Render Unto

Nathan isn’t wearing a mask. It’s Tuesday morning Mass, the first after four months of shutdown, and I have just looked up from reading the welcome. There they are, fifteen or so—surely the largest weekday congregation in the diocese, just saying—all with the toothpaste blue or a more tasteful solid black or flower pattern on their faces. I have to remember to see the dignity behind them. These are the regulars and it’s heartening for me to see them still showing up. Many of them are elderly. All the regulars are there except for Madeleine, who is in hospice dying, from cancer, not the virus. I must remember her son Orlando at the intercessions.

During the Alleluia the voices are muffled, except mine and Nathan’s. I’ve just started using a French medieval chant in a minor key that seems to fit the times. When he came up for communion I tried to keep my face as neutral as possible, and even gave a slight smile. Just two more years until retirement.

When the churches were closed I could scarcely believe the way we—I must include myself—acquiesced to the government’s demands. Not that we should have defied them, but there was no registration of even mild protest and in fact the Church went beyond what the government required. But I’m proud of the fact that I never locked the door. It was always open, slightly ajar, and I knew people had gone in because I saw them, or the little artifacts, pen caps, chewing gum wrappers, prayer requests, or just footprints on wet days, a kneeler not replaced. I knew the place so well I could tell at a glance when a pew cushion had been sat on. During the shutdown—I prefer that word to lockdown—we had Mass every day, just Nathan and I in the house. Our associate priest Father Matthew came once a week, which was all his scruples would allow as he lived in the flat behind the church so technically belonged to a separate household.

“What can we do about Orlando?” asks Cath, my parish treasurer, helping herself to coffee in my kitchen as usual after Mass.

“Nothing right now. We’re not allowed to visit.”

She is silent for a while, then says, “Surely there’s something that can be done?”

“Nope, no visits, nothing.”

“On compassionate grounds?”

“I wish.”

Of course, I said nothing to Nathan during breakfast in front of Cath and Father Matthew. Nathan made scrambled eggs as usual and I had toast. I had learned it was usually better to address troublesome things after a period of time had passed. I would have preferred to wait a few days but there was Mass tomorrow morning so I would have to address it tonight.

As we do every Tuesday, Cath and I discuss the finances, which at present are almost embarrassingly healthy, so we have little to discuss, a great blessing. We are so familiar with each other that several conversations go on over the weeks without the need to explain. She says without preamble, “I don’t mind if he wears a mask or not but think of Rosemary and Elizabeth. They’re almost ninety.”

“I’ll speak to him tonight.”

“Luke twenty, twenty-five.”

“Yes, I know. He’s my parishioner. He’s my friend. I have to do what’s best for his soul.”

“Yes, we all love him, if only he knew.”

When she leaves, I glance at my computer. An official complaint from a parishioner who will remain nameless about Nathan and his face with the Archbishop’s office cc’ed. Already? Sometimes, honestly, these people.

I reply that I will be handling the matter and will be in touch if I require any assistance. There he is, out there in the driveway with the Persian man. We ran a foodbank during lockdown out of the vicarage garage but now he’s the only one who comes. And he comes every day. Mask around his chin. I tried to tell him to come once a week, but he has no English comprehension, poor man. And yet, he bangs incessantly on the door and won’t leave. “Ah, nothing,” he says, putting his hand in his mouth.

“Wednesday! You are to come every Wednesday, no more!” I did become rather irate with him yesterday.

“Ah, nothing.”

But it’s clearly not true. His belly protrudes from under the purple YMCA T-shirt I’ve never seen him without. He is grateful, it has to be said. He kisses the cross around his neck as he’s leaving and says, “Brother, brother. Thank you, brother.” Patience, patience and prayer. Why can’t the poor ever be reasonable, I ask the Lord sometimes. He’d take the whole garage if you weren’t there with him. We keep our nativity decorations on the same shelves and he tried to stuff the little dark-skinned doll we use as baby Jesus into his cart full of food. He points at the cans and packets of napkins saying, “Ah, her? Ah, her? Her? Her?” Her, meaning “that one”. He must know by this point that there are no others.

