Father Dowling was off on his monthly day of recollection and Marie Murkin, a bandanna around her head and wearing an ankle-length apron, was giving the rectory a thorough cleaning. Each time she passed the closed door of the pastor's study, she fought the temptation to ignore the fact that it was the one room in the house on which she could not unleash her energy. Finally she opened the door and looked in, frowning at the stacks of books on each side of Father Dowling's reading chair, the chaos on the desktop, the aroma of pipe smoke. That, at least, she could do something about. She marched across the room and pulled up the window, letting in the humid August air. When she turned on the air conditioner in the other window, she noticed Edna Hospers hurrying along the walk from the school where the seniors of the parish whiled away their day.
What on earth was Edna's hurry? Clearly she was headed for the rectory, and Marie felt a surge of the old undeclared war between them, the rectory housekeeper and the director of the senior center. Edna had a rolled-up newspaper in her hand, carrying it like a weapon. With some trepidation, Marie went to the front door.
“Have you seen this?” Edna demanded when Marie opened the door and got out of the way. Edna had the look of a woman not to be denied.
“We'll have tea,” Marie said, snatching off the bandanna and freeing herself of her cleaning apron.
“They're going to close St. Hilary's! They're going to tear down the church, the rectory, everything.”
“What on earth are you talking about?” Marie asked, following Edna into the kitchen.
Edna slapped the newspaper onto the kitchen table and stood staring at Marie, angry tears in her eyes.
“Nonsense!”
“Read it.”
“I'll put on the water.”
While she did, Edna began reading the story to her. Belatedly, Marie felt the force of Edna's message. She stood at the sink with water spilling over the top of the kettle, mouth open in disbelief. The information was attributed to “reliable sources,” and the story concerned the archdiocese's need to close half a dozen parishes that had been isolated by demographic changes. There, undeniably, the third on the list, was St. Hilary's of Fox River.
“Where is Father Dowling, Marie?”
“This is his monthly day of recollection.”
“Get hold of him!”
“Interrupt his only day off in the month. Edna, he's saying his prayers.”
“He'd better be or else he may have lots of days off soon.”
Marie went back to the sink, lowered the level of water in the kettle, and put it on the stove. Later she would remember that her first concern had been herself. She had been housekeeper here before Father Dowling came, a survivor of years under Franciscans
she preferred not to think about. The rectory was as much her home as Father Dowling's, maybe more. The thought that she might be turned into the street after her years of service filled her with dread, and then anger. “Over my dead body, Edna.”
“What good will that do?”
“Get out the cups, will you? I have some cherry pie.”
“Cherry pie! Marie, this is the end of the world and you're talking of cherry pie.”
“I wonder if I
should
call Father.”
“Of course you should. They can't do this to him.”
Father Dowling was spending the day at Mundelein, where he had been a seminarian and which was peaceful and empty before the resumption of classes. He had been assigned the bishop's room for the day, and the chapel would be all his. Marie remembered the look with which Father Dowling had gone off, several books under his arm, his breviary in his hand. She had asked him if he had his pipe and tobacco.
“Not today, Marie.”
That was all, no explanation, but Marie hadn't needed one. Honestly, she didn't know what she would do if he didn't smoke. He ate like a bird, he didn't drink, he didn't golf or pal around with clerical friends. The man was an anchorite. Thank God for Phil Keegan's frequent visits.
The problem was that she had no telephone number for his room at the seminary. When had she ever had to interrupt his day of recollection? She explained this to Edna. They were at the table now, the tea settling in the pot, slices of cherry pie before them. Edna ate half of hers before she pushed it away. “How can I eat cherry pie?”
“You were doing pretty well.”
“I don't know what I'm doing.”
It helped to have Edna acting outwardly as Marie felt within.
Still, she wasn't used to being the calm and rational one in a crisisâand this was a crisis. Marie turned the paper toward her, started to read the story, then pushed it away. She would rather eat cherry pie. In her nervousness, Edna assumed the role of hostess and poured out the tea.
“Lemon?” Marie asked.
