In 1950 Skinny entered the fifth grade class and found himself being taught by a new brother who had come to Clontarf at the beginning of the year bringing along with him some radical ideas on education. These were not to bash everything into the kids as they might learn just as well with a little kindness. Of course, he had a strap, a regulation one and used it on occasion as it was impossible for a brother not to. By then Skinny was so used to the other brothers and their constant beltings that for a brother not to use a strap constantly was a sign of weakness. Brother Walsh found this out when Skinny’s marks fell away as he loafed in his classes. Skinny even failed composition, one of his strong subjects. This made him angry and he accepted the punishment when Brother Walsh finally administered a few weak whacks. It made him buck up. He hated to fail a test and even told Brother Walsh that he would never ever fail another one. The brother smiled, though not sarcastically at this, and said that he shouldn’t make promises that he couldn’t keep. ‘But I can keep t’is one,’ Skinny retorted, to which he received the reply: ‘I believe you can.’
Towards the end of O’Doherty’s term as principal when he would be replaced by Basher Doyle, Skinny was in class one day doing the easiest of punishments as set by Brother Walsh, five hundred lines on not talking in class, when Basher came in and began a conversation with Brother Walsh or rather it was the other way round. Naturally he listened as it was the way kids gained information on what was happening. Both could see that he was in the room, but ignored the boy in the usual manner as if he was just an empty desk without ears to hear or a brain to think.
‘Brother Doyle,’ Walsh began, ‘the constant thrashings of these children, the English ones especially, well, it’s not helping their studies at all. Most of them don’t seem to have a brain in their heads. It’s just a waste of effort trying to make them good at their schooling.’
‘Lazy blighters, but corporal punishment does have a worthy history. It keeps the helots in place. Relax the strap and there goes the discipline.’
‘Brother Doyle what do you mean by “helots”?’ Brother Walsh asked.
‘Perhaps the term was ill-chosen. I really want them to be, well most of them good Catholic laymen. When they arrive here these, well, they are rubbish and unfit to be anything. Our strong discipline helps to mould them into strong Catholic soldiers in Christ. We must never forget that they are the future of our church. Hopefully, the best of them will become Christian Brothers and fill our order and govern our institutions. Think of that when you are teaching them.’
‘But the majority won’t join our order and they will have to eventually settle down and marry —’
‘And produce little Catholics—good!’
‘Yes, but most of them haven’t the foggiest idea about women. They haven’t spoken to a girl in their lives.’
‘A good thing too if you ask me! They are better off without knowing about such things; but I take your point that they will marry and thus am thinking when I take over from, well, from Dicky, to arrange dances with the girls of St. Josephs in Subiaco. Still, I am only thinking of it. It might spoil them, for we are like Spartans bringing up male children free from the influences of women. They’ll be stronger for it and as for our beating some sense into them, they will be harder all the more for it. Our founder Edwin Rice, may he soon achieve sainthood, said: “We are not in the business of producing weakness, but strength, and hopefully our boys will reflect the same attitudes as the martyrs of the early church.”’
‘Perhaps, and returning to your example of Sparta, a pagan state in Ancient Greece, that was thousands of years ago. I don’t know how the Child Welfare Department might react to this example. They are only too ready to interfere in our affairs as it is.’
‘Oh, they are happy to receive the occasional report, so forget them,’ Brother Doyle rejoined, ‘and if you think the Spartans pagan, then surely you can’t quibble about St. Augustine. He as a boy in school endured punishments that were never as lenient as ours often are. And did that affect him for the worse or the better? In his Confessions he tells us that not only did he deserve them, but they were essential for his betterment. It was through them that he obtained strength to devote himself to his studies and eventually become a Doctor of the Church. With his example before us, no wonder we feel it our duty to thrash these boys into shape. It is for their good just as it was for the good of Saintly Augustine. So when you must belt one of the little blighters think of what you might be producing.’
