Body Count

by William Kienzle

  FOR JAVAN

  Part

  One

  1

  “Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.”

  She settled into the chair opposite Father Robert Koesler as he recited, “May the Lord be in your heart and on your lips so that you may rightly confess your sins.”

  “It’s been … oh … may be a couple of years since my last confession—good Lord, what the hell is that?”

  The priest, startled, followed her gaze and found himself staring at a green growth on the table between them. “It’s a plant,” he explained vaguely.

  “You mean it’s alive?”

  He smiled. “It won’t bite you.”

  “I’m not so sure. It’s about the ugliest thing I’ve ever seen. What is it, do you know?”

  “It’s a Gynura. It’s also called a purple passion vine.”

  “Then how come it’s not purple?”

  “Well …” He was beginning to feel uncomfortable. It was the first time he’d been challenged to defend a plant. “… it needs a lot of light to keep its purple. And, as you can see …” His explanation drifted off. He gestured toward the tiny stained glass window. A lighted candle and a low-wattage electric bulb were the only other illumination in the small cubicle. He felt the woman was looking at him as if he were mentally deficient.

  “It’s a wonder it’s alive at all … it is alive, isn’t it?” she pursued.

  “Uh-huh.”

  “If you’ll excuse me, Father, why put any kind of plant in a room like this?”

  “The new liturgy for the Sacrament of Reconciliation suggests a table, a Bible, a candle, and some sort of plant in the place set aside for face-to-face confession Speaking of confession; That is why you came, isn’t it?”

  “Oh, yes … sure. I was shopping across Gratiot at the Eastern Market and I saw your steeple and it was Saturday afternoon. So I thought, why not? And here I am.”

  So much for his reputation as a sensitive, kindly confessor to rival St. John Vianney, the holy Curé d’Ars. She just happened to be in the neighborhood. “So, here you are. Two years is kind of a long while, don’t you think?”

  “I suppose.” She reflected. “Yeah, it is. Good grief, I can remember the good old days. Once a week. At least once a month.”

  Koesler could remember the good old days even more vividly than his penitent.

  “The good old days!” she continued: “I used to come to confession and say the same old things over and over: ‘I quarreled with my husband. Lost patience with the kids. Gossiped.’”

  Koesler smiled. “Is that what it’s going to be today: Anger? Arguments? Gossip?”

  “I wish it were. I got bigger problems than that. Matter of fact, I don’t exactly know why I’m here. It was just on the spur of the moment. Maybe I shouldn’t have come.” She moved as if to leave.

  “No; wait.” She did. “There must be a reason why you came today, ” the priest said. “I don’t think I’ve seen you before. Do you live around here?”

  “No. Out in the ’burbs. Like I said, I was shopping at the market and–”

  “What’s the problem?”

  “Uh … the Church.”

  “The whole thing?”

  “I just can’t believe everything the Church teaches. Maybe I’ve lost my faith. Maybe I’m not a Catholic anymore.”

  “Like what don’t you believe? In God? In Jesus Christ?”

  “Oh, no, for Pete’s sake, no! Sure I believe in God, in Jesus!”

  “Then … ?”

  “Things like birth control, divorce, remarriage, even abortion. To be perfectly frank, Father, I don’t think the Church has the slightest clue as to what’s going on in the real world.”

  “Have you prayed over this?”

  “Oh, yeah, I read about that in the papers: Some Cardinal in Rome said that if you don’t believe what the Church teaches, you should go pray until you do. That seems kind of silly to me.”

  “Me too.”

  “You too!” She was startled.

  He shifted in his chair so that he more fully faced her. “When I asked if you prayed over this, I meant more in terms of prayerfully forming your conscience.”

  “You did?”

  “I imagine just about every institution, bureaucracy, whatever, would like to dictate what its members believe. It keeps things nice, helps keep them just the way the institution wants. But that’s not the way it works for us. I mean, we have an absolute obligation to form our conscience and follow it.”