“Nothing. I'll drink it straight.” She made it sound like liquor.
“Edna, I can't read that story to him over the phone. I can't just tell him that they're going to close the parish.”
“Well, have someone else do it.”
“Would you want to?”
Edna assumed a look of dread. “No!”
Phil Keegan? He was possible, but Marie didn't like the thought of Phil Keegan running interference for her with the pastor. Then the phone rang, and the problem was solved.
“Marie,” Amos Cadbury said. “Is he there?”
Marie could have cheered in relief. Amos Cadbury, of course. He was the perfect one to bring the bad news to Father Dowling.
“He won't be back until suppertime, Mr. Cadbury.”
“You've seen this story in the
Tribune
?”
“Yes.”
“What time is supper, Marie?”
“Can you come?”
“Marie, I couldn't stay away.”
The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius were not designed for a one-day retreat, but, for all that, Father Dowling found the little book written by the founder of the Society of Jesus a good companion as he spent hours in the chapel and other hours reading in his room. The campus was all but deserted, and on his walk from room to chapel and back again he was assailed by sweet memories of student days. Nevertheless, it was all the days between then and now that formed the subject of his meditations. What had the young man he was at the time of ordination thought the future held for him? In retrospect, he seemed to himself a somewhat shallow man, caught up in an unformulated dream of clerical advancement. He had been sent on to graduate school to get his degree in canon law. He had returned to Chicago and an appointment on the marriage court. That experience had been his personal undoing in one sense and the making of him in a more profound sense. Dispirited by those who came petitioning to have their marriages dissolved, annulled, declared never really to have happened, and at a time when annulments were rare to the point of nonexistent, save after years of waiting, he had sought refuge in alcohol. At the time he had been spoken of as a future bishop, first an auxiliary in Chicago, then on to a diocese of his own and thenâexcelsior, who
knew how high he would rise? He had learned how low he could fall.
Looked back upon, the time he had spent in a Wisconsin haven for priests with a drinking problem had been a second seminary for him. When he emerged, he sensed the attitude of former friends. The offer of St. Hilary's in Fox River had been made almost with averted eyes. Here was the Ultima Thule of the Archdiocese of Chicago, at its far western border, being offered to the former white hope of the Chicago clergy. It was a parish that had been enclosed by roaring interstates, abandoned by most of its parishioners, all but moribundâand it was there that he had flourished. Signs of life appeared, signs appropriate to the parish. The school was no longer necessary to accommodate the children of the parish; there weren't enough children there. So he had asked Edna Hospers to turn it into a meeting place for the many seniors in the parish. It had been an unequivocal success, drawing old people from beyond the borders of St. Hilary's. The population of the parish stabilized; flight to the more congenial suburbs slowed, then stopped. Young couples began to buy the large houses at bargain rates. It was possible to imagine a new day for St. Hilary's.
It had certainly meant a new day for Roger Dowling. Freed from any remnant of clerical ambition, able to see where he was as where he was, the place where his soul would be saved by giving his all to what most of his fellow priests would have regarded as a Mickey Mouse assignment, that was the grace he had been given. So, on this day of recollection at the seminary where he had studied, his heart was full of thanksgiving. That failure should be its own kind of success seemed the essential message of Christianity.
In midafternoon, he lay on his bed for forty winks. It was a day to refresh the body as well as the soul. But he could not sleep. He lay on his back, looking at the ceiling, aware of the stir of trees at the
window and the song of birds everywhere, full of a euphoria that almost frightened him. We have here no lasting city, he reminded himself, not even Fox River, Illinois. At the time it seemed merely a pious reminder. When he got home to his rectory the thought seemed almost prophetic.
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The first surprise was the sight of Amos Cadbury's automobile in the driveway. When he pulled in beside it and looked toward the school, there seemed to be a cluster of old people watching him.
Then the front door opened and Marie Murkin, with a stricken expression, came running toward him. “Have you heard?”
“Good Lord, what is it?”
“Mr. Cadbury will tell you.” Marie burst into tears. Father Dowling took her arm and led her into the house, full of foreboding.
