Having written treatises on his army years and growing up in Inwood, Dad was eventually encouraged by my brother to write his memories of the priesthood. Dad joined the seminary soon after leaving the Army in 1961 and was ordained in June 1968. He spent about four years in active ministry, during which time he met our mother -- a nun who, like him, worked in the antipoverty programs in the city and who taught first grade in his parish. They were married in 1973.
I had in elementary school thought being a priest might be nice, but so too would being a cowboy. It was a time when I thought Roy Rogers might adopt me, though I wanted to hold on to my parents too; Roy could adopt us all.
It seemed each year one of the priests would come into our class to suggest we consider being priest a better choice, better even than cowboy – though they never were explicit in ruling it out. One of the crabby priests was never given this assignment, and if there was a young man in the house it would surely be his job. Father White came, and Father McFarland too. Toward the end of my time at Good Shepherd School, Father Powers got that job, as he got everything in any way associated with kids.
Being a priest was a thought, but even when I’d set cowboying aside there were other choices competing. I could write. I could write plays, or stories. I could be an attorney, maybe a politician. I could be a detective. I could be any number of things I’d not yet even heard of. There was no rush. The idea would now and again come forward, sometimes in contrast to teachers in high school, teachers who were bad enough to require replacement by someone nice, kind, capable. I didn’t think that should be me, but I was open to the possibility – at least to the point where I didn’t dismiss it. After all, everyone had to be something, and it really should be something
****
It was there too in college, where I thought I could teach these classes. That would be an important job, a reasonable contribution to the world. There was at Manhattan no need to be a priest or brother to be on the staff. There were of course a number of priests, and brothers too. It was a brothers’ school, after all.
One of the priests was Father Borzaga, whose accent spoke of Germany, and it was not yet twenty years years since the war’s end. It made us wonder had he been in it. Had people we knew been shooting at him? And had he shot back? He was nice, and tried answering the many questions students could offer, even though many of those questions were silly, or would have been had they not been important to the fellow asking. In the end he might have no answer, though he assured us there was one. It might be in the book no one read, the one on the bottom of the pile over in that obscure library, the one only open a day or two each week. Somehow that was a reasonable reply. It meant we didn’t have to know. We could instead believe in either the book or Father Borzaga, or both.
I was not doing well in college. I didn’t belong there, not then. Maybe later would have been better. Maybe later I would have a clue what there was to learn, and to wonder was it what I wanted to know. On the feast day of John Baptist de laSalle, founder of the order of Christian Brothers, the college was closed. Together with my friend, and no better scholar, Jake Mahoney, I went down to the draft board to tell them they could call us any time after the first of June. They didn’t call. Instead, they sent a letter and taped to it a subway token. We were invited to come by on the 25th.
I recall before heading off to save the nation from the communist menace talking to Bob, and saying I thought when I came back I might go to seminary, to be a priest. I may have been surprised to hear me say so, but it sounded right. When we finished basic training I went to Oklahoma, to the Artillery and Missile School. After work, I coached at the parochial high school and junior high, though I knew little enough about basketball and less about herding a bunch of boys. My colleague, John Degnan, knew; but John was only in the army for six months and he had only four or five left. We’d taken on the job because we’d as usual been broke and so turned up at a free breakfast at the Catholic Church. There Father Allen told us he’d hire us, though he couldn’t pay us. It seemed a good arrangement.
Father Allen was nice, and a good administrator. He was transferred after a time and replaced by someone whose name I can’t recall. He was a younger man, nice too, but not wild about basketball. We’d every so often go to dinner, pizza being the best we ever thought to look for. I mentioned the thought of seminary, and he asked would I ever think to come to Oklahoma instead of going back to New York. If I thought of it at all, it was only for a moment.