‘But Saint Augustus was never a duffer.’
‘Perhaps, but we can always get a second opinion, for what do I spy here but the Skinny Sniveler. Hey Skinny Sniveler, stand up! Ah, see how quickly he obeys. Now tell us if the punishments you have received have affected you for the better or worse, eh? Now speak up, don’t snivel and don’t grovel. Speak the truth, boy.’
‘Sir,’ Skinny began and suddenly became angry at how these men were treating him. He snapped. ‘I don’t snivel anymore!’
‘Why, Sniveler?’
‘Because my mother said t’at it was unmanly, Sir?’
‘And why did she say that?’
‘Well, a friend, Mr. Winter lost his son in t’e war and when he learnt t’at he began crying and Mum, she said t’at it was terrible to see a grown man cry. So I don’t cry anymore, even t’ough I’m still a kid.’
‘Well, well, well and do you think six of the best is good for you or not?’
‘Perhaps or perhaps not, sir, I’m just hit and have to put up wit’ it.’
‘Oh a doubting Thomas, eh, and perhaps I should test you now to see if you have become a Spartan and really stopped being the little sniveler you used to be. You’re not a St. Augustine, are you?’
‘I don’t know sir, but t’en I suppose I might be one of t’ose helots, you mentioned.’
‘Oh eavesdropping, were you, well, we’ll just have to make you learn to block your ears when brothers are engaging in conversation. Now bend over, right over that desk!’
Obediently Skinny lay across the desk. Doyle landed a hard six on his bum. He refused even to flinch. When it was over stood up and faced his tormentor, though his behind was aching.
Basher Doyle turned from the boy smiling in triumph as he declared: ‘There this skinny lad was a sniveler before we knocked some strength into him. Look at him, not a tear. He’ll be a worthy soldier of Christ. Now, tell me can you say the same about your approach?’
‘No, not exactly, but --’ Brother Walsh began uncertainly.
‘Well, there is no argument,’ Doyle declared and left swishing his strap in his hand.
Brother Walsh stared at Skinny who was rubbing his behind.
The boy said: ‘Sir, I have finished my lines.’
The Brother replied: ‘I don’t know—but Brother Doyle has a point. You are like a piece of iron which can be beaten, heated and annealed to become a fine piece of metal suitable for the blade of a sword—the sword of St Michael.’
‘Maybe, maybe sir, but I don’t feel like a piece of metal and even less t’at I’m becoming a sword blade. I hurt too much. I know t’at I deserve a whack or two to keep me on my toes, but some of the ot’ers, don’t.’
‘No, never doubt it. Don’t be a Doubting Thomas feel that you are becoming worthy to serve our Holy Mother the Church.’
‘Sir, I don’t know if a strapping can do t’at or do I t’ink I am such a Doubting Thomas. Why, I don’t even know what t’at means.’
‘Well, your Christian name is Thomas and I assume that you were named after the apostle who doubted the divinity of Jesus, the son of God, hence the term.’
Skinny knew that he had been named after his father, but he let it pass as he replied: ‘Sir, I am not in doubt about anyt’ing, but merely saying t’at beating a dead horse to make it gallop is a waste of time.’
‘Perhaps, perhaps, but sometimes it does help, helps to save a soul from hell, so it is more a matter of the will of God rather than our personal proclivities. Ask yourself: “What use are weak souls in this world?” Pain gives strength and turns one towards God. It is wonderful and truly an act of grace if punishment is seen as a necessary method for our purification and when that is accomplished we become attuned to the will of God.’
‘What is t’is will of God,’ Skinny asked him though he doubted six of the best as a method to approach God.
