Archbishop Charles Chaput
just knew the minute that Philadelphia was chosen to host The World Meeting of
Families that his ship had sailed right up the Delaware River. When the pope
decided to pay him a visit, his joy was complete. All those years of playing by
the company rules, denying the little child of gay parents a place in a Catholic
pre-school in Denver, Colorado, banning Fortunate Families from meeting at St.
John the Evangelist Church in Philadelphia, and forcing the firing of a gay
teacher, Margie Winters from a Catholic school, and calling
it “common sense,” had finally paid off. The vision of a cardinal’s hat began to
dance in his head. He could already see himself with a miter and a new title,
Cardinal Archbishop of Philadelphia. He, Charles Chaput, had
always played by the rules and he now expected a reward.
But alas, all the good bishop
seemed to get was bad press. Most people in the United States, including most
Catholics, did not share his ant-gay attitude, mostly because they knew gay
people as human beings and not as pariahs who stalked the street like vampires
or werewolves trying to feast upon the innocent.
In
fact, many families have gay children or gay cousins or aunts or uncles or
friends who come to dinner, use their napkins and wipe their mouths just like
heterosexuals. The gay people we all know get up and go to work each day, mow
their lawns, shovel their sidewalks, wash their clothes, care for their aged
parents, and even wipe their behinds with toilet paper. We wouldn’t even know
they were gay unless they told us. And telling the wrong person, like Charles
Chaput, that you are gay can cost you your job. Quicker than a medieval monk can
yell “Inquisition,” someone as good and holy as Margie Winters can be out of a
job.
The only thing remotely
different about gay people is that they prefer to love people of the same sex.
Now, what in the name of God is so terrible about love? I thought that is what
God is, didn’t you?
Well, anyway, the City of
Philadelphia and Bishop Chaput were getting ready for the World Meeting of
Families and the pope’s visit. The August weather in Philadelphia was at its
worst, 90 degrees for five straight days. But people had more than the weather
to make them hot under the collar. The pope’s visit was causing the citizens of
Philadelphia a huge headache. Major roads and a bridge from New Jersey were
going to be closed, as were schools. Public transportation was to be greatly
curtailed and working people who needed their full complement of a pay check had
no way of getting to work. There was even talk of building a
fence!
But Charles, who sat in his
air conditioned office down the street from the construction of a gigantic
Mormon temple, thought it all, except for the adverse publicity, good.
He was reading the pope’s itinerary when an elderly woman wearing
a long dress with her hair done up in bun walked into his office.
“Are you lost, “ Charles
asked, looking over his glasses at the strange old woman who settled her small
self in the plump chair reserved for wealthy donors and visiting prelates
without asking permission.
“Oh, no, my son, “she
replied, looking over Her glasses and picking up some of the papers on his desk.
“I AM exactly where I expect to be.”
Charles grabbed the papers
out her hand. “And, who, I might ask, are you to touch things on my desk?”
“Don’t you know who I AM?”
The ancient eyes which looked into his sparkled with what? Wisdom? Joy? Glee?
Love? Charles leaned farther over his desk, drawn into the
gleaming green depths of eyes that seemed to know him as no one else had ever
known him before he snapped himself back to the reality that a
crazy old woman was touching important documents on his desk, unusual eyes or
not. He felt like smacking her hand.
She looked at him and smiled.
“But you won’t, will you, Charles?”
Charles reached for the
buzzer on his desk.
“It won’t work,” She said.
“Even if it did, no one else will see Me.”
Charles, always a pragmatist,
sat back in his chair and awaited Her next move. It was Satan for sure, come to
tempt him into believing that God was a woman. He, Charles Chaput, Archbishop of
the great Archdiocese of Philadelphia could handle Satan as well as he handled
gay people. He was going to throw Her out of his office.
“ Are you really that blind,
my son? You forget,” She said, “I shall be who I shall be. Neither you nor your
brother bishops, not even Francis, can decide who I AM. And, in case you forgot,
I AM on the side of marginalized, the suffering, the poor, those thrown out of
your churches, and those who suffer from injustice. You do know
the Beatitudes, Charles? Matthew, Chapter 5?”
Charles stared ahead
stonily.
“You just celebrated a feast
day of my daughter Mary who said in her great prayer, ‘The Magnificat’ that the
powerful will be taken down from their thrones and the lowly lifted up. You read
those words and you even call them gospel, the Good News. Do you think that
Mary’s words really mean something different from what they say? There are to be
no powerful sitting on thrones on My earth. That is not MY Way.
Did you think that I would approve of you and your brothers
continuing to lord yourselves over others in direct contradiction of My Good
News? Did you ever think how your actions hurt my children?”And God began to sob
great sobs that made Charles’ desk dance across the floor.