  “That does sort of ring a bell, ” she admitted. “Then what’s all this stuff about praying until you agree?”

  “Sort of stretching a point, I guess you could say. I must admit it is kind of tricky. You can see where following his conscience got Hitler, for instance. Nevertheless, it holds true: We’ve got to form our own set of values—what’s right and what’s wrong. The Church tries to be extremely helpful in assisting us to accomplish this. But no one—not me, not the bishop, not even the Pope—can be a substitute for our own personal responsibility. So you may have a big job ahead of you in settling the questions you raise. You know how the institutional Church feels about artificial birth control, remarriage, and the rest. You’d have to have the strongest, most legitimate defensible reasons to disregard all this.

  “On the other hand, if you don’t actually believe what you profess to believe, you’d only be kidding yourself. You’ve got to be straight with yourself and straight with God. We can’t fool God. Not in the recesses of our conscience.”

  The silence was so total the creaks and groans of the ancient church could be heard.

  He had given her a lot to think about. Could she trust a guy who kept a plant in a dungeon? Yet what he said seemed to make sense. She was deeper in doubt now than she had been before coming to confession today. But now it seemed a sort of creative doubt. Henceforth, when she took time for silent prayer, at least she would know what it was she was praying about.

  If nothing else, the silence reached her. She had to say something. “I don’t know what to tell you, Father. I gotta get by myself and think this through.”

  “Pray it through, ” he amended.

  “Yes, that’s right, pray it through. It didn’t take you long to say it, but that’s a lot to consider. I’ve felt so … uh … guilty. It started when the Pope said that the old rules on family planning were right and you couldn’t use birth control. I was sure he was wrong. But, then, how could he be? He’s infallible!”

  “He wasn’t being infallible when he said that.”

  “Okay. But the Cardinal said you had to agree with the Pope whether he was being infallible or not.”

  “An overstatement, I think.”

  “Some overstatement! It threw my life into a tailspin … my spiritual life, that is.”

  Another pause. Finally, Koesler asked, “Doyou want to go to confession? Do you want to mention some sin of your past life if you’re not aware of any sin now? Do you want me to give you absolution?”

  Her brow was profoundly knit. “No, no … not now. Maybe I’ll be back. Would it be okay if I come back that I come to you? I mean, I’m not from your parish.”

  “It’ll be fine if you want to talk to me. When you leave, why don’t you take one of the parish bulletins in the vestibule? It’ll give you the times when we hear confessions at St. Joe’s.”

  She smiled. “I’ll do that.”

  He blessed her and she left.

  It seemed to Father Koesler that he’d been engaged in this sort of activity—demythologizing Church teaching—for an awfully long time now. Since shortly after he’d been ordained thirty-eight years ago.

  Then, as now, the most frequent misunderstanding was over birth control. Just before Koesler had been ordained, Po
pe Pius XII had, in effect, blessed the rhythm method of family planning. Now it seemed archaic. But at the time it was a monumental relief for Catholics, who, until then, had had no acceptable recourse but abstinence.

  In his early days of hearing confessions, Koesler had been surprised by the number of penitents who told him that some previous priest had given “permission” to use the rhythm method for a specific number of months. Would Koesler grant an extension?

  At that point Koesler had felt forced to explain that it was not the priest’s place to treat rhythm as a privilege to be granted, withheld or measured. If advice was sought, priests could advise, but they had no business beyond offering their opinion. And then only if the opinion was requested.

  Once again, it was a matter of the individual’s conscience being the final authority. And it was the individual’s responsibility to shape that conscience.

  No one had followed the previous penitent into the confessional. No surprise there. In the “good old days, ” as the woman had put it, in most parishes there was seldom an interval between penitents. People who confessed once or twice a year did so at Christmas and Easter, and were customarily scolded for not coming more often. It had been, as the woman said, a monthly experience for most, though more often for some.

