The Gathering (35 page)

Y
EARS ACCUMULATED.

Fathers Smith and Benson joined Father Koesler in the priesthood. Shortly after Stan Benson’s ordination, Father Ed Simpson took up his vigil, waiting for the phone call that would at long last free him from Guadalupe and send him off to one of those plush, elegant parishes so prized by climbing clerics. It didn’t have to be a suburban church. Those were more apt to be gingerbread buildings built to serve beginning families as well as the growing exodus of “white flight” from Detroit city.

Father Ed had done his part: He had delivered one medium-rare young man to ordination from about the least likely vocation producer in the archdiocese. Granted, it was a one-way contract; the diocese had promised no reward. But you’d think you could expect a modicum of recognition.

Nothing.

Father Ed was doomed to work this miserable parish until he dropped. He watched as, one by one, his elderly parishioners retired from mostly blue-collar jobs. During this era, retirement was not a consideration for priests. No one—or very few—wanted to be put on the shelf.

On the other hand, Father Mike Smith was carving out a splendid career for himself. After a brief parochial stint, he was shipped off to Rome, the fertile soil that grew bishops. He was sent back to Detroit to the chancery and an expected eventual monsignorship.

Father Stan Benson was disappointed in his early assignments. He was sent to parishes in the moneyed suburbs, first to Grosse Pointe, then to Birmingham. It was easy—too easy—to be noticed. Whenever something happened to these parishioners—and it frequently did—calls came from reporters in search of sidebars … human interest angles that could flesh out a story.

The last thing Stan wanted was to be quoted in the news. It would thwart his secret goal of mediocrity. He wanted no one even to consider his background and discover a reason he should never have been ordained. His parents—especially his mother—were so proud of their son the priest. Stan was evermore determined to do nothing that would draw attention to himself.

Father Benson was making mediocrity a profession. And he was getting very good at it.

He was almost the personification of an Irish Bull: being so good at not being good at anything.

There were few internal conflicts within the Church of that day. Catholics were confronted with a brick staircase. The steps were rules and regulations. If one kept the rules and climbed the stairs one got into heaven, although there was always the possibility, even the likelihood, of a bad time in purgatory. In any case, it was a simple system that could get complicated only by people.

Take the situation in which Manny and Alice found themselves, for example. They had broken one of the biggies: entering an invalid marriage. This put them in the state of mortal sin. There was no escape from this state other than having the marriage convalidated or living apart.

The other biggie, the one that forced adult Catholics into frequent, fruitless confession, was “artificial” birth control.

Pope Pius XII had blessed the rhythm method of family planning. It offered some relief. Before rhythm, Catholics had a choice of intercourse open to life (i.e., unimpeded by any manner of contraception) or abstinence. However, the rhythm method was somewhat less than sure-fire; for those with irregular periods, it was more familiarly known as Vatican Roulette.

All heaven and hell was about to explode.

In 1958 Pope Pius XII died. The Cardinals assembled in the Sistine Chapel were initially deadlocked in finding a successor to Pius. The best they could come up with was an interim papacy. They elected Cardinal Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli, who became Pope John XXIII. Overweight, elderly, with an unconventional sense of humor, John was supposed to entertain for a little while. After which the Cardinals would get serious about a successor to Pius.

As his first public (official) act, John, in view of the fact that he weighed many more serious pounds than his predecessor, increased the salary of those bearers who carried him in the
sedia gestatoria
in and out of St. Peter’s Basilica.

Then, in 1959, John called for a reform of Church law and the convening of an Ecumenical Council, which became the Second Vatican Council. He did not live long enough to see either the desired reform or the Second Council implemented. He had initiated the Council, but it was left to his successor, Pope Paul VI, to finish it. John would have had to wait until 1983 to see revised Church law published. And it was anyone’s guess what he would have thought of it.

Detroit, as an example of dioceses throughout the world, could not help but be affected by Vatican II. Many priests, not to mention lay people, paid scant attention to what was going on in Rome. So a bunch of bishops were meeting; what’s that got to do with the parish debt and yet another collection on the horizon?

Then, suddenly, these disinterested Catholics were hit by a vernacular liturgy. The Latin Tridentine Mass, with which everyone had grown up, was offered in English. And the priest, who had whispered much of the time, with his back to the congregation, turned around and looked at the Faithful.

   
TWENTY-SIX
   

B
ETWEEN 1965
(the conclusion of Vatican II) and 2002 (the present) this humongous Roman Catholic Church changed to the extent that it would never be the same. No one person or no collection of people would be able to shut the windows that John XXIII had opened to
aggiornamento
—the letting in of fresh air. To try to close the windows against the winds of change would be to try to put the toothpaste back in the tube.

The Nicene Creed, a product of the Nicene Ecumenical Council in
A.D.
325, is still recited at Mass. Most Catholics say it by rote, pleased that they no longer need a prayer book. Some theologians would deny its every assertion. Most of the dissent springs from the spirit of Vatican II.

Medical advances challenge a divided post-Conciliar Church.

Cloning: Is it a reproductive phenomenon or a departure from the missionary position?


Harvesting organs: Questioning the transplanting of organs (heart, kidney, liver, etc.) from a dead to a needy person.


Stem cell research involving the destruction of human embryos: Leading to enhancement of life, or committing murder?


Sexual ethics:

in vitro
fertilization: Is it morally acceptable when only husband and wife are involved?

Or, perhaps the most difficult and pressing question of all: The morality of abortion.

Roughly half a century ago and more, many of these and related questions were not even asked, let alone answered. But the documents of the Council and its spirit demanded that the Church catch up with the real world and the knowledge explosion.

Over these most recent years it has, indeed, been interesting to be a concerned Catholic.

On the one hand, a number of Catholics, from Cardinals to segments of the laity, have fought valiantly to preserve a Church that has survived extraordinary persecution, the Reformation, scandal, and assault. They consider Vatican II to be at worst an unmitigated disaster and at best a rank-and-file seduction from Mother Church to the evils of the modern age.

On the other hand, a number of Catholics, from Cardinals to segments of the laity, have fought valiantly to achieve what they perceive as an “openness” to the Holy Spirit and to have confidence in the Spirit’s direction—wherever that may lead.

Of course, these nearly forty years of internal turmoil had their effect on the young—now elderly—people we’ve been following. The questions posed by our age were addressed in different ways by Bob, Mike, Manny, Stan, Alice, and Rose. Though all now were in their early seventies, somehow most of them felt much younger. They had no idea what effect seventy years of life was supposed to have on humans; all they knew was that they just didn’t feel like seventy.

And one of them would die of suspicious causes.

As we’ve seen, not all of the six achieved their primary goal in life. Yet all but one would be satisfied with what they had accomplished.

Father Robert Koesler became a simple parish priest. And so he would have remained had it not been for his accidental involvement in the serial murder of eight of the finest priests and nuns of the Archdiocese of Detroit. He happened by accident to come upon the second of these victims. Then, inexorably involved, he was helpful in assisting the police in the solution of those killings.

Evidently, the police knew a good source when they saw one. For Father Koesler continued to be a resource in succeeding murders rich in Catholic character.

When he wasn’t helping solve crimes, he, as did most priests, tried to understand the Council and its impact on Catholic life.