Page 83 of Sinner (Priest 2)
I smile too, because if this is a sample of the Reverend Mother’s mentoring style, I can see why Zenny is at home in her order.
“I don’t know what to think about God,” I say, going back to our earlier thread. “I used to know exactly what I thought, I used to know exactly how I felt. But I’m more confused than ever. It feels like going backwards, going from being sure to not sure at all. Going from all the answers to none.”
The nun nods, as if I’ve said something wise and not just confessed to my own muddle-headed stupidity.
“Isn’t that bad?” I follow up. “Not to know anything? And then I look at Zenny and how she is so comfortable with what she doesn’t know, and that scares me too. I’m worried getting comfortable with not knowing means surrendering something crucial.”
“Sean, faith and belief are the practices of committing a life in the face of no answers. God is and always will be outside of human comprehension. And loving Her is an act, it’s not stubbornly repeating creeds and trying to force Her into modern expectations or rational paradigms. She’ll never fit in the same boxes we apply to science and reason; She’s not meant to. And to try to force it only breeds spiritual violence in the end.”
“Okay,” I concede, although the things she just said are all things I’ll have to think about later. “That’s God. But what about the Church then? Can’t Zenny—or you or any of the sisters—do these same good works without pledging away your free will?”
“Our free will?”
“Obedience is one of the vows, isn’t it? Obedience to the Church? Obedience to the men who run it?”
The old woman snorts, and
I look over in surprise. “I’ll be obedient to those bishops the day I die and not a day sooner.” At my expression, she huffs again. “I’m obedient to God and to my conscience and to the poor. I’m obedient to my fellow sisters.”
And then under her breath, she mutters, “Obedient to men. Hmph.”
“But they’re the entire administrative structure of the Church.”
“For now. But the Church belongs to us as much as it belongs to them.” And then she nods her head at her own words.
I want to protest this—there’s still so much I can complain about, ways that the Church hasn’t changed since the abuse scandals for example—but then she adds, “We make a place for people to meet God and for God to meet Her people. A place that is safe and free of corruption.”
And I can’t argue with that. In fact, it’s the perfect counterargument to my complaining about the evil hierarchy of the Church—the nuns have carved out a place separate from the bishops and the bullshit and the bureaucracy, a place where they can put their heads down and get on with the work of serving the sick and the poor.
Of course, I understand that it’s not that simple—I’ve heard Tyler talk enough about the troubles between the nuns and the Vatican to know that the men still frequently try to take the women in hand. But the sisters, as the saying goes, persist.
I notice the Reverend Mother shivering the slightest bit and turn down the AC. “So that sorts obedience,” I concede. “But what about chastity?”
“I’ll admit, I’m less strict about it than many Reverend Mothers—as you well know. But we ask chastity of our vowed nuns not only as a trust and sacrifice to God, but also so that they live lives free of other obligations. Our sisters are free to serve the poor completely because they don’t have children and families of their own. Because they don’t have needy men taking up their time.”
Well. Fair.
“It just seems like so much to give up,” I say.
“It is.” The prioress doesn’t argue with me. “It is.”
We turn onto a street of large old houses; the monastery sprawls over a shady corner, marked only with a hand-painted wooden sign by the porch stairs and a Virgin Mary statue in the semi-neglected flower bed.
When I park the car in the driveway, the Reverend Mother turns to me once more. “So you love Zenobia. Are you certain she does not love you back?”
I think of her confession on the day she asked me to do this with her. That she’d always wanted me. And then I think of her laughter at the skating rink when I mentioned marrying her, of her troubled face when I told her she would be the only woman I cared about, of my messy and imperfect reaction the night those people were shitty to her at the gala.
It’s only for a month. It’s not like we have to figure out how to raise children together.
“I’m certain,” I say tiredly.
“Have you told her?”
I shake my head.
“Tell her,” the old nun commands, unwinding her fingers from one another so that she can poke one in my direction. “She deserves to know.”
“Isn’t it…kind of cheap to fling that at her now? She has so much to think about already, and it feels like I’m trying to sabotage her moment.”
