The Confessions(10)

“Marcus—”

“What about Kingsley?”

“What about him?”

“I love him too.”

“I don’t care. You get her or you get him. You’ll have to choose.”

“Why?”

“Because she’s 16, and you’re a bloody priest. She’s Catholic. She’s a child of God. And you’re going to bring her into a sinful relationship that could ruin her life. You don’t get to cheat on her as well. If you can’t give her a real marriage, you can at least give her the semblance of one. No cheating.”

“It’s not like that in our world—”

“Fuck your world, Marcus. I live in the real world. It’s fidelity or it’s cheating. If she’s not enough for you—”

“More than enough for me.”

“Then you have your answer. You told me what you did to your beloved Kingsley. He’s a child of God too and deserves better than to be hurt like you hurt him.”

“I’m a sadist, and he’s a masochist—”

“That’s not what I was talking about. You married his sister and she died because she caught you two together. I don’t care what you and he did in bed together. I care that you betrayed his love for you. He’s not here to speak for himself so I will stand in his stead and speak on his behalf. You don’t get to hurt him ever again. Do you understand that?”

Marcus turned his head and looked away, far away, in the distance. The sun was setting over the Manhattan skyline. The sun rises on the just and the unjust. Which were they?

“I understand,” Marcus finally said.

“Good.”

“Kingsley… I wasn’t a priest when he and I were together. But she’s only known me as a priest. He’ll never understand why I became a priest, never accept. She will. I think she already does.”

“I don’t say this very often,” Ballard said. “In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever said it, but I’m saying it to you. You were born to be a priest. It’s who you are and what you are and you will never be at peace if you leave the Church. It would be like cutting the wings off an angel.”

“I know that. I was never at peace until I became a priest. Even now, in the midst of all this turmoil in my heart…I’m still at peace.”

Ballard nodded. “You are at peace because you’ve built your house upon the Rock. The winds and waves have come now. When they pass your house will still be standing. And I’ll be standing by you.”

“Is loving her a sin?”

“No. Love is never a sin. If it’s a sin it’s not love. And if it’s love it’s not a sin. But that’s not what you’re asking. You want to know if making love to her is a sin.”

“Is it?”

“I think God’s view of sex is far removed from what the Church teaches. All I can say is that if the peace you know in your heart evaporates after your first night with her, you’ll know you’re in sin.”

“If it doesn’t?”

“If it doesn’t then God is more forbearing than we give Him credit for,” Ballard said.

“Tamar dressed like a prostitute and seduced her father-in-law. Ruth got a husband by instigating intercourse with a barely conscious Boaz on the threshing floor. King David had over a dozen wives. King Solomon had seven hundred or more—”

“And Jesus Christ had none. We aren’t living in the Old Testament.”

“We aren’t living in the New Testament either,” Marcus said. “1 Corinthians 7:9, ‘But if they do not have self-control, let them marry; for it is better to marry than to burn with passion.’ Seems a stark contrast to the grin and bear philosophy behind the vow of celibacy.”

“No one forced you to be a priest.”

“John 6:68,” Marcus said as if that were the only answer. Perhaps it was.

John 6:68. Ballard knew the verse well. Many disciples had walked away from Christ and his hard teachings. To his twelve, Jesus had asked, “You do not want to go away also, do you?” And in John 6:68 Peter had answered, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.”

When it came down to it, all priests became priests for this reason—the good ones at least. Because of the love of God. Because they had nowhere else to go.

By now the sun had left them behind. At this rate they’d be walking home in the dark. But no matter. Ballard had been Marcus’s confessor for eleven years now, a priest for thirty. He was a man accustomed to darkness.

“Have you ever thought…” Marcus began and met his eyes. “Have you ever considered, that perhaps the only thing God cares about, the only thing He wants is for us to love Him and to love each other?”

“Dangerous words, young man.”

“They were Christ’s words. Matthew 22: 36-40. What if He doesn’t give a damn who we sleep with as long as it’s consensual? I don’t care what Kingsley does and with whom he does it as long as he’s safe and he’s happy. I have trouble believing God loves him less than I do.”

“You’ll put priests out of a job with thinking like that. If it was all free love and unregulated freedom, it would be anarchy.”

“It would be Heaven.”