Somehow I made it through those early barroom days and headed into St. Patrick’s grammar school in Newburgh.
I grew up Catholic. Lord, did I grow up Catholic. The Church was all-seeing, all-knowing, omnipresent, and all-powerful. From ages eight through twelve, I was an altar boy. I felt like I had no choice, no free will, and no say in the matter.
This is no exaggeration—I served Mass every day for a year and a half. If there happened to be a funeral, I would serve two Masses that day.
St. Patrick’s Catholic Church was about a mile and a half from our house on North Street in Newburgh. Every morning I would ride my bike to church down either Grand or Liberty Street, past beautiful old houses—Federal, Gothic, Revival, Italianate structures. Or, if I was feeling extra-guilty about something, usually “impure thoughts,” I’d walk.
The altar boys at St. Patrick’s were mostly good-natured small-town kids. Sometimes, though, we needed to break the rigid rules. Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. You won’t believe this one!
You really won’t. Before and after Mass, we used to snack on unconsecrated hosts. (In the Catholic Church, this is almost like eating Jesus.) Those paper-thin communion wafers weren’t exactly potato chips but there was a bad-boy thrill to munching them. Of course, no bad deed goes unpunished. The Church was all-seeing, after all.
One morning, I was serving early Mass with a pal named Ray Cosgrove. Halfway through the service, I almost had a kid heart attack.
Communion wafers, at least a dozen of them, were scattered on the floor all around the altar.
God, please have mercy on me!
I immediately figured out what had happened. Ray Cosgrove must’ve stuffed communion hosts into a pants pocket—with a hole in it. The priest, Father Brennan, who was well over six feet tall and at least two hundred fifty pounds, spotted the hosts and figured he had spilled them. Okay, that gave Ray Cosgrove and I some hope.
He stopped the Mass—which in those days was delivered in Latin.
I was about to have my second kid heart attack of the morning.
This mammoth priest got down on his puffy, arthritic hands and knees. He proceeded to pick up every host, every potential “Body of Christ,” then sprinkle holy water all over the floor. This excruciating cleansing ordeal took close to ten minutes.
I held my breath and wondered if all the wafers had fallen out of Ray’s pocket or if there were more. Would a telltale trail of communion wafers lead right to the guilty ones, Ray Cosgrove and me?
Meanwhile, I was having a more urgent thought: I will die after this Mass. First, I will be excommunicated by this priest. Then my father will kill me. My mother will help. My sisters will joyfully pitch in—the little witches.
But Father Brennan never figured things out, and Ray Cosgrove and I sure weren’t going to confess our sins to him.
Not to that priest. Not to anyone.
Not until now.
Bless me, reader, I ate the unconsecrated communion hosts.