These Thy Gifts (eBook)

CHAPTER ONE

2006
THE BEGINNING OF THE END

Years of celibacy had caused Monsignor Steven Trimboli, the new pastor of Queen of Peace, to get a grip on his physical impulses, allowing his intellect to flow freely. Perhaps that’s what they meant in the seminary about controlling the energy of the flesh in order to expand the mind. Approaching his seventieth year, he refused to accept that facile explanation as an epiphany. The unused energy of his flesh had become the fuel propelling his mind to create doubts and questions. These were more of a danger and distraction to the body of the church than an epidemic of onanism among priests and parishioners combined could ever be.

His dominant question was also his dominant doubt. That was not the best example of an Aristotelian or Thomistic thesis, but it was all he had and it pecked away at his thoughts.

In the era of child-abusing priests, he wondered, could a priest or parishioner consider himself both an intelligent and a practicing Catholic? The first time he was exposed to the concept he scoffed, because it emanated from one of the typical array of talking heads perched on some cable news show. One guest, a woman who was prearranged to be the obligatory “defender of Catholicism”—thereby making the debate both fair and balanced—averred that she was both “intelligent and a practicing Catholic.” At the time it meant little to him. It was just another example of rationalized babble which spread across the small screen like a plague of locusts devouring and obscuring more fertile discourse.

Later that evening he nursed a brandy and smoked a cigar. They were gifts he’d received from parishioners when he was “promoted” to monsignor and given his new assignment to Queen of Peace. Amidst the comforting blue haze, the woman’s words buzzed through his head again: I’m intelligent and a practicing Catholic.

“Holy shit!” he said before the self-censor could react. “What a pile of baloney!”

Were they compatible concepts, intelligence and piety? Were they mutually exclusive? What mattered to him was that distortions and aberrations could not be tolerated on an intellectual level. Nor could they be purified, absolved, or excused by the practice of any faith, whatever the faith or rationalization or mysteries couched as faith.

The scandal of child abuse, he was convinced to the marrow of his bones, if not his soul, was the result of a continuous practice by the institution in which he’d devoted his entire life. It had been ignored yet tolerated, albeit with a wink and a nod. For a moment he wasn’t sure if he meant child abuse or his clerical career. To be sure, he could recall in that moment the many times he felt higher-ups had ignored and patronized him.

Morning brought a surge of adrenalin which he defused by rearranging his bookshelf for the fourth time in twenty minutes. He understood the jolt of energy was not from nerves or fear. It was the excitement a boxer might experience before entering the ring.

The doorbell rang. Let’s get it on, the internal electricity said.

Now he was in the thick of it almost one year after being rewarded with his own parish. He’d been an official, card-carrying priest for more than five decades, and now, as he neared retirement or death, the hierarchy of the diocese decided he was worthy of elevation to a higher rank—from private to corporal. Oh, but he must not commit the sin of pride. Questioning those who were raised up to superior positions before and over him must be accepted as God’s will. Of that he’d had years of training by word and example, particularly when an example was made of him in the early years of his priesthood.

Still, he now had a new parish in an old, but fiercely well-maintained Brooklyn neighborhood. He hoped for a few years of tranquility so that he might retire or die from the parish, one of many in which he’d served. That was before the scandal. The doorbell rang again, disrupting his musings.

Escorting the TV reporter and his two-person crew—camerawoman and soundman—down the corridor to his office, he paid scant attention to the pictures of previous pastors that lined the walls. Only one, that of the so-called pastor emeritus Monsignor Barillo, recently deceased, held his gaze for mere seconds.

He pointed out the framed photo of his longtime, corpulent nemesis. “Our late-lamented Monsignor Barillo,” he said to the young reporter who nodded without interest. Dead at long last, he wanted to add but felt it might convey the wrong impression.

Trimboli sat behind his desk to not hinder the crew setting up the camera tripod and fill lights. They checked light and sound levels while the reporter quickly leafed through his notebook.