I had a friend from Manhattan College, Chris Daly, who was entering the seminary in New York, having spent a year learning the rudiments of Latin at Saint Philip Neri School, in Boston. I wrote to Chris who sent back a few Latin tests, and the suggestion we meet when next I was in town. We did get together, and Chris had tales to tell, as well as suggesting I was as bereft of Latin as he had been, which might require a trip to St. Philip Neri – the school for delayed, if not retarded, vocations. He also suggested I right to Msgr. Rhe, who was then rector of the seminary. He wrote back, and like Chris, suggested we sometime get together. We did. I liked him, but by the time I got there he had left Saint Joseph’s to be a bishop in South Carolina.
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When I left the army in 1961 I was already signed up for a year of Latin and Greek at an intown branch of BC on Newbury Street. The Jesuit Missions had the street level space, shared with a small chapel. We were on the third or fourth floor. There were some old guys, a few young men, and a bunch in the middle. Some would be going to Saint Joseph’s when the year ended. I still receive a Christmas card from Joe Martin who had been an insurance salesman for the past ten years. A very nice person, a very good priest as well. Joe for a time was spiritual director at the seminary and worked in several parishes and does still, in Fishkill.
I liked Boston, and New England, which gave us a place to come back to when years later we moved here. I liked being able to walk, and to walk across much of it in a matter of hours. I liked the people I was with, and the teachers too. The director, Father Martin, was a bit odd, but kept everyone interested, wondering what he might do next. He was more spirited than Fr. Ennis and Fr. Berrigan who had been there for years and years. And, Sunday I worked at a Jesuit church in the North End. It is gone now, but was a monstrous empty building. It was staffed by those in the order who had become an embarrassment, usually through their drinking though there could have been any number of other peculiarities at work.
My job was answering the phone, though few people called; and the front door, to which hardly anyone came. Any time someone was called out to see a sick or dying parishioner a police or fireman went along, to protect them. It had for a time been a popular pastime to call, then rob them when they arrived. I doubt there was much money involved, but it may have served as sport. I was told a few had also been hurt, but not in my year among them. They were peculiar, but they were nice enough; and the real attraction was their feeding us. Sunday was a steak day, with onions; and the desserts were grand.
We lived on Beacon Street, number 418 I believe. It was the home of Mrs. Campbell, who was from my perspective more annoying than anything else, but she was company for a number of the men, and she was a presence in the house. Each Friday a member of a religious community would come to tell his story and the community’s history. At one of these events an important juncture was reached. As this priest was talking a friend, Frank Logue, leaned over and asked did I believe what he was saying. I didn’t, but I might never have realized it had Frank not asked. I realized it was OK to believe or not, as long as the belief fit my understanding.
There was also a tradition of reciting the rosary in the evening, and praying for those who might be ill or otherwise in need. One night one of the men, George Something from Chelsea, I believe, had a stroke. As he was being carried out he yelled, "Don’t pray for me, please." Our record of effecting cures with our intercessions had not been very good. Later, in seminary, Father Sullivan, the spiritual director, would tell of visiting priests who were not well. A week or so later we would hear they had died. He was an unwitting version of the grim reaper. Seeing him may have been enough for some to give up hope. Having heard he’d been to see someone there was a temptation to call and say goodbye.
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In September of 1962 I was off to seminary. My father drove me, and on the roof of the Beetle was my trunk. The seminary, in Yonkers, is a grand, stone building looking more like something from the middle ages. Tall and solid, with marble floors, high ceilings with acres of green into which church dignitaries had over the years planted trees when brought to visit by whomever had then been the archbishop of New York. People were friendly, and I already knew a few from our year together in Boston. Chris was there too, but would be gone by year’s end. He introduced me to whom he thought I should know, and a member of the faculty, Fr. Curtin, was the uncle of a friend from Inwood. We were, I think, assigned rooms alphabetically.
I was in what was called first philosophy, which equated to being a junior in college. We had two teachers of philosophy, one intent and knowledgeable, the other a dope. The dope, no matter what the course was called, provided the same classes centered on what may have been his dissertation: answering the question, "How do we know we know?" The answer was, "We know we know we know." It didn’t take two years to know that, or to teach it; and so he taught how wary we should be on anything not based in the 1400s.