I see the Persian man kiss his necklace and wave goodbye to Nathan, who comes back into the house and heads upstairs. Like clockwork he will come down in ten minutes with a book and go and sit in the park with his coffee. Even now when the cold brings a mist that makes the day seem like it never starts. I don’t know what he does the rest of the day. He was doing some online teaching in English, and giving a couple of our kids piano lessons in the church hall, but all of that stopped and now he mostly lives off an inheritance from his mother. No one knows how large, or how small, I suppose, it is. He pays me rent and board in cash every month.

I have to give Madeleine last rites. It was tricky because that was the only reason a visitor was allowed. I wanted to stay in the good graces of the hospital so I wanted to time it right. But of course I couldn’t be too late. I was waiting for a phone call from the daughter, who was semi-estranged. It was complex, as most families are. I calculate how long I should wait before calling her.

As I hear Nathan leave, I breathe out slowly. There was something I remembered reading, in Newman, I think it was, about what the Anglo-Catholic churches had done during an epidemic in the nineteenth century. I spend the next hour in my study flipping through my books, which helps me forget the world outside and even why I was reading in the first place.

I put my mask on to enter the hospital. I sign in, pretend to pump sanitiser onto my hands, rub them together. Three nurses are chatting in the corner with their masks around their chins. As I walk past they pull them up.

In the room with Madeleine. Her mask has fallen down below her nose. As I enter I see the attempt at a smile in her eyes. She looks smaller, as the dying often do. On the table next to the bed is a photo of her and Orlando and her two daughters, when the children were little, framed in ceramic white roses.

“Father Lawrence,” which is not my name, she mumbles through the mask.

“How are you, Madeleine?” But the answer is obvious. It’s good I came today. She is in and out, drugged and dazed. I watch her for a while, holding her hand and praying silently for the relief of her pain and a good defence before the Judgement seat. I take my mask off. What does it matter? I feel imprisoned, watched and judged. I unpack my case with the materials for last rites. Anointing her forehead with the sign of the Cross, I realise it’s been a long time since I have touched someone. “Father Lawrence, I think I want to drop out of school.”

“That sounds good.”

“I’m so glad you agree. My parents don’t understand.”

During the first shutdown, in the absence of anything to do in the evenings, I started playing chess online with my glass of wine and clips of the hymns at World Youth Day 1999. I love the part when a retarded boy gets up on stage and JPII waves away security and embraces him and listens as he speaks in his ear. Makes me cry every time.

For chess, I used a picture of Saint Mary Mackillop next to my name, my avatar, as they say. It’s amazing how God arranges things such that anything you pay close attention to can teach you about the world. I thought I could tell when a male player was trying too hard not to get beaten by what he assumed was a woman. I played ten-minute no-increment games, long enough that you weren’t rushed but short enough to be fully engaged. I started noticing patterns in the nationalities. Russians and Serbians played very slowly, deliberately. They were easy to defeat on time. Indians played fast and brought their queens out early, often much too early. Americans usually tried to gimmick you. If you knew the gimmick you could win easily.

Chess is a funny game. Become fixated on one attack and you lose on the other side of the board. Bunker down and fail to attack and you’ll get opened up eventually. It’s a game of finesse and intuition, proportional action, windfall and psychology. A year after I started my account I got an email from the chess website about my stats. I was astonished to find I had played more than a thousand games during the shutdown. My rating hardly budged. I had almost an equal number of wins and losses, with a few draws.

Nathan came in after curfew and after I’d had a few glasses of wine.

“What’s this about not wearing a mask? It’s the law. I know how you feel, but you have to do it.”

“It’s not so much that I won’t, it’s that I can’t.”

“Oh, come on.” This was too much. “I’m not saying it’s not absurd.”

“The absurdity is the point.”

“They’re doing their best. It’s a hard time.”

“They’re not even trying. It’s a fake problem. It’s a sign of submission to a lie.”

“This isn’t a war. This is not the hill to die on.”

“Then what is?”

I ignored this. “Believe what you want, just put it on.”

“No. It’s a sign of fear. Christians shouldn’t be afraid of death.”

“It’s the law.”

“It’s an insane law.”

“I’m a priest, a responsible person. A public person. I can’t go openly defying.”

“Oh, the reputation of the Church. Yeah. I think people would respect the Church more if it did break the law.”

“I can’t have politics in the church.”

“It’s not political, it’s metaphysical.”

“But everyone else will see it as political.”

“That’s not my problem.”

