My Dark Irish Self

My Dark Irish Self

As Ultramontanes go, I was as ultra as you could get.   In Poet year, I fervently agreed with Johnny O when he declared, “The Inquisition was the best thing the heretic ever knew.”  In Rhet year I defended the proposition that the Federal government should pay for Catholic schools.  I believed it.  I was ultra ultra.

By the time I was ordained a deacon several years later, I wasn’t even sure I believed in God. I definitely didn’t believe in Papal infallibility.  I was questioning everything about the Catholic enterprise.  Eventually, I left the seminary and the Church, moved into the Haight Ashbury, enrolled at S.F. State, and grew a beard.  

A year later, I decided to go back to St. Rose Parish for a visit.  I had good friends there – Mal Costa and Mike Kenny – and I wanted to see them again.  It was tense for me walking up the stairs of the rectory.  The last time I was here, I was a deacon, part of the team.  Now I had no role except that of outsider.  

I recognized the woman at the front desk.  We had gotten along well during my deaconate.  She greeted me warmly, although I could tell the beard made her a little uneasy.  We chatted a bit and I was about to ask her if Mal or Mike were around, when the door opened and a young priest came bustling in.  He had bright red hair and was well scrubbed in his short-sleeved clerical shirt and collar.

“Can I help you?” he snapped at me in a surly Irish brogue.

“Yeah, I was hoping to see Mal Costa,” I said.

“It’s FATHER Costa, and he’s not here,” he said.

The woman at the desk rolled her eyes.

“Okay, well, how about Mike Kenny, is he . .?”

“It’s MONSIGNOR Kenny and he’s the chancellor of the diocese!”  he barked.

“Oh shit!” I groaned, shaking my head.

“And don’t use language like that in this rectory!”  he said, shaking his finger at me.

It was then that I felt it emerge, that deep Irish rage that must have lain hidden for centuries, seething beneath the peat bogs, suffering the arrogance of the Romanist priests, contained within the properness of the good Catholic lad.

I brought my face even with his and jabbed my finger into his neck.  “Listen mother-fucker, just because you’re wearing that fucking collar, that doesn’t make you any better than anybody else. You understand?!”

His face turned purple and he wheeled around and stormed out, slamming the door.

An hour or so later, Mike and I were pulling out of the parking lot on our way to dinner. The Irish priest came rushing up to the car.  

“I’m sorry,” he panted.  “I didn’t realize . . .”  

I signaled him absolution and we drove off.  

I had finally exorcized my ultramontane self.