Penance
Edward Ahern
Walter Mueller waved a thick arm toward the
stained-glass windows. “We’re not going to knock those
out, Imre, even with what the heat loss will cost me.
We’re going to back-light and strobe them so they’ll
pop out at our drinkers. Sanctified eavesdroppers.
Should give the clubbers guilty pleasure staring at
them while they’re hooking up.”
Father Imre Herceg winced at the man standing next to
him in St. Emeric church. The Connecticut parish, once
full of Hungarian-Americans, was almost without
members, and unable to pay its bills. But its sale to
a man creating a singles bar seemed close to
sacrilege.
The two men made an odd pairing. Father Herceg was
gaunt and tall, with white hair, and in his black
cassock looked like a lit funerary candle. Walter
Mueller’s well-tailored gray suit struggled but failed
to mask his portly frame. They looked like the
personification of starvation dieting and binge
eating.
“I’m glad the Bishop let you handle matters, Imre,
you’ve been a lot easier to deal with than some of the
Bishop’s gofers.”
“Thanks, I guess. You paid a large amount for a
hundred-forty-year-old church in need of serious
repairs. And disregarded the false rumors about the
church being haunted. So long as what you do with the
desanctified building is legal, we will have no
objections.”
The concern in Father Herceg’s eyes was apparent.
“Don’t worry, Imre, no sinning will be done here.
Well, at least not consummated here. And the ghosts
just add to the clubbing experience. I’m going to have
the wait staff in pale makeup, like vampires.
Imre Herceg shifted topics. “The religious
items—altar, tabernacle, statues will be out by the
end of next week. You do still want the pews and
organ?”
“Hell yes. We’re going to step the pews two high along
the side and front walls. Pad the seats with
suggestive cushioning, bolt down some little bitty
cocktail tables and let ‘er rip. Figure to use the
organ as background music for the wet tee shirt
contests.”
The priest kept silent. He’d been given the failing
parish as the last gasp of a forty-year career. Imre
had wondered at his ordination if he might become a
prince of the church, bishop perhaps, or archbishop.
But between a weakness for the bottle and an
unwillingness to be unctuous, he’d remained a
journeyman priest.
After showing Mueller out through the sacristy door,
Father Herceg left the church lights on and slowly
paced down the central aisle to the rear of the
church. The winter dark made the empty church seem
dim, as if the season were fighting against the
lights. As he walked, the priest once again thought he
felt the brush contact of others, like commuters
ignoring him in their passage. Just drafts, he
reminded himself, or the misfiring senses of old age.
The Diocese had ruled that confessions must be
scheduled weekly, so St. Emeric held them every
Saturday evening from five to six, whether or not
anyone showed up to repent. As he reached the
confessional, Father Herceg extracted his breviary
from a pocket in his cassock and opened the middle
door. His flock strongly disliked sitting face to face
with their confessor, so the carved oak confessional
with kneelers and screens was still in use.
Imre picked up his silk stole from the shelf and
placed it over his head so the ends draped down to his
waist. Then he sat on the cushion he’d left on the
chair and opened the breviary. He’d already read the
daily selection, but had the strong feeling that God
liked repetition in prayer and started over.
“Páter Herceg.”
Imre started and dropped his prayer book. He hadn’t
heard anyone enter, and the confessional doors always
creaked.
The man spoke in Hungarian, his voice wavering as if
it were windblown. “Páter, I need to confess to you
before I can leave.”
Imre said his pre-confession prayer to himself. “Of
course, my son, please begin.”
“Bless me Páter, for I have sinned. It has been a
hundred twenty years since my last confession— “
“Wait, a hundred twenty years?”
“Yes, Páter.”
“I don’t recognize your voice, but you sound much too
old to be playing a prank like this. If you’re not
here for confession, please leave.”
“Páter, this is very hard for me to accomplish, so
please listen closely. My name was Halasz István, and
I was a parishioner here at St. Emeric.”
Father Herceg had leaned closer to the latticework
separating the two men, but the penitent’s side of the
confessional was very dimly lit, and all he could see
was a vague, gray shape.