“But it’s mine. The Lord says we are to render unto Caesar, meaning obey the earthly authorities, even if we don’t wish to.”

“Is this made in the image of Caesar?” He pointed at his face.

“That’s not the point.”

“Then what is? You can’t tell me that covering your face during Mass has no meaning, Father. No spiritual meaning, I mean.”

“Maybe it does, maybe it doesn’t.”

“I emailed the Archbishop about it when it was announced last week. I said that given that in restaurants you don’t have to wear a mask and that Mass is a communal meal we shouldn’t have to either. You know what he said.”

I could guess. “No,” I said.

“He said, or one of his minions said, that there was a requirement to put your mask back on between bites. Can you believe that? It’s a lie.”

That was what I expected. I couldn’t respond. I can’t agree that the Archbishop is a liar and I can’t defend that absurdity. But then again, Mass is more than a communal meal.

“Yes, I agree there are inconsistencies in the government’s response, but they’re doing their best.”

Nathan rolled his eyes and did that irritating raised eyebrow, closed-mouth smile. I loved him but he could be a right git.

“I couldn’t even hear anyone during the Alleluia, except myself. Do you think it’s honouring God covering your face like that?”

Here I drew up and stood with righteousness. “Are you saying those people today weren’t honouring God?”

“Well, no, but.”

“You have a certain arrogance sometimes.”

“You were the one who taught me to follow the truth.”

“It’s a very serious matter, and very foolish to deny yourself the Sacraments.”

“I’m fasting, like everyone else was during lockdown. And it might be a mistake, but you have to let me do it.”

He stormed off upstairs and we didn’t speak about it again. I could feel the anger coming off him at dinner, no matter how outwardly polite he was. It was almost like watching a toddler having a breath-holding tantrum. The parents are worried but also admire the resolve. The way to torment him the most is to ignore his anguish, so I do.

It remained in the back of my mind, and arose whenever I saw him, which was frequently, as we lived in the same house, but I trusted God would put it right. I found myself spontaneously rehearsing new retorts to him from our argument while I was in the shower, or otherwise unoccupied, which was not often. We prayed for him every night at evening prayer.

It was all the more painful because I knew he got it. I remember clearly it must have been some weeks after he started coming to Mass and my focus happened on him as I held up the host and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God.” I saw his eyes open, as if following my instructions, and knew that he was there for the same reason I was there, the same reason I had become a priest. Amidst all the people who were there for their parents or their children, or their spouse, or their friends, or for the organ music, he and I, and to be fair our church had many like us, were there for the same reason, to have our lives redeemed by the only Redeemer.

Nathan’s baptism was such an encouragement to the church. A few months later one of his friends was baptised. They both invited friends who merely dabbled, but the age profile of the church shifted downward. It was wonderful to see them both growing in devotion, learning about the faith. Nathan learned to serve at the altar and when his housemate overdosed, I invited him to move in with me. How many priests in the diocese could say they had altar servers in their late twenties? He was one of the first successes we had, and not the last. I hope I am not overly proud in the growth of the church. There were fifteen at my installation three years ago, now we get that on a regular weekday. On Sundays we are full, perhaps eighty to a hundred, and on Easter and Christmas even the side chapel fills and the late-comers have to stand at the back.

I was his confessor for a few months but when he moved in, I felt it was better if he stopped confessing to me. People think that hearing confessions will make you dislike people because you hear about them at their worst, but it’s actually the opposite. The intimacy that I have developed with penitents far exceeds those who never or rarely confess. The priest is just the conduit of Christ’s grace anyway. All I can say is that his sins were nothing on mine; scarlet, magenta, fiery flagrant sins, the deliberate misuse of myself and others. But dwelling on your sins gives them power they don’t deserve. God calls some men to be priests not because they have unique gifts, or not only because of that, but because He knows there is no other way they will run the race.

Weeks go by. Slowly life returns to the city. There are more people walking the streets. The pub across the road roars back to life and I realise I had become accustomed to silence on weekend nights just as I had been accustomed to sleeping through the pounding noise of the pub, called “The Refuge”, before the shutdown.

