Page 208 - What They Did to the Kid

196 Jack Fritscher

“Forgive me, Father. Don’t get mad at me. I’ll be ordained in two
years and haven’t the time to waste in preliminaries, in getting to
know you. I welcome your objectivity. I open to it. I need direction.
I’ve gotten this far. To this plateau. Where from here?”
“You hide behind too many metaphors, too many images. Where
is this plateau? What is it?”
“It’s love. I work out of love. That’s 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’ve solved all that. About
identity, I mean. I’m a child of God. Plain and simple. I arrived at
that nearly two years ago and it still satisfies me. But that’s a state
of being. Where’s all the action of life itself to be filled in? I want
to give myself. I must give myself. There’s 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’ve never felt anything deeply. I’ve
worked hard studying, reading, writing, praying, to prepare myself
for my priestly life in the world. But that’s not enough. I don’t want
to be a standard-issue priest growing fat living isolated in a rectory.”
“Watch your mouth.”
“I’m 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’s a short circuit. Am I dumb or numb, or
do I feel too much?”
“You are having a spiritual crisis.”
“Yes, Father.”
He talked for a few minutes and said we could both read, think,
pray, and make a novena to Our Lady of Knock.”
“Knock? Knock?”
“Don’t mock me, boy. You Americans!” 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’s 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

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