Some teachers had been at it a long time. Notes for their classes were passed down and could be read along, word for word, with what they were saying as though it were an insight just realized. As years passed there would be courses in Scripture, Canon Law, Moral Theology, Sociology, Pastoral Counseling, and a few other things. The purpose of seminary was the development of scholars, which it in some instances did. Most teachers took it seriously, intent on providing what we would need to know so we could be of service to whomever we would be working with.
There was, as there is often in a closed society, division into opposing groups, with opposing views. It is not as though there are good people and bad, one side who is as right as the other is wrong. Instead it is groups of good people who disagree, but have no interest in reconciliation. It was something to do, and confirmed us in what we thought or inclined us to think along particular lines. Sometimes the focus of disagreement could be something silly, even though treated seriously. Sometimes it was important, further inclining us to take particular stands, supporting particular views, authors or approaches.
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The seminary offered a great deal, and thoughtful people. We were in some ways taught to be good at our job, if the job was centered on the rules and laws, and on being good at ritual. That was certainly a part of it. People were entitled to priests who knew what to do in areas that were exclusively theirs. They should have an understanding of how to speak, how to manage, how to engage people. But they never really did much with holiness, or so it seemed to me. People were allowed to be holy, to pray, to go beyond what was done in community, to become spiritual people, intent on awareness and humble enough to know their limitations. There were a couple of men who were holy and good. Julian Karvosky was one of them. A good, kind, capable man; and a good quarterback too. There were a couple of others too, but in a community of a couple of hundred intent on priesthood I’d thought there might be a few more.
The faculty were perhaps holy or spiritual in their own lives, but few would offer a sense of God when they addressed the community. Perhaps they were embarrassed, reluctant to be seen as holy men. An exception was Father Panella, who left me with two things that seemed very important. He was a teacher of Scripture. Sadly he was killed in a car accident. While changing a tire someone ran into him.
What he’d said was this: when God told Solomon he could have whatever he wished, Solomon asked for wisdom; and, when the prophet fled from the wrath of King Ahab, and Jezebel, his wife, he went into the desert thinking he would die; but that didn’t happen. He went into a cave for shelter, but was told to instead go outside for the Lord was passing by. There came first a strong and heavy wind, followed by an earthquake, and then fire. After the fire was a tiny whispering sound. Then Elijah went out to stand before the Lord.
There may well have been other things, but I don’t remember them as readily as I remember that God is not in the noise and fury, but in the gentle breeze; and, that all we might possess is of passing value when compared to wisdom.
****
It was the time of the Vatican Council. Pope John XXIII had called upon the church to open the windows, to let new and vitalizing air sweep through. We could look at everything, keeping what was beneficial, letting others things settle into history. He was a man of faith and so never worried what the outcome might be. We could look at and question the purpose of what was, asking what else might there be. He asked too, what do we believe; what should be our relationships with other beliefs; what might we share. It was a hopeful time. Pope John had been elected because they couldn’t decide on anyone else, and he was old. They would have time consider who might follow him, and do so soon because he was old and wouldn’t last long. I suppose the cardinals had thought he become a nursing home pope, sitting quietly, watching soap operas and planning his funeral. I recall when he was elected seeing a picture of him smoking a cigarette. If he’d had a beer in the other hand I would have thought the faith in good hands.
Of course he did die, and the man following – Pope Paul VI – was a good person (he was the first to come to New York, to speak at the United Nations of peace), but a number of the cardinals and bishops were saying the Council had gone far enough, and maybe too far. It was called to a close and it seemed one by one the lights went out. The dream was ended before it had even begun. I suppose the leaders of the Church were not the men of faith John had been. The Church was not in danger of becoming other than what they’d learned or how they were used to operating. Too bad. Everyone is reluctant to risk, but once they have there is no risk at all. We, as a community, weren’t ready to do that.
Some things had changed. Latin disappeared, even as I was learning bits of it. The altar was turned to face the people rather than the wall. We were open to dialogue with others, but wary lest people think all faiths were the same. There was a declaration that the Jewish people were not at fault in the death of Jesus, and so there was no basis for the hundreds of years of persecution. Women were said to have a role in the church, but not actual equality.
