altar boy

As an altar server, Easter was a busy time for me. Particularly so given one of our priests had delusions of grandeur. To some extent, his ambitions were thwarted because church was built when our town was still a village and was of limited capacity. Easter is one of those times when all those Catholics who have fallen by the wayside briefly rediscover their faith and pile into the front pews at their local adopting a suitably pious expression. I may have only been twelve, but I had them sussed.

Our church was on the edge of a large diocese, the poor relation of much grander and newer constructions, so back then we had three priests taking care of business. It was always a bit worrying waiting to find out who were going to get dumped with. Our favorite was an Irish priest, Father O’Leary who, despite a fondness for strong drink, always stuck me as the most religious of all the priests I encountered. We once led him out on a standard Sunday morning service, walked up and stood either side of him in front of the altar. He genuflected, stood there for a moment and then walked back to the vestry without uttering a word, leaving us standing there with our backs to the congregation and exchanging confused sideways glances. Nowadays, I would take something like that in my stride and entertain the crowd with a sing-a-long of Bittersweet Symphony or Walking on the Moon, but we must both have been little more than ten years old so we all just dutifully stood there as if this was something that happened every Sunday, until he finally reemerged 10 minutes later to pick up where he left off.

Father Baldrick was the head honcho, the guy who wielded the power and decided who got what church. The one memory that really sticks with me was he would always ask for “a little bit of wine” to wash down the crumbs that were in the chalice that had contained the hosts when he was cleaning up after communion. Since this was Catholicism and he was having a post transubstantiation tidy round what he actually should have said was “could you give me a little more blood of Christ to wash down the body of Christ. Ta mate.” This obviously didn’t worry him greatly

But being the top of the pecking order in his little fiefdom, there was no risk he would trouble himself with a tiny little outstation of God, which usually meant we would get lumbered with priest number three.

That I can’t remember his name (Crichton, Compton?) is a testimony to how much he bored me. He probably was quite as religious as Father O’Leary but he was too intellectual for the common man, and particularly so for a 10 year old who thought Scooby Doo was the apex of entertainment. I think now that he might have been quite interesting to talk with, but 40minute sermons on philosophical interpretation of a single sentence from the bible were a little too abstract for most of the congregation. While I tried to sit still on my stool and maintain an expression of interest, I could hear the sounds of handbags being opened and closed, prayer books being dropped and general fidgeting in the pews.

But if his sermons were ambitious, they paled in comparison to his intellectual journeys when planning the Easter services. They always involved mass mobilization of the full army of altar servers; I think there were 6 to 8 of us, depending on the state of grace of some of the boys. We would have to attend several practice sessions leading up Easter week for Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday and Easter Sunday.

In these sessions complicated manoeuvres would be planned, each iteration more complicated that the last. We would fan out with Team A running up the left side of the chapel, Team B pulling hard to the left and Father C running up the centre with Team C. I’m surprised he never hit on the idea of copying the Red Arrows and adding colour smoke. But we weren’t allowed to glance across to recce the progress of the others so no matter how many times we practiced we never arrived at front of the church the same time. Inevitably, we would confuse Maundy Thursday with Good Friday and while he was laying prostrate in front of the altar, two altar boys would be somewhere at the back of the chapel wondering where the fuck everyone else went and whether they had just experienced a miracle.

And this was in an empty church without small kids, coats or handbags blocking our progress. To further complicate things when we entered the church one of us would be carrying a bucket of holy water, another had an oversized book of service (the bastard gig that no one wanted), two more with the thurible and incense and two more operating at the front and back of the procession running security.

And then there was the cross.

This was a small brass crucifix mounted on an 8 foot pole. Given I was short for my age, I still can’t figure out why I was assigned this responsibility. It was barely manageable when I was trying to make the turn from the entrance into the centre aisle, but when we did the stations of the cross along the side aisles, it was almost impossible to manoeuvre. The chapel was filled to bursting and there were 8 of us plus the priest trying to squeeze past the saved who were blocking our way.

We finished Station 6, jesus shoots but hits the crossbar, and packed up and tried to move to Station 7, Peter scores from the rebound. Everyone was coughing and hacking from the smoke that was pouring from the thurible as Father C tired to swing a device containing red hot coals without injuring anyone. This was then switched out for the holy water and the congregation was doused, presumably for safety reasons. I then had to try and lower the cross without poking anyone in the eye or losing my balance so we could all shuffled forward to the next Station. Witnessing our shabby progress, I couldn’t help thinking of the remnants of the Sixth Army retreating from Stalingrad.

The whole process must have taken an hour to complete and I could barely lift the cross when we were done. Little wonder I clipped it against the top of the threshold when we did our final exit.

My sister said the crucifix fell off the next week when they employed it at a mass at her school. She said she spent the remainder of the service considering the religious implications, I’m sure Father C would have been happy to discuss it at length.

Anyway, a Happy Easter and Tomb Cleaning festival to everyone.

Author: cyanide bunny

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