Episode transcript - “Halloween special: Where Angels fear to tread”

FR. BEN: Good morning, Dave. How long has it been since your last confession? 

DAVE: Ohhh… (exhales dramatically) I was …fourteen? Maybe fifteen?

FR. BEN: That tracks. I’ve never seen you in here before, although I have seen you cross the street so you wouldn’t have to pass directly by St. Patricks. 

DAVE: Churches give me the creeps. 

FR. BEN: And you would be the expert about that.

DAVE: What’s that supposed to mean?

FR. BEN: Oh. Nothing bad. Just that – well, you run the Texarkana Terror-torium, so I figured you’d be knowledgeable on the subject. 

DAVE: Ah, yes. Apparently I am. Did you hear about what happened at the Texarkana Terror Entrapment and Hayride of Heck?

FR. BEN: Dave. The whole town heard about what happened at the Texarkana Terror Entrapment and Hayride of Heck. There’s going to be an editorial in the Texarkana Times. Is that why you’re here?

DAVE: I suppose it is. I feel bad that I scared those kids. But…I think I feel guiltier about not feeling guilty. Is that a thing? 

FR. BEN: If you feel it, it’s a thing. 

DAVE: Including fear. If you feel fear – ? 

FR. BEN: I don’t see why fear could be excluded. And like all emotions, fear is healthy in moderation. Why don’t you start by telling me what you’re afraid of?

DAVE: Being here, for one thing. Did you know that starting in third grade, around 1pm, a whole little group of us would be walked over to St. Pats for a lesson on being good little Catholic children? We’d hear stories from the bible, interact with activities, ask lots of questions - anything on our minds. Oh, they loved questions. And being who I was as a kid, I asked a boatload. Maybe even an arkload. 

(pause)
Did you know they built a real life ark down in …Kentucky, I think it is? Supposedly designed true to the dimensions listed in the bible. Big tourist attraction down there, along with the neighboring creation museum, so you can learn about the real history behind the garden of eden, the great flood, and how god knits each one of us together in our mothers’ wombs. What do you think about that, Father? Would you enjoy visiting that attraction? They have a zip line. Oh and I forgot to mention. Children are free. Maybe I could organize a trip for the little ones I scared so badly at the Terror Entrapment. 

FR. BEN: I mean, a real life ark does sound…kinda cool? 

DAVE: It’s a grand sight in the publicity pictures, I’ll grant you that. But I’ve seen the inside. There’s nothing more depressing than a big spectacle that’s completely empty inside. 

FR. BEN: Right. I have to be honest, I’m not sure the parents are expecting a gesture of apology so…extravagant. Anyway, back to your story?

DAVE: Yes. So there I was, asking questions to my religion teacher. That’s what we called it. Religion. As if it was Physics or Pottery. I didn’t think anything of it at the time, but being marched to the church basement during the middle of elementary school seems like something of a violation of the law, doesn’t it? At the time though, we did what the grownups told us to do. They knew best!
(beat)
And so there I was, coming up with my questions. “Is hell real, and if so, what’s it like?”

My fourth grade religion teacher got very quiet. Her name was Mrs. Morris. Sweet lady. Tiny little glasses. Knit sweaters handmade in seascape patterns. She told this story of someone in the town - she named them by name but I don’t remember. Let's call him Hank. Well, Hank wasn’t a nice man. Made a lot of bad decisions in life. Drank a lot. Was mean to his family, even abusive. But Hank’s wife went to church regularly and prayed for him until her knees wore out the pues. Flash forward a few years and Hank has a heart attack. He’s legally dead for three whole minutes. And when Hank comes back after getting his chest beat in with a defibrillator, he’s a different person. Humble. Patient. Kind. Scared. He’s jumping at shadows, holding doors open for people, and goes to church with Mrs. Hank, Pious as Peter. She finally asks him what happened to him. What he saw. And he looks her straight in the eyes, his lips trembling. “I didn’t see anything,” he says. “I could barely move. But I knew I was laying down. I knew I was surrounded by something cold and dark on all sides, something I could never move, never dig through. I knew I was completely alone. And I knew I would be there - wide awake in all that cold, empty darkness - forever.” 

(beat)

I have no idea if that story is true. Meaning, I have no idea if that’s really how Hank told it to Mrs. Hank who told it to Mrs. Morris. But think about this for a second. For a kid wondering about the reality behind this holy trinity mumbo jumbo, if a fraction of this story is true, there’s two possibilities. One, the man died and went to hell and that is what hell is like. Or two - that’s just what it’s like when you die. And the problem with asking yourself *that* question? Is that it feels like blasphemy. It’s an almighty legal loophole, an instant get out of heaven free card. You start questioning Mrs. Morris, you might as well hock a loogie right into God's face. The ultimate damned if you do, damned if you don’t. So no, father, I don’t like being here. It reminds me of all those questions I asked, with answers that were more horrifying than what my prepubescent imagination could conjure up being delivered by a sweet, serene little old lady in bifocals and crocheted seagulls on her sweater. 

