Mass, at 16

Among many dozen reflexive monotones, Ryan’s inflection fitted the words.

“May the Lord accept the sacrifice at your hands, for the praise and glory of his name, for our good and the good of all his church.”

Since he had become truly aware of the Mass, sometime in middle school, Ryan had pondered the significance of nearly all the responses. At first, he had asked questions of his Sunday school teachers. But their halting answers had not satisfied him, so he studied the words on his own.

This passage made him recognize how tenuous salvation is. The people pray in hope that God accepts their sacrifice. Were acceptance automatic, no supplication would be necessary. It stood to reason, therefore, that God did not always accept the sacrifices offered in his name. Every Sunday, Ryan realized, they all made offerings and took part in the liturgy and the Eucharist, but this guaranteed nothing in return. A true Catholic believes in grace and strives for grace, but he cannot bargain for it.

Light fell through the nearest stained glass onto the woman’s neck in front of him, shading it in gentle blue and green. He looked to the window itself, where St. Francis carried a lamb on a riverbank. A sculpted relief of Jesus collapsing under the weight of the cross hung next to the window—one of a century-old set of the Stations of the Cross which his present catechist had proclaimed the most beautiful she had ever seen. Next to the hanging stone was another window, with its fragile colors reaching a peak high above the parishioners’ heads.

The family sat in their accustomed pew in the choir loft, reached by turning left up a winding staircase with a metal pipe for a rail. The stairs were wooden and painted pale blue, presumably with lead paint. There was a hanging rope for the bell at the landing at the top. His mother played the organ, but after each hymn, would rejoin her husband and two adolescent sons nearby.

Beneath the giant crucifix at the front of the church, Father Eugene had concluded his blessing of the offerings. His clear, unamplified voice carried to the back wall with ease. “Lord be with you.”

The people muttered, “And also with you.”

“Lift up your hearts.”

“We lift them up to the Lord.”

“Let us give thanks to the Lord, Our God.”

“It is right to give him thanks and praise.”

A lengthy prayer followed before the assembly attempted the Sanctus. As a small child, Ryan would lose his concentration around this point and begin playing with Matchbox cars or whatever toy he had been permitted to bring. But often, his mother would tap him on the shoulder and whisper kindly in his ear, “Pay attention now, Ryan. He’s about to turn the bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ” The boy would redouble his efforts to remain attentive, eager to witness the mystery before him.

The organ played a preparatory note to signal the parishioners, and their varying levels of devotion melded with the choir and the deep melody flowing from the pipes.

Holy, holy, holy,

God of power and might,

Heaven and earth are full of your glory,

Hosanna in the highest.

Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord,

Hosanna in the highest.

The last chord lingered, calling God down from the rafters.

After a glance to confirm that everyone’s feet were out of the way, Ryan’s father brought down the hinged kneeler. Their bodies followed. In the front row of the church, elderly Mrs. Fairbanks still insisted on kneeling, her son holding her arm in an effort to spare her fragile joints.

No two priests say Mass in precisely the same manner, though most fall within broad categories. There are kindly uncles, and sleepy or crotchety retirees, and automatons. The squat priest who once filled in for Father Eugene after his surgery had the pitch and self-importance of an insistent child; he had been a variation of the schoolmaster type. Alone, among priests Ryan had encountered, Father Eugene proclaimed Mass rapidly but with remarkable precision and presence. During the extended prayers Mass required of a priest, he sounded like nothing so much as a horserace caller.

“Father you are holy indeed and all creation rightly gives you praise, all life all holiness comes from you through your Son Jesus Christ Our Lord by the working of the Holy Spirit, from age to age you gather a people in your name…”

The parishioners had long ago become the family of Father Eugene; his parents had died not long after bringing their young son out of Soviet Czechoslovakia. This adoptive family appreciated his delivery of the liturgy. Most enjoyed the certainty that Mass would conclude inside of an hour, and from time to time even approach the 45-minute mark. A few of the most devoted were reluctant to admit to such thinking, but even the staunchest traditionalist approved of Father Eugene’s expression. His speed accentuated his enthusiasm. His words brimmed with faith, and under his direction, the rote ritual that every Catholic in the world observed weekly became a spiritual, dramatic event. The priest’s voice rose and fell with passion.

“...we ask you to make them holy by the power of your Spirit that they may become, the body and blood of your Son our Lord Jesus Christ…”

Ryan listened with faithful hope. The stained glass and the altar and Christ and Father Eugene struck at the cold flint that the world had embedded within him. The whole of his mind focused inward, shielding the sparks and giving them breath. Make me your servant, Lord, he thought. Let me serve you. I am not worthy, but grant me grace and let me serve you and show my love…

Now, as the Eucharistic prayer turned to the events of the Last Supper, Father Eugene slowed. He sounded grave and measured. “On the night he was betrayed,” he began, “he took bread and gave you thanks and praise, he broke the bread gave it to his disciples and said—take this, all of you, and eat it. This is my body, which will be given up, for you.”

The priest raised the host in front of Christ on the cross, and the church bells tolled somberly. Ryan focused on the last note, reverberating in the still air.

Father Eugene’s voice suddenly rose again, his pace and keen edge reflecting the agony of the imminent parting. “When supper was ended he took the cup again he gave you thanks and praise gave the cup to his disciples and said— Take this, all of you, and drink it.”

The pause before Christ’s words, the lengthiest in all Father Eugene’s Eucharistic Prayer, never failed to move Ryan. The profound feeling of the sentence brought the divine to his skin; as a child, the moment had sometimes made his hairs stand on end. The prayer concluded with an expression of the promise and the solemnity of a dying Lord’s words to his friends: “This is the cup of my blood, the blood of the new and everlasting covenant. It will be shed for you and for all so that sins may be forgiven. Do this, in memory of me.”

The bells tolled again, as Ryan knew they did in churches throughout the world, uniting the family of Christ in remembrance of their savior. Father Eugene stood with his head low.

Make me worthy, Lord, Ryan thought. Forgive me.

Father Eugene intoned, “Let us proclaim the mystery of faith,” and the organ filled the church again as the people sang.

Christ has died,

Christ is risen.

Christ will come again.

The priest resumed. “Father calling to mind the death your Son endured for our salvation his glorious resurrection as ascension into heaven and ready to greet him when he comes again, we offer you in thanksgiving this holy and living sacrifice…”

Ryan could feel his brother and father kneeling next to him. His mother sat on the organ bench, her hands clasped, piously watching the priest in a mirror hung above her for that purpose. Father Eugene slowed to accord with the conclusion. “Welcome into your kingdom our departed brothers and sisters, and all who have left this world in your friendship. We hope to enjoy forever the vision of your glory, through Christ our Lord from whom all good things come.”

As he chanted, Father Eugene’s unpolished singing voice had humility if not beauty:

Through him, with him, and in him

In the unity of the Holy Spirit

All glory and honor is yours almighty Father

For ever and ever.

The people sang “Amen” three times. Father Eugene led them in the “Our Father,” and they shook hands in a sign of peace and all sang that the Lamb of God takes away the sins of the world. And just before Communion, in a line he felt sure others could say without hesitation, Ryan remembered his most private sins.

“Lord, I am not worthy to receive you, but only say the words and I shall be healed.”

Shortly thereafter, he received the Body of Christ on his tongue, and he knew that despite everything, God was with him. He believed.

***

Four years later, the child abuse scandal broke in Boston. There were weddings and funerals, and one or two painful Christmas Masses with his family. Otherwise, Ryan never set foot in a Catholic church again.