‘God works in mischievous ways, I mean mysterious ways,’ Brother Walsh corrected himself. ‘St. Augustine as Brother Doyle said was beaten much more than you have been. He could have rebelled against this, but he accepted it as the will of God working through his school masters to render him a fit instrument to serve his Holy Mother the Church. He learnt obedience and submission to the will of God. God began to work through him and he became a doctor of the Church. Read his Autobiography. See how the will of God manifests and how His purpose is made known. Why, who knows, He may be working right here now and asking you to completely accept and become His instrument. Have you ever thought of becoming a Brother? No, that it not the right way to put it. It is not a matter of thinking; but of opening up to God and receiving a vocation, a call from Him. Without it, it is impossible to accept the vows of poverty, chastity and obedience and serve God through helping others, for as you have learnt from your catechism, “faith without works is dead.”’
Skinny muttered “amen”, then excused himself and ran down to the playground seeking to outrun his disturbed mind. It was too late to participate in the games and so he went to stand on the wrecked jetty and stare out over the turgid stream as he contemplated what the brother had said. He came to wonder at “a vocation”. They even spoke about it in church. How exactly would he know if he received such a call? Did he even want to! He thought on. There were as many types of vocation as there were orders in the holy church. There were for example monks, but what did he know about them? A priest; but that seemed far beyond his abilities though he knew very little about what being a priest meant. Clontarf had a chaplain; but the man had nothing to do with the kids. He served mass, heard confession and stayed in his house behind the church. Skinny had watched him pacing up and down reading his breviary, but the word that summed him up was “unapproachable”. Why he never even had boys to clean his house. Of course he had contact with other priests when the Society of Jesus came to conduct retreats; but even then he had never talked to one face to face. They were mysterious men, spoken to through a veil, agents of God on earth who could and would do no wrong. Skinny had never pondered or thought about these things before and blamed Brother Walsh for putting ideas into his head. He stared out over the water and pictured himself in a black gown and swishing a strap. The image caused him to jump off the jetty and run for a mile around the ground seeking to get the silly image out of his head; but the idea of a “vocation” sat there to plague him. He found himself praying to God for this mysterious thing, this absolute determination that would solve the direction of his life forever more.
That night he lay in bed on his right side and whispered to God: ‘Dear God, My Lord and Savior, give me the gift of a vocation that I might serve you.’ He waited for the reply and waited. He fell asleep and came awake without even the memory of a dream to enlighten me. He made his bed morosely.
Tommy Cooper had managed to get shifted next to Skinny and now he whispered: ‘What you been ridin’ - a nightmare?’
‘Nuttin, nuttin,’ Skinny replied then made a silent prayer to God asking for an instant response, but there was only emptiness within his head where there should have been a warm, loving feeling. In desperation, he decided that he needed to read St. Augustine, for surely, the saint had not only received a sign from God, but would have seen him as clearly as he could see that bloody Brother Boulten coming towards him.
‘You not speakin’’, Tommy Cooper asked.
‘I’m listening for t’at inner voice,’ Skinny replied.
‘You, what?’ his chum asked incredulously.
‘Just jokin’,’ Skinny yelped as Boulten slammed his strap across his shoulders.
Well, that put paid to any silly ideas until Brother Walsh remembering their conversation from the day before gave Skinny a book after class. He even let him stay there to read it. Brother Walsh wasn’t one for sports and didn’t care if Skinny missed them or not.
Skinny was amazed to find that St Augustine had been a black man perhaps the same colour as he was and this caused him to thumb through the volume until he found the section on St. Augustine being punished. Yes, he had been beaten and ‘yes’ he had put it down to the will of God. Skinny read on trying to grasp the saint’s image of God. It was too vague, to faint, to void. St. Augustine addressed endless prayers to Him, received no voice in return, but only certain signs such as a child murmuring, “read this”. St. Augustine even had been a Doubting Thomas and what put his doubts to rest didn’t seem very spectacular or real. Anyone if even he might find the will of God then Skinny should because he was a bigger sinner than the saint. As a child St. Augustine had merely stolen fruit from a tree, whereas Skinny—but no matter, for if God had heard St. Augustine surely he would not only hear but listen to him. Skinny was the greater sinner and thus more in need of redemption.