(pause)
You know they used to have these faces with wings hanging above the altar here? I would stare at them through every mass I was forced to go to. The eyes were blank and gold and their faces were wide open as if drowning or singing. I asked Mrs. Morris what they were one day. She didn’t know what I meant. I kept describing them just as I saw them, in simplest terms. “Gargoyles?” she’d ask. “We don’t have those.” No, not gargoyles. I brought her upstairs to point at them. She laughed at me. “Oh, David,” she said. “Those are just angels.” As if somehow that made it less horrifying. They had no bodies! Just - just heads with wings, mouths like collapsed stars, eyes like drowned zombies!
(beat)
Angels. That’s what I talked to those kids about at the Texarkana Terror Entrapment and Hayride of Heck. That’s what upset them so much.That’s what made some of them cry. 

FR BEN:  Are you sure that was everything, Dave?

DAVE: I lifted up my eyes and looked, and behold, a man clothed in linen, with a belt of fine gold from Uphaz around his waist. His body was like beryl, his face like the appearance of lightning, his eyes like flaming torches, his arms and legs like the gleam of burnished bronze, and the sound of his words like the sound of a multitude. Their entire bodies, including their backs, hands, and wings, were full of eyes all around, as were their four wheels. 

FR BEN: You’re jumping around from Daniel to Eziekel, and I’m sure centuries of poor translations haven’t helped but – 

DAVE: Why do they have wheels???

FR BEN:  I don’t think they’re for driving, they’re more like …spheres…with…eyes - what does any of this have to do with the Texarkana Terror Entrapment and Hayride of Heck?

DAVE: Well. I depicted them inside the Terror Entrapment. 

FR BEN: Angels?

DAVE: Yes. Two of them. Covered with eyes like torches, turning wheels, and faces like lightning. Ten children at a time entered the room, which was lit only by the angels' eyes and faces. And I stood between the two and patiently explained that these two angels were here to destroy the cities of the plains because God has grown angered by their parents' wickedness. If the angels could find ten good souls, they would lead us out of the city before God rained fire down over them and soured the soil, making the blue daylight look like night from all the smoke and ruin. “But you musn’t turn around,” I’d warn them. “If you look back at your home, God will be angry. Look what happened to the last person who turned around.” A pillar of salt in the shape of a screaming woman. Then, shouting from outside of the room. Demands that I let the children go, that I return them to the wicked citizens of the plains. And I asked the children - which do you prefer? Stay with them? Or leave with us? And the angels lifted up their hands in offering and the room filled with blinding white light.
(sighs)
It was my masterpiece.

FR BEN: So let me get this straight. In this year's haunted house, while other rooms were filled with werewolves, Draculas, and Frankensteins, you enacted a scene from Sodom and Gomorraah? 

DAVE: That’s right. 

FR BEN: Dave, that’s totally inappropriate! 

DAVE: Which is just what all those parents said, just like they’ve always said in their snide little whispers behind my back, calling for the closure of my store, petitioning to end the tradition of the town Terror Entrapment, demanding to rename the Hayride of Hell to the Hayride of Heck? Meanwhile, how do they treat their own children, Father? If they fail to live up to the hundreds of hypocritical rules in their holy handbook? Excuses to spread fear and hatred to their children, their neighbors. Excuses to drive them out, excuses to scorch the earth, excuses to turn them into nothing but pillars of salt. 

FR BEN: It’s the wrong emotion. 

DAVE: What?

FR BEN: You came in here talking about feeling fear. But that’s not it, Dave. It’s anger. Yes, it started with fear. The fact that you were force fed these beliefs, made to consider the possibility of hell at an impressionable age, made to subscribe to beliefs you found unbefitting. And you’re not completely wrong. There are people who misinterpret and abuse the word of God for their own self-interests. And some of them are in this town. But there are good people here too. And to me, there’s nothing scarier than God when he uses his power for destruction. With Noah. With Sodom. With Gomorah. And that’s exactly what you did. Those children were expecting the fun kind of fear, not the type that would make them question their beliefs, not the type that would confuse them, mix faith with fright. 

DAVE: Father. We are living with a world hurtling towards disaster, towards a future no ark or angel can save. And every day I have to look at these bright, knowledgeable kids growing up in a world which would rather see them shot in school than have…I don’t know, solar panels or drive electric cars. I don’t know what to do with that. I’m in that cold, dark place and I can’t dig through. 

FR BEN: And that makes you afraid. And that fear makes you angry. But you can’t take it out on the kids. It’s not their fault. Fear can be fun. It can also point out what’s wrong. But you can’t play god. You can’t bring fire and brimstone. You can’t damn the future before it happens. Use your gifts to point the way. Let these children find and express their own fear, their own anger, their own futures.

DAVE: (silence, then sigh) You’re right, Father. I guess I’ve heard good things about you for a reason… I’m not going to say any Hail Mary’s or anything like that. I – I hope that’s okay. 

FR BEN: It’s okay. But I want you to know you’re always welcome back. To confession, to church. Maybe I’ll even find a way to make it less scary for you.

DAVE: Well, those angel heads above the altar are gone, so that’s a nice start. But I seriously doubt I’ll be back. Still, thank you for talking. I – I feel a lot better, honestly.

FR BEN: Any ideas for next year?

DAVE: Yeah. Maybe a workshop where I try to take ideas from the middle school monster camp I run over the summer. 

FR BEN: (chuckles) I think that sounds like a …frighteningly good idea. 

DAVE: (sighs) Good while it lasted…