Amos Cadbury came out of the study, apologizing for invading the inner sanctum. “Marie insisted, Father Dowling. Besides, I wanted to smoke a cigar.”
Amos's manner calmed Marie. Edna Hospers looked out of the kitchen, her hand to her mouth, eyes wide with anxiety.
Father Dowling went into the study, and Amos followed, shutting the door behind him.
“So what is it, Amos?”
For answer, Amos handed that morning's
Chicago Tribune
to Father Dowling, indicating what he should read.
The story was by the religious editor of the paper and began with a sweeping account of the altering character of the archdiocese, changes that were characteristic of other large cities as well but especially visible in Chicago, the largest diocese in the country, some said in the world. The writer described with some unction driving from the Loop to O'Hare and seeing on either side of the interstate massive churches, only a few blocks apart. A dozen at least, maybe more. He
had not counted them. Those churches, larger than most cathedrals, were monuments to the ethnic groups that had built them, clustering around their parish plant, a little world of their own in the wider world of Chicago. A few blocks away, a similar little world, and another and another. The question the archdiocese faced was what to do with these huge churches and parish plants now that their parishioners had deserted them for the suburbs. Their schools were now open to any children in the neighborhood but could scarcely be called parochial schools anymore. They represented a significant contribution to the education of the young of the city, but who was to bear the financial burden?
The conclusion to this overture seemed obvious. It was unrealistic to imagine that such parishes would know a rebirth. The expense of keeping them up was now borne more by the archdiocese than those living within the parish confines. The financial burden was becoming too much. There would have to be a closing of some churches, a consolidation of parishes, a more justifiable use of resources. Then came a list of churches to be closed, based on “authoritative sources.”
Father Dowling looked at the name of his parish on the list.
He realized that Amos was waiting for his reaction. He sat forward and rummaged around on his desk. The day's mail was still bundled together and enclosed in a rubber band. He slipped it off and shuffled through the letters. There was no letter from the archdiocese.
“It's all speculation, Amos. I wonder who his âauthoritative sources' are.”
Amos was not a man given to expressing surpriseâhe had seen too much over a long life to find anything truly novelâbut Father Dowling had surprised him. “You don't think it's true?”
“Amos, the only authoritative sources I know would communicate
with me directly and give their names. There's no point in getting upset by a newspaper story.”
That was the line he took, and he stuck with it. Amos, Marie, Edna, and Phil Keegan, when he arrived in time to be asked to supper, fell in with him, or pretended to, but he sensed that they thought he was deluding himself. Perhaps he was. Thank God he had a day of recollection behind him when he received the news. In the end, it proved to be an almost convivial occasion. When they rose from the table and Edna and Marie went into the kitchen, the men repaired to Father Dowling's study. Cigars were lit, and the pastor's pipe. Phil Keegan mentioned that the Cubs were on, but that was that. Getting interested in a ball game would have required more pretense than Father Dowling was capable of.
After Edna left to go back to her family, Marie brought Phil a beer and handed Amos a glass of Courvoisier. The pastor was content with coffee. The great topic was forgotten when Phil brought them up to date on current crimes and murders, and both the lawyer and the priest showed professional interest. Of course, it was Phil's phlegmatic account of a woman's body that had been found hanging in a garage that particularly caught their attention.
“What a horrible thing,” Amos said.
“Horvath is on the case,” Phil said. “He and Agnes Lamb.”
When his guests rose to go, Father Dowling went with them to the door.
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“I don't think the Deveres will take the threat to the parish as philosophically as you do,” Amos said.
“I thought I was taking it theologically.”
Amos smiled a wintry smile and followed Phil down the front walk.
Father Dowling watched them drive away. Marie had gone up to her apartment, reached by a staircase in the back of the house. Father Dowling returned to the study, sat at his desk, and looked bleakly about.
Nunc dimittis servum tuum, Domine,
he murmured. For the first time he confronted the real possibility that his days as pastor of St. Hilary's could be coming to an end.