“Mr. Halasz, you’re not making any sense, and if you
don’t leave, I’ll be forced to call 911.”
Halasz’ sigh sounded like a slow leak from an air
mattress. “The police could never find me. Please,
Páter, I’d rather not demonstrate. Many of us were
left here without choice after our funerals. But with
the church closing we must find a way to leave. We
hope if you confess us we can go.”
Father Herceg found his voice and took out his flip
phone. “I warned you. Not get out, before the police
come.”
He pushed the three numbers, but before he could hit
send, his hands went numb with bitter cold, the
fingers frozen in claw shapes.
“Please, Páter, we are desperate for your help. We
live here with you, and know you to be a good man,
despite your watching those cable television shows and
drinking too much vodka.
Father Herceg began shaking his hands to try and get
back feeling. The phone popped out and bounced off the
side wall of the confessional. He jumped up and
grabbed the handle of the confessional door and tried
to turn it. But the handle, like his right hand, was
frozen.
“Holy Mary, protect me,” he yelled. Imre slammed into
the confessional door twice before it splintered off
its hinges and hung sideways. As Imre ran out, the
hissing voice resumed. “You should have more faith,
Father. Now we must demonstrate.”
The priest ran awkwardly toward the front of the
church, out of breath by the time he reached the
altar. As he did so, he watched the flower-filled
vases around the altar tip over one by one, spilling
water onto the floor. The ciboriums inside the
tabernacle began rattling together, and the water in
the baptismal font began slopping over. A stray
thought broke through his panic- that the vases and
the flower stems weren’t being broken, nor was the
font. It was careful mayhem.
The telephone land line was already disconnected, and
his cell phone, if it still worked, was in the
confessional. I am, however fallibly, a minister of
God, he thought, and will stand within my
faith. If this is demonic I must face it. I will not
abandon this church while I tend to it.
Father Herceg’s hands had thawed, and he took out his
rosary and walked back down the main aisle to the
confessional. He grabbed the penitent’s door and threw
it open. The air inside seemed hazy, but there was
nothing else in it. He stepped into the center cabin
to retrieve his breviary and phone. The abused phone
was dead. As he sat in his chair, punching phone
buttons, the voice resumed.
“Páter. We are asking for a sacrament you are ordained
to give. What evil can there be?”
Imre shuddered. “Mr. Halasz, was it? If you are a
Catholic, you will know that the church’s sacraments
are for the living and not the dead.”
Am I in an alcoholic delirium?
Some aftershock from a stroke? “What you ask is impossible.”
“Our baptisms are listed in the church records. And
our other sacraments and funerals. We’re part of your
flock, Páter. I can give you our names and birthdates.”
This delirium will pass. Find a
witness who will prove this apparition false.
“Look, whoever you are, it’s a cruel, clever trick.
I’m going to the Vilmos house next door and call the
police. You’d be wise to run away before they come.”
“Vilmos is my great grandson. Please give him my
blessing.”
The priest jumped up, stepped out of the confessional,
turned around, and flung open Halasz’s confessional
door. And again, nothing was there but a faint
shimmer. He walked unsteadily out the rear door of the
church and over to the Vilmos house.
Father Herceg watched Vilmos’ shocked expression as
the priest telephoned the police. “It was a, an
attempted shakedown I guess, from a man hiding in the
confessional.”
“There’s a patrol car on the way, Father. Please stay
at the Vilmos house until it arrives.”
As the policeman was speaking Imre could hear a siren
getting louder. After the police arrived, they
searched the entire church and the rectory, found
nothing, and took Imre’s statement.
“The man wasn’t a thief,” Imre said, “but he’s
seriously disturbed.”
“And you didn’t see him when he knocked all that stuff
over?”
“No, officer. I know it sounds crazy, but I couldn’t
see anyone.
“Yeah, crazy. Well father, do you want to move out of
the rectory tonight?”
“Thank you, officer, no. You’ve searched the church,
and I’m sure he’s long gone.”
