your oldest friend bleeding out on his apartment floor.
He knew he should be listening to the words. And he was … well, the tones. He knew the words inside and out. He knew when to stand and to sit. He knew the responses. He could do it all on autopilot and let his senses search for the things the new priest wasn’t saying. The congregation he filtered out with practiced ease, but the sound of the sparrow rapid heart next to him he kept as an anchor to stop his mind wandering. Father Castle’s soft voice, so quiet when speaking directly to him over coffee, projected clearly over his new flock. When he proclaimed himself a penitent – just like everyone else – Matt heard the truth of it. It wasn’t a game to him when he said he had sinned, he had greatly sinned, he meant it with all his heart. In comparison the deacon (an admirable man in every other sense) merely mouthed the words of the readings.
Appropriately enough, the homily was on welcoming the stranger. Matt stopped listening to the man’s body and listened to his words. Nothing that diverged from the official line of the St. Agnes parish web site as he introduced himself. Nothing to explicitly ruffle the feathers of the more traditional congregants. Lots that hinted that everyone should and would be welcome, everyone was worthy of grace. Father Castle … Frank … concluded by saying everyone had their own way to God and he would welcome anyone wanting to find that way through his ministry.
Worthy of grace or not, Matt didn’t take communion. He went up to the altar with the others – not at all in response to the sharp elbow of the person sat next to him – but bowed his head and signed that he could not take the sacrament. He wasn’t the only one. But he was, maybe, the only one who received a blessing specifically meant rather than generically given. Returning to the pew he wasn’t sure if the twin holes burned in the back of his suit jacket were real or just him imagining Sister Maggie’s disapproval.
Then the dismissal and it was over. Go in peace. Thanks be to God. Thanks be to God.
Some left – lives to go back to. Some milled about – hopeful like fans at a stage door it seemed to Matt. But he was there too. Some – the traditionalists perhaps – lying in wait to find out what this new man meant by ‘the stranger’. Maggie stayed at his side. The perfect guide attentive to the blind man. And she remained quiet while he listened to the conversations going on around them. He’d never known how much Father Lantom had told her and, to be honest, he’d always tried to avoid conversations about how much his other senses made up for, and in his case often surpassed, sight.
“Will you have time for coffee this week?” Frank sounded done with questions about the service and his hopes for the church. “Sister Margaret says I should keep practicing when I’m not trying to get the warehouse across the park at a decent price for a veterans home.” Some of the trads had been very keen on that subject … and not so keen on having anything quite so close to home.
“Of course. And … if I don’t have time now then I’ll ask Karen to magic some time for me. I can always tell her I’m meeting a potential client.” Matt smiled, fell back on his ‘good man needing good clients’ persona. It was true, after all. “You know, if the church needs some locally based legal advice on zoning permits.” There was that odd little stutter in the steady heartbeat again.
It hadn’t wavered in front of his new congregation; not flickered a jot while people – politely – suggested that the area would always been seen as “Hell’s Kitchen” if unhoused soldiers found a welcoming haven there. Frank had been equally polite in his replies to them. Matt considered the control this man had on his reactions. An anger locked down; everything apparently locked down … until speaking with him. And if Matt’s heart did a similar odd beat, now and then, that was just coincidence.
“Forgive me Father for I have sinned. It’s been too long since my last confession.” And what should he say? That Karen had met Father Francis and reported back how blue his eyes were, how his smile made them crinkle when he thanked her for coffee when he could make a much better brew? That Foggy had confirmed his commitment to the veterans home even as he’d been circumspect about the funding? (Matt had definitely heard the thud of cash – actual notes, large ones – from his office across the way – as the deposit was presented.) That both had made comments about ‘The Thorn Birds’ seeing an unexpected resurgence of popularity in the area?
Frank had been taken through the coffee menu by Sister Maggie. He’d practiced and honed his skills on the sisters and the older children (babyccinos only for the younger ones, they were often hyper enough). He’d presented coffee to Matt as an offering under the supervision of Margaret Grace. They had chatted and said things. And not said things … and that had seemed important. And Sister Maggie had seen him off for the night as St. Agnes closed down for sleep.
