Me and the Church   622 wds                 

          John Culp was the other orderly taking care of Monsignor Hauptman. We worked together on the second, ‘medical’ floor with the old people. John’s mother worked on the surgical floor, #3, and my mother was an obstetrics nurse on the 4th. Monsignor Hauptman was a permanent resident of this hospital run by the Catholic Church. When he came to the parish in 1932, young and fred up, and he eventually took charge of the parish and high school i graduated from sixty years later.  Many thought he was obsessively strict in the confessional in digging for details; how many times you lied, what lies you told, how many times you committed adultery, (per day, father?), with whom and where? At the time i lied to everyone and had only committed adultery alone, if that’s real adultery. I lied to Monsignor Hauptman when i told him i did it with all the wealthy babes in town, particularly the daughters of prominent Catholics. He challenged me and i heard him kicking around inside his booth when i named the daughter of a wealthy, personal friend of his. His voice was so severe, i’m sure people in the pews heard him. I saw his shadow moving as he tried to eyeball me through the confessional screen. I don’t believe it, he said, i don’t believe you, boy. Well, that’s what she said her name was, i said. He told me the worst punishment is for lying in the House of God, thereby losing God’s grace.

     I felt bad. I told him i was sorry, i was sure the girl could not be the daughter of that good man; she was so shabby and crude and asked for so little money. This must have comforted him. He grew quiet. I did feel bad about lying in the House of God and didn’t do it again. 

I felt sorry for him, this lone fanatic. The line outside his confessional booth was always short because confessing to him took so long and he assigned so many prayers in penance. We preferred the younger, less curious priests who imposed less penance.  

Monsignor Hauptman spoke Latin; his missal was in this ancient tongue, the taproot of so many modern languages. I envied him having this knowledge. He could go all the way back to the time of the Romans, lions and Christians, gladiators and the brass bull, all these were available to him. The brass bull was my favorite, a particularly cruel form of execution. You bet it made the early Christians pray and kept the Roman horde in line. A huge, hollow brass bull was rolled into the center of the Circus Maximus, the naked, quivering victim huddled inside. A fire was kindled under the belly of the bull and the man or woman inside slowly roasted. The horns of the bull were inverted, forming megaphones stuck in the sides of the bull’s head. This made it all so entertaining as the horns trumpeted the victim’s death agony into the sunny air. I would hate to have to clean out that bull when it was all over. That would be the real pain.

In his last years old Monsignor Hauptman had a room at the end of the hall. John Culp and i had to clean him up when he defecated in his bed. We worked together to equally share the work load. The old man would moan and say he was sorry over and over as we cleaned him up. Once we had him down the hall in a small bathroom where patients could take a shower sitting down. There was a chair in the shower stall. The old guy loved taking a shower there.  One day we prepared to help him dress after his shower and, clean and dry now, he stood naked and lost control of his bladder and peed all over his clean clothes piled on a bench. He couldn’t stop himself and i wasn’t going to reach over and clamp him off, so John and i watched him empty himself on his clothing. He was so ashamed his face contorted and he started to cry.  There before him on the bench were his clean clothes and he had soaked them. His expression was so shocked and pitiful, i almost laughed. I was glad he had only urinated. 

“I’m sorry,” he said, “I’m sorry.”  The humiliation in his voice and eyes was complete.

“That’s okay, father,” i told him, “I forgive you.” 

     I paused to think about what i had said and feel the strange, unfamiliar power in my words. I made a sign of the cross, up down and thumb up on the horizontal stroke i swiftly jerked it aside as if “dude, you are out of here” and smiled. Again i said, “I forgive you father. In the name of the father, the son and the holy spirit, i forgive you.” And i did forgive him. It was my job to keep him clean and clean up after him and i had no reason to get upset about it.  I really did feel sorry for him. Monsignor Hauptman made no reply, John Culp said nothing. Pure astonishment shone on his face. I think John Culp was very devoted to the church and afterwards was aloof with me. 

Over the following weeks i told this story to my friends at school, but i don’t think any of them understood what it meant to me.  

End of “Me and the church.”