  Slowly—after the Second Vatican Council in the early sixties—things changed. Perhaps the most radical change, as far as confession was concerned, was a transition in the concept of sin. Particularly in the Catholic concept of mortal sin. Upon disturbing reflection, it made little sense to many that God would vacillate between sending one to heaven or hell dependent on a single event—missing Mass of a Sunday, eating a pork chop on Friday.

  With one thing and another, the “good old days” seemed gone forever.

  It was difficult, from the confines of the confessional, to determine whether or not there was anyone else in the church. “Old St. Joseph’s,” as it was called more often than not, truly was an elderly edifice. Established in 1856, it had now been declared a historic landmark. In addition to an abundance of Gothic arches, it was overflowing with pictures, windows, and statues depicting God, Jesus, Mary, Joseph of course, and lots of other saints. Over the years in the archdiocese of Detroit, eleven other churches had been dedicated to St. Joseph. But “Old St. Joe’s” in downtown Detroit had been the first.

  Once it had been a thriving parish with an adjacent Catholic high school for boys, run by the Christian Brothers. But with the shift in population to the suburbs, St. Joe’s had become merely a historical as well as an architectural curiosity. Then, with the erection of a series of nearby high-rise apartments and condominiums, “Old St. Joe’s” had the potential for a new life.

  Father Koesler, after a lengthy pastorate in a suburban parish, had been pastor of St. Joe’s just a little more than a year now. And, due in large part to his diligent work, there had been a significant comeback. At least Sunday Mass attendance was healthy and growing.

  Koesler’s satisfying thoughts about his flourishing flock were interrupted by a woman who entered the confessional and seated herself across from him.

  Her appearance was in stark contrast to that of the previous woman. Koesler could not help notice the difference. He knew neither, but this woman was at least vaguely familiar. If he was not mistaken, she had been attending Mass at St. Joe’s for the past few months.

  But the extreme contrast! What a coincidence that they had appeared, one after the other, on this leisurely Saturday afternoon.

  Woman “A” had been dressed appropriately for just what she claimed she had been doing—shopping at the Eastern Market. She had worn faded jeans, sneakers, a sweatshirt several sizes too large, and no makeup.

  Woman “B” wore a well-fitted business suit that accentuated her attractive matronly figure. Her hair looked as if it had been “done” recently. Her makeup had been carefully, artfully applied. But her lips, unlike those of Woman “A,” were thin, tight, and disapproving.

  Koesler waited a moment, then offered, “Peace be with you.”

  “And also with you, ” she responded.

  Well, at least she was familiar with the updated formula. At this point either the priest or the penitent might have suggested a relevant Scripture reading. But she said nothing, so, in the tentative circumstances, he thought it better not to delay getting to the heart of the matter.

  “Bless me, Father, for I have sinned,” she said, after a moment. “My last confession was six years ago.”

  “You recall that it was six years?”

  “Yes.”

  Odd that without hesitation she could pinpoint her last previous confession at six years. Not “about” six years, “approximately” six years, six years “more or less,” but “six years” exactly. “Was there something special that happened in your life when you made your last confession?”

  She almost smiled. “I left the convent.”

  Surprised, Koesler asked, “Did you leave the Church too then?”

  “No, no, not that … at least I kept coming to Sunday Mass pretty faithfully. But—”

  “Did you go to confession regularly while you were a nun?”

  She shrugged. “I suppose that was the problem.” She thought for a moment. “No, maybe it was more the symptom.”

  Koesler’s look was a question.

  “I was a convert in my teens …” She hesitated. “Do you have time for this?”

  He nodded. “I’m in no hurry.”

  She shifted in the chair and looked away. She was remembering. “My parents had no religion, so they gave me none. Sometime during high school, I felt I was just drifting, especially compared with some of my classmates who had … faith. Who were committed to one or another religion. I became interested in Catholicism … probably because a close friend was Catholic.”

