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%u00a9Jack Fritscher, Ph.D., All Rights ReservedHOW TO LEGALLY QUOTE FROM THIS BOOK168 Jack Fritscher%u201cYou must know, it%u2019s been so long, it%u2019s been never, actually, since we%u2019ve had adequate spiritual counseling.%u201d%u201cYou boys are vain and demanding boys.%u201d%u201cForgive me, Father. Don%u2019t get mad at me. I%u2019ll be ordained in two years and haven%u2019t the time to waste in preliminaries, in getting to know you. I welcome your objectivity. I open to it. I need direction. I%u2019ve gotten this far. To this plateau. Where from here?%u201d%u201cYou hide behind too many metaphors, too many images. Where is this plateau? What is it?%u201d%u201cIt%u2019s love. I work out of love. That%u2019s the meaning of everything. To feel deeply and strongly enough about the world so that Christ can work through me. I know who I am. I%u2019ve solved all that. About identity, I mean. I%u2019m a child of God. Plain and simple. I arrived at that nearly two years ago and it still satisfies me. But that%u2019s a state of being. Where%u2019s all the action of life itself to be filled in? I want to give myself. I must give myself. There%u2019s no choice any more. My vocation has passed the chance of choice. Only how do I give myself? How do I know myself? Maybe I%u2019ve never felt anything deeply. I%u2019ve worked hard studying, reading, writing, praying, to prepare myself for my priestly life in the world. But that%u2019s not enough. I don%u2019t want to be a standard-issue priest growing fat living isolated in a rectory.%u201d%u201cWatch your mouth.%u201d%u201cI%u2019m sorry. Why do I want to reinvent the priesthood? What can you tell me? What is the secret knowledge and the secret power of priests? Somewhere there%u2019s a short circuit. Am I dumb or numb, or do I feel too much?%u201d%u201cYou are having a spiritual crisis.%u201d%u201cYes, Father.%u201dHe talked for a few minutes and said we could both read, think, pray, and make a novena to Our Lady of Knock.%u201d%u201cKnock? Knock?%u201d%u201cDon%u2019t mock me, boy. You Americans!%u201d He handed me a holy card with a drawing of the Blessed Virgin appearing in the village of Knock in Ireland. He would be able to see me again in two weeks and I should continue to work at God%u2019s will, discovering it and expressing it. Two weeks! Damn nondirective counselor! Exiting his door, I asked for his blessing and knelt before him outside his threshold. He made the Sign of the Cross and put his hands on my head and gently closed his door. Clouds of his blue smoke, incense, rose off my cassock. I actually felt better. I believed in the craft of Jesuits over ordinary priests. I had dared express