We are cordial in the house, but I can feel his pain. It is painful for me. I miss him at Mass and prayer. But life goes on. Rosemary enters hospice care. The refugee family the church supports is being evicted from their apartment because they haven’t passed on information about a rent increase to the parish council, and so are quite in arrears. One of the homeless men who comes for a free lunch on Wednesdays stroked the hair of the teenage daughter of one of my parishioners who had just started helping prepare the food. I had to ban him from staying. He can pick up his meal but he can’t stay. The ebbs and flows of life. My niece had a baby but I wasn’t allowed to visit.

I found what I was looking for. It wasn’t in Newman. I was showing Cath a picture of the church in Sussex where I was ordained and the book, Churches of South-East England or something like that, fell open to a black-and-white photo of a plaque in a church in Maidstone that said, “It was during the typhoid epidemic of 1896 that the daily offering of the Eucharist was begun in this parish.”

A fox got into the garden and I interviewed a potential new curate, Daniel. I like to have active interviews. It keeps them away from their prepared answers, so he and I picked both olive trees clean. I pretended it just had to be done that day. It was a good activity actually. He was up the ladder with the tennis racquet, battering the top branches. He’ll make a good priest if he can keep his head out of the books.

Nathan sulked around the house. I had to remind myself often not to resent him but it was hard. “You have to let me.” He was right. I and the vast majority of the country could think he was foolish and cutting his nose to spite his face, but he was entitled to do so. You can’t force people to church any more, though ironically, Nathan might have been one of the few people who would think that would be a good idea. “I would be happy if you were King of Australia,” he told me once. As one does, I learned through the grapevine that he had begun calling our Lord’s Supper “Masquerade Mass”.

Less than two years now to retirement.

Madeleine died and we had the funeral. Only ten were allowed so it had to be filmed. They had an outbreak at Orlando’s home so he wasn’t allowed at his mother’s funeral. I would have asked Nathan to do the incense and the reading but he would have refused on principle. At breakfast on the morning of the funeral I wanted to tell him about Orlando, which of course he knew, being part of the parish, but rub his nose in it, the way parents tell their kids about starving children in Africa when they won’t eat. But a deep breath, a Lord Give Me Strength, and I went back to some story in the paper about China buying up the Philippines.

At evening Mass for the fortieth anniversary of my ordination, organised by Cath, he is there in the middle of a pew, maskless. A couple of the other young men have them around their chins. It is a glorious service. Bishop David preaches a wonderful sermon and afterwards we have champagne and fancy canapes in the church hall. Cath has organised a mash-up of congratulatory videos from my friends in England, Africa and around the world. One of my friends, a Swedish bishop, says, “I wish you many more decades in ministry,” but with his accent “decades” sounds like “dickheads”. Nathan and his friends giggle rather indiscreetly, sitting with their backs to the grand piano. Cath has asked him to play some light music in the background. “Wichita Lineman”, “What a Wonderful World”, tunes like that. When I come by to talk, he says, “It’s us, we’re the dickheads. I wish you many more dickheads.”

Because there is food and drink, no one wears a mask. He starts playing “My Way” because he knows it will irritate me. I had once preached against the playing of “My Way” at Christian funerals. It should be “His Way”, I said, or something cheesy like that, pointing at the crucifix behind me.

I put my wine glass down and start playing “I Will Sing the Wondrous Story”. There are all the young people gathered around the piano. Nathan sings loudly with his rough and ready voice, in tune. He puts his arm around my shoulder and I do the same to him. We stand that way for maybe a minute taking sips of wine, looking at the ladies who are clearing the tables and stacking up the chairs. Some of them have their masks back on.

In the morning there is an email, which I skim: “no mask … formal complaint … jeopardising the safety … refer you to public health advice …”

Oh what is this life? The endless complaining. In the end it’s just you and God, you and Christ, and you and the Spirit, that’s always in front of your nose. I didn’t open the email from the Arch when it arrived. It was from some aide no doubt, he wouldn’t even be aware of the complaint. One year, now, to retirement.

And then the rules changed, and Nathan came back to Mass. I visited my new grand-niece, but it is never the way it was. Nathan got married—I performed the ceremony—and moved out of the city.

The whole thing lasted a widow’s mite of the interdict against King John. I don’t think I would have been pleased, in the end, if he had worn a mask.

Lucas Smith lives in rural Victoria. He is the co-founder of Bonfire Books in Melbourne and is the 2024 Wiseblood Books writer-in-residence.