Ego Te Absolvo

Father Clive finished helping with the last of the dinner-dishes, eying Javier with kindness. The boy had cut some corners and left some dinner plates slightly smeared with grease; but he was only 13. His hands shook, and his attention wandered—classic anxiety. Fr. Clive saw the boy grab a buttered roll, stuff it in a napkin, then into his pocket, but chose not to bother with it. The kid needs to eat, he thought.

"Are you ready for night prayer?" Fr. Clive asked, scratching his shingle-ridden head. He'd been avoiding a doctor visit for too long.

Javier nodded with exaggerated (but not sarcastic) obedience. Canter walked by, "I'll pray for your soul," he said to Javier. 

That drew a smile from Javier, "You need it more than I do after dodgeball today."

Canter laughed and the door from the cafeteria shut loudly behind him as he exited. Fr. Clive and Javier exchanged a glance, shrugged, and followed him close behind for night prayer. The snow was piled high, and the pair barely kept their footing as they walked to the chapel.

"Are you okay, Javi?" Fr. Clive asked. 

"Yes," he said. 

"It wasn't your turn to do dishes tonight or the past few nights," said Fr. Clive. "Why volunteer?"

"Por Cristo I guess," he said.

"Christ wants you to enjoy life too," said Fr. Clive. Javier nodded but said nothing.

The foul smell of cheap incense hit them as they opened the chapel door. The students' Tantum Ergo hymn would have echoed through the chapel if the acoustics weren't so bad. 

Javier gave the customary thumbs-up to his superior, Brother Samuel, who nodded; and he slipped into his assigned spot in the chapel. 

Fr. Clive abandoned formality and sat—rather than knelt—in the back of the chapel, wishing he had a pipe to smoke or a classical music song to listen to. The silence of benediction made him shift in his seat. He looked at his watch and cursed to himself, then went to the confession booths. 

There was quite the pile-up of students waiting outside. He smirked, seeing Fr. Paul through the window of one of the confession booths, sitting up tall like a statue. What a robot, he thought. He remembered going to Fr. Paul for confession for joking too harshly with the students. 

"Be more like Christ," was the only advice Fr. Paul had given. "And for your penance, pray a rosary." 

A rosary? he thought. What a prick! Fr. Clive still felt a little guilty for avoiding that penance. 

Fr. Clive took his seat in the confession booth further down, with plenty of space so students couldn't hear anything from outside. The bright-yellow fluorescent lighting in the booth always bothered Fr. Clive. Confession was supposed to be a conversation, not an interrogation. 

Students filed in one by one and Fr. Clive smiled as they confessed the same things he heard week after week: I masturbated; I didn't use my time well; I was late to breakfast; I broke silence... Fr. Clive would put his head gently against the lattice and nod kindly. Well, the nod also let him scratch his shingled-head a bit too. 

He saw that the students were leaving the chapel, and he left his booth, whispering a prayer of gratitude from the back of the chapel. Smoke was still rising from blown-out candles, and he liked to look at the monstrance from this angle. That image of Jesus breaking bread with his disciples was just as burnt into his mind as the smell of that rotten incense was burnt into his cassock. 

He closed the chapel door quietly, so as not to disturb Jesus. He knew his superstitions were silly, but he was attached to them. He turned, and the doorway at the bottom of the stairs flew open. Brother Clay looked at him, wide-eyed, and immediately burst into tears. 

"What is it," asked Fr. Clive.

"You have to hear my confession," he said. Fr. Clive could barely understand him through his sobbing. 

"Okay, okay, come on," he said. He didn't even bother turning the chapel lights back on, and he let the light of the dreadful moon guide him to his booth. Brother Clay followed close behind. 

"In nomine Patris," Fr. Clive paused. Br. Clay was breathing heavily and making it difficult to focus. "Et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti."

"Bless me, Father, for I have sinned," said Br. Clay. "It has been one week since my last confession; but I haven't opened up fully for a while now. I don't know if I can today either." He was practically choking on his words with snorts and staggered breaths. Fr. Clive felt the deepest compassion, though he would soon regret it. 

A long silence passed, Fr. Clive nurturing him with kind words and understanding. 

"I've molested a student for over a year," Br. Clay said. No, he nearly shouted. It escaped from his lips like water from a dam. 

Fr. Clive gasped, and he knew Br. Clay heard it. 

"Who?" asked Fr. Clive, surprised he was unable to hold back this inappropriate question. He'd turned this into an interrogation, he realized.

"I only need to give generalities," stammered the brother. Br. Clay was right. Confession needed to be specific enough to know the sin, but not so specific as name-dropping. 

"I already feel much better," said Brother Clay, after a span of silence. "More detail can't hurt—seal of confession and all. It was Javier."

Fr. Clive's heart felt like it would jump out of his chest and let out an, "Oh God." He thought of all the signs he had overlooked: the lethargy, the bruises Javier would explain as "battle wounds" from sports. 

"For your penance you must turn yourself in to the police," said Fr. Clive. 

"Yes, of course," said Brother Clay. 

Fr. Clive noticed Br. Clay's thick cologne, and his sadness turned to disgust. The moonlit booth felt like a prison. He had to do better. 

"If you don't tell the police, I will," said Fr. Clive. 

"Okay," said Brother Clay. "You have nothing to worry about."

"No, I don't," said Fr. Clive scratching his shingles vigorously and trying to sound as threatening as he could. He opened his prayer book since he could not think straight.

"Ego te absolvo in nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti," said Fr. Clive. 

In a horrible moment, Fr. Clive saw Br. Clay's smile through the moonlight—that same smile of absolution and catharsis he'd seen on the faces of his students confessing to "tardiness at breakfast" moments earlier. Br. Clay was forgiven just as they were, to the same degree that they were: soul white-as-snow.

Br. Clay left, and Fr. Clive fell to his knees and began to pray that rosary-penance he'd received from Fr. Paul a while back. He offered this act of penance to God in the hopes that Br. Clay would willingly fulfill his act of penance. But then a worse thought occurred to him.

Even if the law imprisoned Br. Clay's body, his heart would be free. Further if Br. Clay were to die this very instant, he would join the choirs of angels in heaven that, "eye has not seen and ear has not heard". 

Winter winds whipped Fr. Clive on his way back to his bedroom. 

This is the rest of my life, he thought.