It was a beginning, and for some it made little enough difference what the rules might be or what the bishops or cardinals might say. The beginning was not also to be the end. It called for change, if not on a grand scale, then in our lives and practices. Sometimes, there may be an invitation to forget what we had heard or seen, the things we had learned, the things that really could be if we would believe, and take a chance, becoming people of faith. There was a lot of discussion, and at times – as happens in all discussions of important things – people might not win, but they were unwilling to lose either.
Some thought we were bound to our history. Others thought our debt was to the future. Some thought we could combine them, but didn’t know how. Probably time would answer more questions than did people’s efforts, in which too much may have been invested.
Matters of Church -- its future, practices, interpretations of what it said or what it meant despite what it said – were significant, though concern about the Vietnam War was becoming important too, and more personal. It was not a theoretical question. People were dying, and others were killing them. It was complicated by Cardinal Spellman, the archbishop of New York, also being in charge of the chaplaincy, of having priests volunteering for service in the military. He was by that time in decline, but he was not alone in thinking loyalty to one’s country – as to one’s church -- was not to be questioned, and that what the government determined was to be followed. It had made sense to them in the second world war, and the first, and pretty much in Korea too. It should now as well.
In the midst of the conflict and disagreement a friend from our class – Brendan Walsh, now with the Catholic Worker in Baltimore -- took a year off. He spent it working with the Phil and Dan Berrigans and others, meeting the needs of people and protesting the violence of the world. When he asked to come back, he was told he couldn’t. It was like he had disappeared. People didn’t mention him, as though he had never ever been. It was crazy, of course; but it was more about the time than anything else.
The government thought it was about to lose control, that those who could not agree on something like war, a war they thought so essential, were enemies or fools. They feared the loss of even more if this could not be won. President Johnson has believed in the domino theory, that the fall of one nation would lead to the fall of others; and soon there would be no freedom, no democracy. Communism would have won. In some ways the church was feeling the same way. It was wondering what would happen if they let people become their own authorities on what was instead doctrine, long settled and never challenged.
When people and organizations feel threatened they may become even stricter. They may develop tests of loyalty. They may close the windows, pull in the draw bridge, boil the oil to dump on the invaders – whoever they might be. In government, there were enough people joining the dissent or withdrawing their support of the war, and of President Johnson. In the Church no one asked where anyone stood, even if they knew. There was a shift implying things that could be managed without undue discussion. Doing the work, no matter how it was defined, became important. Work could be managed. At seminary, classes went on. Any controversial question raised was acknowledged, but no attempt to answer it was needed – in part because none was available.
Other things were done as they had always been done. There were games, which in a closed world take on importance: softball, football, ping pong, handball, the twice yearly tournaments with Maryknoll (a missionary order whose seminary a little farther upstate), tournaments too based on the high schools people had gone to. We studied, read, watched the news, watched the Giants on Sundays. Time passed. On June 1st, 1968 we were ordained. Time to go to work.
****
For the summer before ordination and during the one after I, along with a good number of others, was in Puerto Rico at language school. It was where I met Brother Albert, Mike Higgins, Gene Connolly (if you remember a fellow with a scraggly beard who turned up one day whey you were around ten, that was Gene – who by then was in Paraguay, at a church sponsored by the Brooklyn diocese). There were as well priests and brothers from New York, and from Chicago, Delaware and other places too. There were religious sisters, and people in social work wanting to learn the language. Some were better at it than others. Al, Gene and another fellow from Brooklyn were in what became known as the Helen Keller group, which was no compliment to Ms. Keller. We had classes outdoors, in groups of three or four, under the canepas trees. The teachers were young men and women, high school or college students, some of whom spoke English, others who didn’t. We were at a center in downtown Ponce, and lived at the Catholic University.
On weekends we would go out to parishes on the island, to practice the language and to learn what we could of the culture. It was a wonderful time, among wonderful people. The first year was the time of the Plebiscite – people were voting to determine whether they wanted to be related to the United States or to become an independent country – which made it easy to start discussions. We needed only to ask what people thought of the question. Of course, some of them wanted instead to practice English. We could say we spoke no English, that we were Greek, but it would only make them laugh.
