James 2:13
Saturday 7th June: The friary nestled in a bowl shaped valley cut like a cirque into the hillside. Fields like rivers tumbled out of the valley into the foot hills and pastures in the adjoining semi-wooded lowlands. The sun beat down intermittently on this refuge.
They were in the garden on the roughly trimmed lawn. The little low gabled guest house with its picture book four windows and door marked one side of the square enclosure. A high beech hedge marked the South and East boundaries of the lawn respectively and set it apart from the cloistered friary next door. The West side of the lawn was open to the wooded hillside but for two or three yew trees brought in, no doubt, generations ago as seedlings from Europe. And from the West the blazing rays of the afternoon sun scorched in on them, making Seb squint if he looked directly at the bishop, who was seated on a kitchen chair Seb had set there, a small table at his side with coffee. Seb sat on the grass. He wore the full dark brown habit of the novice. Though not yet with the three knots in his belt that signified a Franciscan who had taken full vows.
The other friars were at prayer. Franciscans were no enclosed order, but they still did a lot of praying. The breeze rustled gently through the nearby trees, making the same sound as waves on the shore. But it was hot for all that.
"They'll let me retire gracefully," the bishop was saying. He was enjoying this visit to his young friend and one-time confessor. It gave him a sense of closure. "After all, it's not as if I was caught buggering the choirboys." He laughed at Seb's grimace. "I shouldn't joke about it. But really . . ." he paused for effect. "Consenting adults is quite a different thing." He sighed. "I shall go to New York. There is an apartment owned by the diocese. I will do a little light work for the local cardinal, who is a good friend, but generally I shall remain in the background." He chuckled. "And I shall enjoy New York."
Seb laughed in turn. "I am happy for you."
The bishop raised a questioning eyebrow.
"Yes well I'll stay with the Franciscans for the full three years of my novitiate, since you ask so pointedly."
"And then?" asked Bishop O'Mally.
"Then perhaps I'll leave the order."
The bishop opened his mouth in genuine surprise. "Forgive the sense of deja vu," he said.
"Well perhaps not the order. There are lay brothers with the Franciscans. But in its way this period is giving me time to adjust to the day when I will no longer be a priest."
The bishop smiled. "You could always stay a priest and join the Episcopalians. I'm sure they'd be grateful."
"Perhaps they might." Seb sighed. "But no that would seem too much like betrayal."
Bishop O'Malley cocked his head on one side. "You intend to go back with Angie Merill?" he asked.
"Heavens no. She has someone else now," he said, not without a hint of bitterness that embarrassed him. "I still think of her though, in ways that are inappropriate for a friar. Even a Franciscan. Quite inappropriate and far too often. Which is why I realise I am no longer fit for celibacy." Seb paused for a sip of his coffee. "I think I'd like to work with refugees back in Springfield, in a perfect world."
"Perhaps it is a perfect world. I have contacts in a Springfield charity that does that sort of work. I'll see what I can do."
"Thank you bishop."
"Patrick. You're not my confessor any longer. Call me Patrick." Bishop O'Malley combed the fingers of his right hand back through his lank black hair. "But I know what you mean about celibacy." He paused but then decided to continue. This man knew all his secrets. And after all, what secrets had he? The gossip pages of the Springfield Republican had put paid to those. "I think I always knew I was homosexual. Gay seems so trivial a word for something so seminal. But I've always been gay. Consciously gay since those early embarrassing encounters at school, with other boys. Not that I couldn't appreciate women. I tried, when I was at college. There was one of those willowy, pert girls. Her name was Teresa. She was magical. She put me in mind of the Bernini sculpture of Saint Teresa in ecstasy in Rome. We had an affair, a clumsy sexual encounter but for a while I thought myself capable of being heterosexual. I think she loved me. She took me back to meet her family; but her mother was a wasp. Anglo-Saxon to the toes. She didn't approve of Teresa's pudgy Irish-Catholic boyfriend. And Teresa wasn't one to kick against the pricks. I soon got the message and we drifted apart. She married a salesman I believe." Patrick O'Malley cradled his coffee in both hands and sipped at it before continuing.
"Then in my last year at college there was a boy. Such a lovely boy. His name was David. And he looked like David as Michelangelo sculpted him. Exquisite. Gentle. We had a beautiful affair. I was truly in love for the first time in my life. Then one day, quite out of the blue, he told me he'd decided to enter the church. I was stunned. Quite devastated. But with time I decided that was what I too must do. I quit college and entered the seminary. My family took it surprisingly well. They were good catholics after all. And I genuinely felt I was not meant to be part of this world. That God was closing all the doors. That hedonism was to be denied me as was sexual love. That I was being challenged and shown the way." He sighed. "And all these years I was good. A good priest. A good bishop. And then there was Sean. Sean Hartnett turned my world upside down. Such a beautiful man. And for the second time in my life I was in love. And this time I was utterly bewildered. I was not happy but I did not want happiness. To be alive and in love was sufficient, whatever the consequences."
Seb was touched by the bishop's honesty. In many ways he felt they had both made a similar pilgrimage. "Why does God do this? Make us as we are? I mean both of us called to serve Him and both undermined by our human frailty. We were made as we are. Is it our fault? Are we weak? Or is it God's fault that we are what we are?"
"Do you think that it is our sexuality that condemns us? Do you really believe that God damns us all on that basis? If Jesus weeps it is because he watches over a world where men kill one another - a world in which abuse and selfishness is rife. A world whose very fabric is being destroyed by our lust to exploit its resources for short term gain. God yearns for some resolution to the paradox which is man's love for both creation and destruction. You think that humankind, in some shape or form, will roam the face of this earth a million years from now? Perhaps. Humanity walks a knife edge. Yes it has the potential to survive. But progress as it does at present and the human race is doomed. God weeps. But not for us. Not for you and I. Our petty sins are not that important."
"And our happiness? Does that not matter?"
The bishop smiled. His eyes twinkled. "They say that the Dalai Lama rates happiness high. For him, to be happy is essential, a key aspect of the purpose of life. For others, including most Christians, what matters is hope, redemptive hope in a better tomorrow in both this life and the next. Then there are others for whom what matters above all else is to have no regrets. Whereas for those facing the more outrageous of life's challenges, mere endurance is what matters. But Sebastian: hope, happiness, contentment, endurance; these are all important this side of the grave - and beyond. But they are not everything.
"The essence of it all, ultimately, transcends all that. The way I see it, just to have truly lived is everything. To have acknowledged life and grasped it with both hands. To have loved 'till your heart is fit to burst. That is more than happiness. And yes. More than enough."
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