Once the patrol car had left, Vilmos insisted on
walking back into the church with Imre, and helping
him clean up the spills. As he was removing the
splintered door from the confessional, Vilmos jumped
backward.
“What is it?”
“I thought I felt something tousling my hair. Just
nerves I guess.” Vilmos’ smile was forced. “Or maybe
our famous ghosts.”
“Nincsenek kisértetek itt! There are no ghosts here.”
“As you say, father, but some of us are
superstitious.”
Imre thanked Vilmos, locked up the church, and walked
across the driveway to the rectory. Let it go, old
man. You’re not leaving this church, this church is
leaving you. You’ll probably go to a nice inner-city
parish where everyone speaks Spanish.
He poured himself three fingers of vodka, added ice,
and dropped into his recliner, the only piece of
furniture in the house that wasn’t convent-Spartan.
Imre launched a recorded episode of a mature-rated
cable show and let the vodka work its magic. He paused
the show twenty minutes later, got up and dropped
fresh ice into his glass.
How did Halasz know how much I
drank?
He started to pour, glanced around, and stopped at two
finger depth. I could get an exorcist. But no,
they’d never agree to an exorcist for a church that
will be profane in a few weeks.
***
The next morning, before mass, Imre reentered the
church and searched through all three confessional
cubicles for microphones or wires, but found nothing.
He stood outside the oak doors and spoke aloud, his
voice echoing in the empty church.
“Infernal or ghostly, if you’re here, show yourself,
and I’ll show you what an ordained priest can do with
the Roman ritual!”
It’d sounded stupid as soon as he said it, and his
bravado died away unanswered. Yeah, sure.
After mass, Imre walked back over to the rectory. The
death of a church involved about as much paperwork as
its birth. Imre got busy officially notifying present
and former parishioners of the closure, and suggesting
alternate parishes that could minister to spiritual
needs and would be grateful for donations, however
small. The work extended, with a break for a sandwich
lunch, until five that evening. It was again dark, and
Imre paced slowly back over to the church. After
letting himself in he walked to the front of the altar
and looked up at the massive Crucifix.
How many marriages, and baptisms,
and holy communions, and funerals. And this wonderful,
old, dilapidated house of God is being discarded like
yesterday’s vegetables.
“Páter,” the voice wheezed. “Páter, I’m afraid I must
insist.”
Imre jumped and spun around, looking for its source.
But the church was empty. “So, you don’t need a
confessional to speak.”
“No but dark spaces make it easier. You need to
confess us, Páter.”
“Why don’t you all show up at ten o’clock tomorrow
morning. I’ll invite the bishop.” Imre realized that
he was being sarcastic because he was afraid.
“The light disrupts us, Páter, in a painful way I
can’t describe to you. You will need to confess us in
the evening, after dark. We were not sophisticated,
and you will find our sins commonplace.”
“How many of you do you claim there are?”
“Twenty-seven, counting myself. If you use our years
alive, there’s one boy of ten, and the rest of us
range from our twenties through our eighties. Sixteen
women, ten men. We’re not evil, Páter, it would be
like confessing the Holy Name Society.”
Imre sat down in a front pew for almost ten minutes
thinking. Then, without standing, he began to speak
toward the altar.
“This is a moment when I wish I were trained in logic
like a Jesuit. I am probably delusional, in which case
what I do will be without moral consequence. And if I,
in good faith, administer the Sacrament of
Reconciliation there should be no evil, perhaps only
impropriety. But if you, my mental aberration, do not
truly repent, the sacrament is null and your sins will
remain with you. Do you understand this?”
“Yes, Páter.” The voice seemed a chorus of softly
whistling words.
Imre was silent again for a few minutes. “And these
confessions would involve penances.”
“Of course, Páter.”
“Are all these ’parishioners’ here?”
“Yes, Páter.”
“Then let’s begin. With you. It will probably take a
few hours.”
As Imre walked back to the confessional his thoughts
churned. Is what I’m about to do a sin of itself?