Nothing stopped the night job. People needed him. Needed the Devil. And if the Devil happened across the rooftops opposite the orphanage, and maybe took rest on the crosses atop the church? Just coincidence.
Frank had moved into the old apartment on the top floor of the orphanage. Father Lantom had lived there too. The other priests, young men all, had taken rentals paid for by the church in better parts of the city. Maybe that was the difference? And if, on the night the new priest walked the perimeter of the church and the orphanage without a sister by his side, he happened to look up and wave to the Devil looking down on him – what did that mean?
It had taken weeks. Weeks of coffee and gentle conversation. Weeks of Foggy … then Karen … “you know what, he is a really nice guy” and he knew they meant it. And they knew that he knew they meant it. Weeks of attending mass and not taking communion. English, Spanish or Croation … the Devil needed to take communion.
“Hello Matthew. I know this is anonymous, but I’d just like to say how happy I am to hear your voice.” The figure on the other side of the grille sat up straight, prepared himself for whatever Matt – or the Devil – had to say. “I know you’ve found it hard to come to confession since you lost Father Paul. Take your time. How can I help you?”
The teaching was that confession was good for the soul. Really? How could anyone say ‘I am the Devil’ or … and would this be worse? … ‘and I think I might love you’? Matt sighed and fretted. Frank waited. He had learned patience.
“I have a way of … living.” Okay, vague but it might be a start. Matt Murdock could hear old Mrs. Jeyes waiting her turn. The priest might be willing to wait, but the devout seemed never so forgiving.
“It’s okay. We all take our own time.” A pause. Like the priest also listened for others around them. Surely not? “I’m here for you, don’t let other people out there rush you.”
“I have deceived people.” That was true. “I have hidden parts of myself … from my best friend … from a woman I love … I …” Again, all true, he loved Foggy and Karen. That was true. Would always be true. What did he sound like?
“It’s okay Matthew.” The world of the queue and the misses Jeyes and everyone else focussed down on the calm, quiet voice. “It’s okay. You can be yourself. Just you, and me, and God here. And he knows everything anyway … so I’m just here to help you find your way back to him.”
“I’ve had a secret. So long now. I’ve made mistakes … I … I thought I was better than I was. Oh, I have such done things …” In the wooden booth who was he talking to? His father? His priest? Where was God? The box gave him no hint how to progress. The signals from the body nearest to him were a mass of confusion but he had to keep going. He had to. “I had a secret that I kept from my best friend. I don’t know if it was because I didn’t trust him or … somehow … I thought it was so terrible … and then Karen.” The words ran out. What could he say? It didn’t make any sense.
There was a long pause from the other side of the screen. A pause that might have included a sigh. “Matthew, are you afraid to tell me that you are gay … or whatever is include in ‘queer’ nowadays?” Yes, that was definitely a sigh. And another skip in that magnetic beat. “What is it the angels say when they reveal themselves … be not afraid?” The levity dropped from the priest’s tone, an acknowledgment of what had been told. “You do know there are far worse things to be in the world?”
“Oh I know Father. Trust me, I know.”
“Matthew I respect that you’ve come to express your contrition before the Lord, but there’s more here than the sacrament of confession.” A pause. The priest gathered his thoughts while his heart clattered an alarming tarantella. “There are things we should say. Would you meet me in private?” A few seconds of silence and the beat regained that steady in its rhythm. “On the parapet outside my apartment?”
“The roof? The roof of the orphanage?”
“Yes Matthew. If we’re being truthful. On the roof. Because I believe … I believe that you have been there before, and you can get there again.”
“Tonight?”
“Why not? Consider this your penance.” The grille closed. The blind man sat in the booth uncertain quite what to do. This was not what he expected. The grille opened again. “I can do the whole Father, Son, and Holy Ghost thing if you want but, seriously, please … come meet me on the roof after midnight.” There may have been a shrug, Matt was too distracted to be certain. “Let’s be honest about who we are.”