  Koesler almost smiled as he recalled the old story of the Catholic girl who wanted her fiancé to convert to her religion. To please her, he started taking instructions—and ended up going to the seminary and becoming a priest. Had this woman’s “close friend” been a young man who, wanting to marry her, had gotten her interested in his Catholic religion only to lose out when, tragically for him, she entered the convent and became a nun? Koesler didn’t interrupt. It was her story.

  “Anyway, I found just about everything I seemed to need in Catholicism. So, as I’ve already mentioned, I entered the convent. I became a nun.

  “You asked if I went to confession regularly when I was a nun.” Her smile was bitter. “Every week—to a priest whom we called our regular confessor.”

  “And, ” Koesler completed her thought, “four times a year to one who was called your ‘extraordinary’ confessor.”

  She glanced at him. “That’s right.”

  Early in his priesthood, Koesler had been assigned as a regular confessor for a group of almost thirty nuns. Thirty nuns confessing every week! In their sinless lives these women had not prepared lesson plans, failed in promptitude, and committed similar crimes. Why a regular confessor? Who knew? There was even a regulation that, for a valid confession, a screen was required to separate the confessor and the penitent nun. Prompting the story of the nun who wanted to go to confession to her pastor in the rectory where there was no established confessional. So the priest held up a fly swatter between them.

  “Then, ” Koesler said, “there came a time when there were no more regular or extraordinary confessors.”

  She nodded. “Then, ” she added, “there came a time when the ‘community’ disappeared. So many of my Sisters left. So few women were entering. So many nuns decided to get into apostolates that had nothing to do with the purpose of our order.” She shook her head, “There was nothing left.”

  “So you left religious life.”

  “There was nothing to leave.”

  Koesler knew many former nuns. Most were leading well adjusted, productive lives. Many were married. If anything, this one did not appear to be all that well adjusted. Something was troubl
ing her. What?

  “How have you done since leaving?” he asked.

  “Materially? Quite well.”

  “Oh?”

  “I’m in estate planning.”

  Appropriate. The way she came across, she did not appear to be the type who would work well person to person. Better that she juggle figures than do counseling.

  “I have no financial worries, ” she continued. “I’ve got a comfortable apartment at 1300 Lafayette.”

  Thirteen hundred Lafayette, among one of the pricier high rises on the edge of downtown, was within walking distance of St. Joe’s. Koesler knew it well. “I’ve rung some doorbells there,” he said, “But I haven’t run into you.”

  “You probably called during the day. I’m seldom home until late in the evening. But I’ve heard of you. I’ve attended Sunday Mass here over the past couple of months. You seem down to earth. So I decided to try confession.”

  “You’re familiar with the new form? What we call the Sacrament of Reconciliation?”

  She smiled, but there was no humor in her eyes. “I saw the signs outside the confessional: private confession on the other side, face-to-face here. I chose this. Yes, of course I’m familiar with it. Vatican II happened some twenty-five years ago. I left the convent only six years ago. Actually, this is one of the very few changes that I came to like. I always thought the screens, the sliding panels, the anonymity was silly.”

  “That brings up a question: The Council, indeed, took place in the early sixties. What took you so long to leave?”

  She seemed overcome by the memory of all those years. “I had a commitment. I was determined to fulfill it. As it turned out, I should have left years earlier. By the time I was forced to decide, there was nothing left. I was skating on water. All the reasons I had chosen Catholicism over the other religions disappeared after that Council. I just wouldn’t let myself believe it. I kept telling myself the changes were God’s will—that, in time, things would work out. I was wrong. And, in my mistake, I wasted some twenty years of my life—twenty very precious years.” She seemed drained.

  So that was it. The lady was bitter. Well, in a way, she deserved to be resentful. On the other hand, the wasted time was her own responsibility. No one had barred the convent door, imprisoning her. Although in her circumstances a decision to leave or stay had to be painful, nonetheless it remained her decision to make.