If they’re not released, will they haunt me instead of
my church? Just walk out the back door, priest, and
don’t come back.
But Imre knew he couldn’t desert. At the rear of the
church he entered the confessional, donned his stole,
said the usual prayer, and slid open the panel that
allowed him to hear a penitent.
“Yes, my son.”
“Forgive me, Páter, for I have sinned, it has been a
hundred and twenty years since my last confession.”
“Go on……”
Their sins, as Halasz had said, were mundane.
Carnality of course, and theft, greed and gluttony,
all the seven deadly sins were well represented. But
no murder, no acts so vile that Imre shuddered. All
had died before the advent of porn sites or shaming on
Twitter, which was refreshing. The boy, Gáspár, made
Imre heartsick. He’d died at ten of pneumonia, before
he’d had a chance to become good or evil. His
confession could have been Imre’s at the same age. The
boy did not deserve to serve penance, and Imre
absolved him with an extra blessing.
By the third confession, Imre found himself asking
their names, and where they had lived, and who among
their descendants might still live near the church. He
felt he was attending a parish reunion spanning more
than a century, and was sorry to end the last
confession a little before eleven that night.
Cretin, you’re just pandering to a
delusion in hopes it’ll dissipate. May God forgive me
for what I’ve just done.
As Imre stepped out of the confessional he thought he
felt hands gently patting his back
“Thank God for you, Páter!”
“Halasz?”
“Yes, and everyone else. Gáspár has left us. When he
came out of confession he had a smile that would melt
gold, and then, no words, he just left. You’ve given
us hope, Páter.”
“There’s more for you to do, Halasz.”
“Yes, Páter.”
***
Father Herceg handed over the church keys and moved
out of the rectory two-and-a-half weeks later, at
eight in the morning. Mueller had crews waiting to rip
out the pews and rearrange them. As he left, Imre
could hear the rusty screams of bolts yanked from
concrete.
Priests never really retire, just work part time. Imre
found himself housed in the rectory of a placid
suburban parish, Assumption, where ethnicity
had lost relevance. His new parishioners thought his
being Hungarian exactly as significant as his being a
Capricorn.
He read two months later that his old church, newly
christened as The Sacred Sinners, had opened
with a capacity crowd. Curious, Imre drove by the next
Saturday night. The large church parking lot, nearly
empty for Sunday masses, was full, and a long line of
young men and women stood outside the rear doors
waiting admittance. The emblem of the club, a heavily
made-up angel wearing a low-cut celestial robe, hung
above the doors.
Thousand one…, thousand two…, Imre thought. Patience.
Let’s wait and see.
The wait took three more weeks. As he was celebrating
a 10:30 Sunday mass, he noticed a large florid blob in
the congregation. It was Mueller, who trapped him
after mass was over.
“Father, you gotta perform an exorcism.”
“Mr. Mueller, nice to see you too. What’s this about
an exorcism?”
Mueller waved his arms, and Imre noticed sweat rings
that had seeped through the suiting. “The club, ah,
church. It’s possessed. People are afraid of it.”
“Please, Mr. Mueller, let’s just sit in this pew.”
Imre hitched up his vestments so he could sit more
comfortably and turned to listen.
“My club is ruined. People come in, they don’t even
finish their second drink, they turn all pale or
flushed and almost run out. They claim something’s
whispering in their ears, threatening them with
damnation if they sin. Word spread, nobody even comes
anymore. That damned church is costing me a fortune. I
gotta have an exorcism.”
“That’s something you should talk to the diocese
about. I’m sure the bishop would listen closely to
your complaint.”
“That son of a bitch! He told me there was no such
thing as ghosts, and that I’d bought the church as is,
problems and all. But you could do it for me. You know
the church is haunted.”
Imre nodded in apparent sympathy, but inwardly asked
God to forgive him for the almost lie he was about to
utter.
“I’m afraid I’ve never seen a ghost, inside or outside
of Saint Emeric. Maybe there’s something in the
ventilation?”