The tiny woman’s body
continued to be wracked by sobs as rain drops pelted the bishop’s window.
Charles grabbed his pectoral cross and tried to head for the door. This was far
too weird for him.
The woman stopped sobbing.
Charles looked out of the window. The streets below were bone dry, but the
Persian rug under the woman’s chair was soaking wet. “Geez,”
Charles thought, “The old girl wet her pants.”
Those green eyes sought out
his own again. He shifted in his seat. “There are none so blind as those who
will not see,” God said kindly as She took out a large, hardbound book She had
kept in large canvas bag hung around Her shoulder and began paging through it.
God didn’t seem wet at all.
“Do you have
any idea who is prodding my son, Francis, to say things he is saying? While
Francis still needs a little work, he has really listened to the Good News that
you choose to ignore. It is amazing what can happen when those who hold the keys
unlock the chains they have put on the Holy Spirit, don’t you think?”
Charles sat still. “Ah, you
are not so sure of my son, Francis, yet you expect him to reward you with a red
hat? That’s up to him. I don’t worry Myself about such nonsense. What I do worry
about is My children. What really angers Me, if, indeed, I can be angered, is
when people like you who should know better hurt them.” She handed Charles Her
book.
From the look in Her eyes,
Charles found that he had no choice but to take the book. The book was a living
record of his latest acts. In it, he saw the little children at Waldron Academy
crying because their teacher, Margie Winters, had been fired. The word, “Why”
came from hundreds of little mouths. “We love Ms. Winters. She’s nice and kind.
She’s a good teacher. Why would you fire her, Bishop Chaput?”
He saw the
hardened faces of the seventh and eighth graders who were acutely aware of just
what he had done. Like most kids in their generation and the generation that
preceded them, most of these kids would repudiate everything the church stood
for because that church labeled their friends and family members “Intrinsically
disordered” without cause. The injustice and sheer ignorance just took both
their breath and their beliefs away. God nodded at Charles. He was to be held
accountable for their lack of faith.
He saw the faces of the
Waldron teachers and their principal with yellow caution tape across their
mouths reading, “Danger.”
He saw the hundreds and
thousands of parishioners, priests and nuns who did not agree with his stance on
gay people. They too were wrapped up in caution tape.
He saw the faces of the
parents, grandparents, brothers and sisters and friends who belong to Fortunate
Families and who try to counteract the horror of discrimination perpetrated
against their gay relatives or friends, the ones he had turned away from a house
that belonged to the God of all and not to Archbishop Charles Chaput.
“Is there any reason why you
refuse to listen to them, Charles, My son?” God asked gently, Her great green
eyes brimming with tears. “You should understand that I, the Lord thy God, do
not, as the saying goes, make junk. Each one of my children is my
beloved. Look through My photo album and see that I am standing with them,
forever, My hand upon their shoulders as My Hand rests upon yours.”
Charles tried to shrug away
from the ancient warm Hand of God that came to rest upon his shoulder. God
walked back to Her seat, head bowed in sadness, leaving footprints
where Her holy Feet trod.
“You are not
supposed to shut people away from Me. I am the one who decides and judges, not
you. My son, Francis, hinted at just this last year. Your actions are very bad
and need correction, soon, or else more people will be driven away from Me and
My love. The World Meeting of Families is your big chance to set things right.
Open your mind, my son. Remember Who and What I AM.”
Charles was not to be moved
and stood up. “Is this meeting over? I’m tired of this liberal, socialist
prattle and left wing plants. Get out of my office and let me finish my work. I
am a busy man. I have to prepare for the pope.”
God collected her living
book, picked up her canvas bag walked out of the archbishop’s office, sadly
shaking her head and saying, “Occasions for stumbling are bound to come, but woe
to anyone by whom they come!”
Charles Chaput sat back down
and continued to work on the pope’s itinerary. From that day
forward, regardless of how many times he moved his desk back into position, each
morning one leg or the other was a couple of inches off position. Charles spoke
to the cleaning people, but they said that they only moved the desk once a year
for spring cleaning. He even purchased a new desk, to no avail. Then there was
the wet rug. Not only did he have to get rid of it, he had to have
the floors re-sanded. God’s visit proved to be very expensive to Charles Chaput
in several ways.
Charles never told Pope
Francis about his visit from the old woman even though Francis was probably the
only person in the hierarchy who would believe him.
And then there was the matter
of the small red mark on his shoulder that felt warm to the touch in the place
where Her hand had rested upon his shoulder…Must have been some
scar he had forgotten about….
© Eileen McCafferty DiFranco,
RCWP
August 18, 2015
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