Ready to hear His voice, Skinny began ducking into the church for a quick prayer and a short wait. Doyle found him there once and chased him out. Few brothers, with the exception of Brother Walsh, were religious in the sense of wanting to see God, though all of them must have received a vocation. Skinny asked Brother Walsh how his had come about or rather how God had passed on the decision for him to become a brother. He said that it was a sudden conviction.
‘Nuttin like God speaking or you seeing him,’ Skinny asked.
Brother Walsh laughed at this before replying: ‘Only great saints are given a glimpse of God. It is a privilege that I did not aspire to even then, for the face of the Lord is said to be terrible to behold. It is better if you want to feel the presence of divinity to pray to Our Lady, for the Blessed Virgin is much easier to approach. Children in particular are favoured by her. We have the example of the children of Fatima as proof of this.’
Skinny nodded at his words and decided to follow them though he wanted to go directly to the boss himself. Praying to the Virgin Mary was easy. There was the grotto just off the quadrangle and next to the first playground the older dilapidated one with the weathered image of Her standing above an artificial cavern in which Skinny could pray in peace and wait in quietness for that magic voice to sound. Only it didn’t!
Desperately, he prayed: ‘Dear Lady Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God please heed my voice. Give me a sign that you are listening to me, just a sign. This will do for starters, but what I really want is to know whether I have a vocation or not?’
No reply! He kept on and every night tried to say an entire rosary before he fell asleep. He seldom succeeded but his ardor increased to such an extent that he convinced himself that it was only a matter of time before She replied. Indeed one night as he was lying in bed saying the rosary Skinny fell asleep into a dream in which he saw the statue of the Virgin Mary, the one down next to the playing field. It was immaculately white, but as he stared into its eyes maggots began falling from them down her cheeks and onto his face as he stood below her. The dream was strong enough to jerk him awake. He lay there trying to decide if it was a sign or not. If it was it had been so dirty that what it must mean is that he should purify himself.
Skinny remembered how Dicky had a favourite would be saint, Blessed Matt Talbot, a simple working man from Belfast who practiced intense devotion to God and indulged in extreme penances such as wearing a hair shirt. He had made them pray to God to make this man a saint, but it appeared that God had not answered the prayers as yet. In order to be sure about this, Skinny went to Brother O’Doherty to ask him if their prayers had been answered. Dicky was most annoyed at his question. He found it impertinent and grabbed his ear as Skinny’s head had grown too big for his hand to hold.
‘See here, you skinny hairbrush, God works in mysterious ways and at his own pace. If you wish for the Blessed Matt Talbot to achieve sainthood, pray from your heart and not from your lips. Blessed Matt Talbot was a man that indulged in the most extreme of penances and here is a taste of what he suffered in order to purify himself and reach heaven.’
Dicky gave Skinny a couple of whacks from his long strap to send him on his way. The boy had wanted to ask the brother about hair shirts and tormenting the body to find God. Not even Brother Walsh seemed to think it a good idea when Skinny broached the idea. He went to his favourite spot, the grotto cave to say a few prayers to the Blessed Virgin Mary. After receiving no reply he climbed above the grotto to the orchard. The oranges were ripening and he filled his shirt with the biggest and juiciest ones. Loaded down he walked to the quadrangle where he expected the wrath of God to descend on him. He smiled, perhaps a saintly smile, as Brother Mitchell, a working brother came towards him. Skinny didn’t know much about him, but he was sure to be punished.
‘What have you got there?’ the man asked as he stopped next to Skinny. ‘Ah, oranges! Give me a half dozen and don’t get caught with the rest unless you have been ordered to pick them.’
Strange were the ways of the brothers as strange as the ways of God, The Virgin Mary and the subject of vocations. Yes, indeed, Skinny thought as the kids descended on him and fought over the succulent fruit.