“No, no, Goddamit! I know fear, and these wanna-be
players are scared shitless.
“Language, please, Mr. Mueller. I’m not authorized to
perform an exorcism, but I could visit your club,
could even bless it if you like.”
“When, Father? I’m hurting bad.”
“Well, I’m tied up this week with masses and visits to
hospitals, but I could stop by… perhaps a week from
tomorrow?
“You’re killing me, Father. Look, I’ll pay you to come
by later today. We’ll call it a donation.”
“Oh, I’m sorry, but no, thank you. A week from
tomorrow?” Which should be enough time for you to
slow cook properly.
“Oh, hell, all right.”
***
Father Imre arrived at four in the afternoon. Even in
daylight the interior of the ex-church was garish,
with nightmarish pink and purple lighting strips
festooning the walls. A long bar with perhaps twenty
stools had replaced the altar, and shelves of liquor
bottles took the place of the tabernacle.
“It’s quite a change, Mr. Mueller, but I don’t see
anything supernatural.”
Mueller frowned. “Nah, nothing’s happened during the
day, but then there’s nobody here but the cleaning
crew. And it didn’t attack the staff. Can I get you
something? A drink?”
“A healthy Gray Goose would be nice.”
After a sip Imre continued.
“I’ve had a chance to talk to some of my parishioners
about your place, Mr. Mueller. It seems that its
reputation is terrible. I don’t know how you’ll
recover. You have my sympathies.”
“That’s not what I need, Father. If you bless this
place, will the demons go away and leave me alone?”
“I’ve never seen real proof of any ghosts, Mr.
Mueller. Any blessing is spiritually valuable, but I’m
afraid it wouldn’t be much use against something
imaginary.”
“So, what the hell am I going to do?”
“I wonder. You have several other businesses I
believe, all profitable?”
“Yeah, they’re good money makers.”
“How would it be if you were to take a tax loss on the
club by selling it off cheaply and offset the loss
against the profits from your other businesses?”
“You sons-a-bitches! You think you’re going to hustle
me? I’ll burn this place down first and claim the
insurance.”
“No, no, Mr. Mueller, you misunderstand. We don’t want
the church back. Just think for a second. Depending on
how you declare the value of the church and the costs
of improvements, you might actually make money selling
the building. I can think of several congregations
that might be interested.”
Mueller remained silent during an internal
calculation. “I don’t know how, but you’ve screwed me
Father. I’ll think about it.”
***
At Mueller’s invitation, Father Imre returned to the
church about a month later, shortly after dark, and
walked up to the bar.
“You know what I’ve done, Father?”
“Yes, Mr. Mueller, it’s been on the news.”
“I still think you and the bishop diddled me, but I
sold it like you said. I’m a little ahead of the
game. And I could move the appliances and lighting to
another church that hasn’t got any spooks. Would you
consider acting as a consultant for me, help me get
through all your holy red tape?”
Imre smiled. “Thank you, Mr. Mueller, but I can’t.
Good luck though, maybe the next church will be your
conversion.”
“Yeah. No hard feelings. I left you a little something
on the bar. Goodbye, Father.”
Mueller let himself out the sacristy door while Imre
looked out over the dance floor, trying to visualize
people kneeling in pews. When he was sure that Mueller
had left, he called out. “Mr. Halasz?”
“Yes, Páter.”
“Is everybody here?”
“Yes, Páter.”
“You’ve succeeded. The club has been shut down, and a
Pentecostal group, Joseph’s Many Colored Coat, will be
moving in. You have performed your penances well. When
you whispered in the ears of those clubbers you acted
as their consciences. I believe your penance is
fulfilled, and pray that you can move on. The lord be
with you.”
They answered with a sibilant group “And also with
you.” Halasz spoke a last time. “We’re leaving,
Father, the oldest ones first. Köszönöm!”
“You’re welcome. Goodbye, my little flock.”
Imre reflexively turned to face the absent crucifix
and noticed a bottle of Gray Goose vodka and a glass
on the bar. Just one, he thought, for missing members.
end