We went everywhere, though rural places were best. It was where real people lived. I recall Mass on a Saturday evening in a coffee plant, where during the week people sat grading the beans. Mike Higgins, who you may have met but might not remember, was, as I recall, holding the chalice out to the people, smiling at them and probably too at God. I thought this is how prayer should be. It should be with a smile, an invitation, delight in being just where we were. It has remained a fond memory of a time of wonder and peace, in the presence of God, in the actions and heart of Mike Higgins.
At the end of the language study program we would go to parishes for several weeks, unless we were needed back in the New York, or wherever else we’d come from. Both summers I went to Jayuya, the first year with Gene and a group of sisters from Brooklyn and Pennsylvania. Gene and I lived with a family out in one of the country. They were a young husband and wife, a child and a grandmother, with a man living under the house who was related to none of them, but needed a place to be. The husband worked for Don Q or Bacardi, selling rum.
We were rarely home, coming back in the evening to spend a bit of time with them and to sleep, both of us in the same bed under a net that collected any number of big and little insects, some of which were surely unique.
The pastor, known as Jayuya Joe, was from Germany and less well liked than was his assistant, Vic Masterlitz, a fellow from Connecticut who had been a dance instructor at the Arthur Murray studio somewhere in his earlier life. There was another priest too, but I saw little of him. Joe was, according to legend, cursed by a native woman, perhaps a witch or maybe just someone who didn’t like him. To retaliate he dressed up in his vestments, took a bucket of holy water, and a censor raising clouds of incense smoke, and he both yelled and sang, in Latin, what must have looked like an even more severe curse – though what he was saying could as readily have been "Take Me Out To The Ballgame."
On my second summer in town I met David Hixon. One Sunday, leaving what had been used as a Church or maybe it was in fact a chapel, I found a note tucked under the windshield wiper. It said if I had time I would be welcome at his home, that I should just ask for the American with the swimming pool. I did and was greeted by a gracious gentleman, who some years earlier had set aside his past, and gone to live in a small town in the middle of an island few from elsewhere then visited. His neighbors may have wondered who he was, but they were good enough not to ask, and there he read, thought, swam, and tended his gardens with the assistance of a young man, Santos, who would work for him for many years, and when David died would inherit all he had possessed. When I returned to New York I would write to David every so often, at times just to know what I thought and to learn what thoughts had someone who needn’t reply without having considered the matter for a while. He visited a couple of times too. He was a good friend, mysterious though he might also have been.
In Puerto Rico what on the mainland might have seemed barriers no longer intruded. Men and women, religious and those not in religious life, young people and those few who were older, mingled readily. They had in common their interest in the people, and in working with them. They also had faith, and most could agree on what it proclaimed and where it might lead. It was a wonderful, freeing time, that would translate to future relationships once back in New York, Chicago or Pennsylvania. The barriers, if ever they had significance, no longer had meaning. We were one people. There was no need to fear or to establish differences. Better to set them aside.
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In September I returned to New York, and was assigned to Saint Catherine of Genoa Church, on West 153rd Street. There were three other priests already there, and one delighted to see me coming so he could go. The pastor, whose name was Jim – though his last name I’ve forgotten – was old and had been there for years. He was by no means evil, but he was wary of most things. He resented change, taking some of it personally. He resented the arrival of Spanish-speaking people, and he may too have resented the presence of black people, who had been there long before he had come along. He was advertised as someone hard to get along with, but he wasn’t so bad. He wasn’t good, but he didn’t intrude. He spent part of each day reading the Wall Street Journal from the day before, and sometimes making investments on the basis of what he had read. How well the system worked I never knew.
