Pardon Me

We exchanged formalities and banalities.

It's a pleasure to meet you.

Likewise.

Nothing about the weather, more along the lines of how was your trip, your accommodations, how are you enjoying the conference and our pastoral tourists-attracting environs.

From his side, very little, holding his cards close to the vest.

Are you from here originally?

Tell me your role again.

And then, I stopped parrying and went for the heart of the matter. His heart.

What do fellow bishops call you? How about fellow priests? How does your secretary address you? Your excellency? Father Theodore? Theodore? Is that as far as the informal reaches: first-name basis?

Then: What did they call you as a kid?

He halted. He sat back in the ancient two-armed paisley, upholstered chair. He closed his eyes, took in a long breath. I waited.

Teddy.

He opened his eyes. A curtain lifted. His face softened, its pallor lightened.

May I call you Teddy?

The ancient grandfather clock, its pendulum swaying. His dolorous eyes pleading, fixed on my eyes. Hands folded in his lap. 

You may.

We had opened a door and entered a room, a dark one with sagging purple velvet drapes and the fragrance of burning candles and stale wine.

Teddy.

May I call you Paul?

Of course.

And I entered a confessional with the same velvet curtain, a kneeler, and a sliding screened door in the window.

How many times, son?

I lost count, Father.

How many times, Paul?

Self-abuse? I tried to count. Mortal sins. I didn't want to commit a sacrilege of the sacrament by leaving out a mortal sin. 

I don't know. It's only been two weeks, Father. Fourteen. Give or take.

Fourteen?

Maybe fifteen. Let's say seventeen, just to be safe. (Safe from what? Eternal flames.)

I'm not coming back, Teddy. How many times for you, Teddy?

I lost count.

But more than fourteen, give or take, right, Teddy?

I lost count.

Teddy.

Paul.

May I call you Paulie?

I prefer not.

Teddy, what are we talking about here?

I prefer not to say.

Is it safe to say it ain't the same as my fourteen-year-old's transgressions, the ones they labeled mortal sins, the Inquisition's torture chamber of shame and remorse for the normal tides of testosterone, Teddy?

You're quite the poet, Paul.

And you're quite evasive, Theodore.

The screen closed.

I parted the curtains. I walked out, to the pews. Or was it the communion railing? It was an odd feeling. I had been give no absolution and therefore no penance.

The silence shrouded me. I longed for the cloudy fragrance of incense. All I got was unlit candles.

Anno Domini

Forty years ago today, Thomas Merton died.

Here was a man who truly mattered, who matters now.

Traditionally, a saint's feast day is celebrated on the day of his or her death.

We are blessed by his presence, by his absence, by his eloquent silence.

The King's English

Here is my book report. For my book report I read the book God's Secretaries: The Making of the King James Bible by Adam Nicolson. (No, that is not a typo. This fellow has no "H" as Jack Nicholson does. [Didn't you just love Chinatown and Five Easy Pieces?].) Being more of a fiction rather than non-fiction (what's the diff, really?) reader, I started off skimming this book for a research project, and then got drawn into it. I loved the prose. And the history. If I reveal what I learned, it will shine a red-hot a klieg light on my ignorance, but that's okay. They didn't much like Catholics in those days, in Merrie Olde England, especially after the Gunpowder Plot. Nicolson says it was mostly trumped-up hysteria. His book was published in 2003, and he pointedly compares the attitude then toward Catholics of all stripes to attitudes today to Muslims of all types. Many see the King James Bible, or the Authorized (Authorised with an "s," for Glamourpuss) Version, as a landmark work of our English language. It was "translated" by a committee of some 50 scholars. A committee! The language was even archaic in its own time. No one knows how many were printed in 1611; the printer sort of mixed and matched versions, so they were all different editions. Therefore, in essence, "The curious fact is that no one such thing as 'The King James Bible' -- agreed, consistent and whole -- has ever existed." (page 226) There are some startling misprints, including "Judas" instead of "Jesus" in one of the Gospels! Plus, a 1631 edition, called the Wicked Bible, left out the word "not" in Exodus 20:14, so it read, "Thou shalt commit adultery." Miles Smith, who wrote the Preface to the KJV Bible, quoted from the popular Geneva Bible instead of from the work of the Translators in the Preface itself! Similarly, Lancelot Andrewes, one of the chief Translators, continued to use the Geneva Bible as text for his sermons, not the fruit of his work, the King James Version (KJV). How's that for a vote of confidence in something you labored over for years? Speaking of the Geneva Bible, that's what the Mayflower Pilgrims (Separatists; radical Nonconformists) carried on board, though the KJV ironically became the guiding text of Puritan America. Finally, click on the image shown here and you will see the most exquisite and delicious use of the semicolon I've ever encountered. That's my book report. The End. (I am a deliberate reader. Though I found this hugely entertaining, I had to renew the book twice. I'm returning it to the library this evening.) p.s. I learned, or relearned, the word "Jacobean" as an adjective referring to King James I and the period of his reign.