In the last few days, he’d often asked himself if he had a choice. He was not trying to wriggle off the hook, but only reaffirming his actions, taking his moral temperature, consulting his moral compass, and all the other clichés which satisfied his conscience. At every turn he knew and was deeply convinced he’d made the only choice.

“Excuse me, Father,” the young TV reporter intruded.

“Monsignor.”

“I’m sorry.”

Trimboli was sorry too. He didn’t like to embarrass anyone. But he didn’t want this young kid to get his title wrong and be considered a sloppy, incompetent reporter.

“Just for accuracy’s sake. I’m not into titles. Understand?”

“Sure, sure. My mistake. No problem.”

The kid fell all over himself, and Trimboli knew he was probably a non-Catholic trying to show reverence and respect to the representative of a mysterious and unfathomable religion.

“We’re ready for you now,” the reporter said.

Trimboli looked into the glare of lights and blinked to adjust his vision.

“Do you want me to look in any particular direction?” he asked, hoping the answer would let him know which side of his profile was most photogenic. He suppressed the burp of a laugh and replaced it with an enigmatic smile. Admitting to such a small degree of vanity would never register on his personal sin-o-meter.

“Straight ahead is fine.”

“We’ve got speed,” the camerawoman told the reporter. “Five, four, three, two, one. . ..”

Trimboli watched as her countdown ended, and she wagged one finger in front of the camera to cue the reporter. A red light on the camera drew Trimboli’s focus before he heard the reporter.

“Monsignor Trimboli, many demonstrators are protesting on the sidewalks in front of your church, Queen of Peace, and at your office here in the rectory as we speak. Can you tell me and our viewers why they are demonstrating?”

“From what I can conclude, they seem to be upset that a former priest in this parish has been removed from his pastoral duties,” Trimboli replied without a hint of subtext.

“You are referring to Father Dan Schaefer?”

Trimboli nodded, not wanting the name to pass his lips. The reporter persisted. “Exactly what does that mean?”

“It means he no longer has any duties in this parish and cannot function as a priest—saying Mass, giving the sacraments—until the charges brought against him, very serious charges, I might add, have been settled.”

“Is it correct that you brought those charges to officials in the diocese?” the reporter asked.

His tone continues to slide over to the deferential side of the scale, Trimboli thought.

“I did.”

The reporter struggled to frame his next question, mindful that the camera was running. Only Trimboli’s motionless face was being recorded on tape. Moisture started to form under the last follicle on the nape of the reporter’s neck. If he focused hard enough he could actually feel the formation of the first bead of sweat—flop sweat, the more experienced reporters called it—just before it began its journey along the ridges of his spine to the bottom of his coccyx where it would drop into his Fruit of the Looms. At last he found a direct but inoffensive approach.

“What caused you to take that action?”

“Improprieties.”

“Which were. . .?” The reporter snapped off the return question. He’d regained his composure and was now in command.

Now Trimboli felt moisture on the nape of his neck. A fifty-year-old memory returned as he recalled the nervous perspiration he’d felt when Rosalie picked him up at the train station. Best not to linger on that memory and all it would regurgitate. His forefinger circling under his white clerical collar caused his focus to change. This was not a delicate age, he thought. No reason to equivocate.

“Last Sunday, that priest celebrated the last Mass of the day. It started at twelve fifteen, and whoever says that Mass usually returns for Sunday dinner by two. When he had not returned by two thirty, I could no longer resist the stares of Bridie. . . her name is Bridget, but we call her Bridie with affection. She’s our cook and housekeeper. Bridie was convinced he was either dead or had vanished in a UFO. Worst of all, she was concerned the delay had turned her pot roast into a coagulated glob of—”

“Yes, but—”

The reporter was aware of the time and needed to get a sound bite back to the station for their Live-At-Noon news broadcast. Trimboli put up his hand to stop the reporter; it was...