Stephen Sangirardi   The Monster   Bard715@aol.com

  Once upon a time there was a priest who had the best of intentions. While in the seminary, he devoted himself to God and practically memorized the Bible. He was going to transform the world into a model of Christianity, beginning with the parish he would one day shepherd. No vow was too difficult for the young man to grapple, especially the vow of chastity and purity, and not a night passed when the young novitiate did not pray like a thousand saints rolled into one.

  The day of his graduation from the seminary came, and the priest was sent out into the world. His parish was a small community in upstate New York, where he would serve under the current pastor. It was understood that when the elder pastor died, the young priest would succeed him. For the first few years of his service, the young man of God zealously served his flock, energizing his sermons with a power that the congregation had never seen before. In addition to sermonizing, the priest counseled anyone who sought his advice and administered Holy Communion in the dead of winter, swirling snow and all, if an ailing person needed to receive the Eucharist at home. In this respect, the priest was like an old-fashioned doctor who made house calls. Word of the priest’s spirituality began to spread to other congregations, and in no time the priest had doubled the number of people who came weekly to his church. He had made proud the old pastor who once told a newspaper reporter that had he, an aging pastor, not chosen the celibate life, the young priest was the type of son he would have wished for.

  After a few years, however, the price of repression, of sexual sacrifice, had begun to take its toll on the priest. He prayed endlessly to ward off the temptations that began to attack him and he made certain that he never looked at any woman in his parish for too long or spent too much time with any female in the confessional or the sacristy. He practically took to whipping his flesh, as the Reverend Dimmesdale resorted to in The Scarlet Letter after the Rev. had fornicated and produced a child with Hester Prynne. Sure enough, the priest overcame every urge to make the beast with two backs with a woman. Continue reading The Monster