There was also Dominic Kuo, a priest from the Philippines studying then at Fordham University. Dominic was a very good, polite, interesting person. I last saw him at the celebration of Sr. Elizabeth’s 50th year in religious life. He left ministry a year of so before we did, managing a half way home, going into the import business, marrying and have a son, Dennis, who was Sr. Elizabeth’s godchild and would become a physician. As a colleague Dominic was pleasant even in the company of those who weren’t. I’m not sure I knew what he’d been studying, but it gave him a place to be and a focus for his life. Dominic was from China, but when the Communist revolution began he, and the other students, went to the Philippines for what everyone seemed to think would be just a few months, a year at most. He didn’t return for many years.
The other priest, whose name was John (there is probably a reason why I remember some names and not others, but I don’t need to know what it might be). As a young man he had transferred to Maryknoll wanting to be a missionary, and off he went to China. To have done so I thought must have called for a good deal of dedication and willingness to endure a measure of difficulty. I assume when the revolution began, he was no longer welcome and then had come back to New York. When I met him, John would be off most days to the Downtown Athletic Club to play handball, and to drink. He drank vodka (which he assumed had no scent that would suggest he might have been drinking) everyday, which made him all the more talkative, though unfortunately he had nothing to say. He complained a lot, about everything. He would wrap empty bottles in newspaper, and put them in paper bags, slipping them into the trash late at night, though one would have to have been deaf not to hear the bottles bumping against one another. I wondered what became of the dedication that had sent him around the word to share his belief, but there was by them little evidence of it. Religious life offered examples of who we might become and too who we should be on guard against becoming.
It was a time when nothing was expected other than Mass, sacraments, availability in the event of a crisis and doing no harm. It was easily accomplished. In the diocese the reported rule was: don’t wear white socks in the cathedral, and don’t embarrass the cardinal. I don’t know if that was accurate, but the local rules, while silly, left a lot of room to develop other things, other programs and other interests, including going back to school, which I did with the encouragement of a dear friend, Peter Ensenat. Peter was a year ahead of me in seminary. He was in a parish in the South Bronx, to which Bill Marold and I went weekly to teach the people about the scriptures and other such things. People came, largely to be polite and so Peter would have company. What we were learning was both archaic and outlandish in the view of most. It had only limited application to the daily lives of most; but it was good to be out and about among real people. Peter, because he one of very few native-speaking priests of Puerto Rican ancestry, was also in nominal charge of the Spanish instruction programs and the summer program in Ponce.
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There were in the parish two essential people: Sr. Elizabeth and Louis Fontanez. In large measure I could be successful as a priest if I did nothing more than heed their suggestions and support their endeavors. They really did know what was best, and had known it for a very long time. Sr. Elizabeth had been a teacher of developmentally delayed children, but at some time thought there was more to be accomplished and shared in the community – the religious community as well as the local community. She was then (and still is) visiting people, bringing them bread and milk, finding out what they needed, wanted, were able to share. Years later, during a course at St. John’s, I had to administer tests to learn the procedure, and so called upon the children of the parish to be subjects. One of the question was: where does milk come from? The answer, not surprisingly, was: from Sr. Elizabeth).
She was ahead of her time, and ours as well. She organized things, including street festivities, summer activities, adult education programs, trips – everything, though none of it was labeled a religious activity, except in its being just what the Gospel had said we should do. She was an inspiration to others in her community, and a beacon for some who would follow in her footsteps, not bringing people to church, but church to the people. She recognized we were guests in these places, that we were received by the folks for whom this place was home, and if we did give things, and if we addressed some needs, we always received more in return.
Louis lived in the far Bronx, nearly at the Throggs Neck Bridge. One day two men of the parish asked would I like to meet him. Sure, I’d meet anyone. They knew him from the Cursillista Movement, a program in which people would spend a weekend learning the essentials of their faith, and how to pray together, meeting weekly to review their lives, and to be available to one another in pursuit of religious practice and lives that would be favorable examples for others. It was small groups, each a presence in their local churches and united could be a very influential group, supporting one another and powerful in their belief.
Louis wanted a parish in which he could model the Christian life, where Spanish people could feel at home and welcome. He was, and hopefully still is, a delightful person. In his other life he was an elementary school teacher. But, in his life with us he was an apostle. He had a great deal of knowledge, and we shared an understanding of what was essential. We were as intent on replacing the old ways, which in some Spanish communities was more on the magic side, and offered a god most would do as well not knowing. Suffering was a popular aspect. Luis had no qualms about saying no. No, that is not what Jesus meant when he said that; no, it is not helpful to get too caught up in penance; no, we don’t need a choir since everyone should sing; no, we don’t need to ask what is called for since it is there in the beatitudes. No one ever disagreed, and everyone was happier, holier at peace with one another. And, we did make the Spanish community central to all things in the parish. It included going to the homes of desperate people to clean them, joyously carrying out years of trash; going out on ‘big garbage night,’ when people were throwing away large items, and sometimes appliances – we would go to better neighborhoods, since it was there people threw things away; having celebrations, open to all; responding to the needs of everyone, as they identified those needs and the response they sought. I recall a young woman asking that people come to pray the rosary for her child who was quite ill, since she knew it would restore him; and it did.
As Elizabeth was the heart of the neighborhood, Louis was the soul of the Spanish congregation. Very good people, kind and caring. Without the two of them, I haven’t a clue what I would have done. With them, life was a joy.
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There were others. At Esperanza, John Mercier’s church, there was a community intended for the Spanish community, being part of the Spanish museum. There were there several priests, each unique. Preceding John had been Bill Dubois, a wonderful and thoughtful man (who sadly died shortly after coming to the parish), opening it to its surroundings, reaching out to know and to share. John followed him, and was another grand addition to the community, and to all he opened the doors at Esperanza, its church and common room where we could meet and where it was always Christmas, the tree never having been taken down.
At the Episcopal Church, there were some capable and welcoming priests, Jay Gordon being as much on the street as in the church, organizing activities for kids and having a role to play in the never-ending basketball tournament that ran well into the night. There was also, Joe Moore, the verger and superintendent of the cemetery, a good and interesting man, always welcoming. Joe and his family lived in the cemetery, and in their back yard we would hold our wedding reception.
I parked my car in the cemetery, to avoid its being stolen as the first one was, as well as the alternate side of the street program permitting the Sanitation Department to clean the streets. Often enough Joe would ask me in for a drink, or I would just knock. Joe had a head start, having begun around supper time. I didn’t try catching up, but on occasion he would be talking to the fireplace and I to the door, sharing profound thoughts on the world, the church, the neighborhood.
Friends, such as Peter, Brother Albert, Mike Higgins, were influential, supportive and open to whatever I might need. So too were others. Phil Treanor was in my class at seminary, an artistic and sensitive person, he was assigned to a parish on the East Side, around 116th Street. Drugs were a problem, as was violence, and all that haunts the poor. It response he conducted marches enabling people to take back, even for a moment, their street; and processions stopping at those places where drugs were sold that he might exorcise them, praying aloud against the harm done and the for the well being of all. Phil was part too of a group of priests gathering regularly to support one another. We met weekly, and Bob Fox’s residence was a common site.
We would talk of what we had seen, what was right, what worked. We talked too of how we could get around what was more a hindrance, and of what we believed. We spoke of church as it might be, and treated it as thought that had already been accomplished – as long as it could live in the hearts and minds of those who believed. People might think it rebellious, that we were defiant or contrary, outside the boundaries that defined the Church and its mission. It wasn’t so, but sometimes people are more at ease with what is familiar, even though it may be no more than familiar.
It’s not as though priesthood was a fatal condition. Maybe they were just used up more quickly. Each was an inspiration and a wonderful friend.
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Church years, like summers on the street, or visits to the homes of those we love and respect, never end. They remain in our memory and awareness; they define us still. And, no one stops being a priest. It was never a job, but was instead of our essence. It was who we were rather than what we did, and is still. I have offered Mass only three times since setting it aside – the first Christmas I was out, and when you and James were born, that God and all creation might be aware and welcoming of you. Yet, I could do it again had I something more and as grand to make known. The events, the times, the people with whom it was shared visit me now and again, as recollection and sometimes as though it were happening still.
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