Christmas in Harmony by Philip Gulley

Author:Philip Gulley [Philip Gulley]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
ISBN: 9780061741302
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2007-10-26T04:00:00+00:00

Five

The Unveiling

Two weeks before Christmas, my office phone rang. It was Miriam Hodge, informing me that a special meeting of the elders committee had been called. There went my dream of a meeting-free month.

“I thought we were going to take December off,” I said.

Miriam sighed. “Dale Hinshaw asked to have a meeting, and got Opal Majors to go along. According to the rules, if two elders ask for a meeting, we have to do it.”

“What’s he want to talk about?”

“He mentioned something about running the plans for the Nativity scene by us.”

“For crying out loud,” I said. “How hard can it be? You nail together some boards, get a few people to stand around in bathrobes, throw a cow or two in the mix and you’re halfway home. What’s the big deal?”

“I’m not sure, but he wants to meet tonight at seven.”

“Tonight! Tonight’s the night Clevis Nagle is showing It’s a Wonderful Life at the Royal. I promised my wife and boys I’d take them. Rats!”

“Sam, why don’t you go ahead and take them. I’ll go to the meeting, then call you tomorrow to tell you what he’s up to. Sound good?”

“Thank you, Miriam. That’s real sweet of you. I appreciate your kindness.”

Having wormed my way out of an evening with Dale Hinshaw, I was in a mood to celebrate and offered to treat Frank to lunch at the Coffee Cup. We walked down the street, pulled open the door, and the bell tinkled as we went in. Vinny Toricelli looked up from the grill. “Change the subject, boys,” he called out. “The preacher’s here.”

There’s a price to be paid for pastoring in a small town. I never hear the juicier gossip, and the jokes are limited to priest-minister-and-rabbi golfing jokes, which I’ve heard a million times but have to laugh at anyway, lest I appear to be a poor sport.

Frank and I found a corner booth, across the room from the buffet, away from the traffic. I had to endure a few minutes of good-natured insults before the diners turned on someone else and I could study the menu in peace. Friday is meat-loaf day, unless you’re Catholic; then Vinny has codfish with tartar sauce, your choice of two sides, and sweet iced tea. With sufficient catsup, the meat loaf is tolerable, so I ordered that. Frank had the codfish, in honor of his deceased Catholic grandmother, who’d married a Protestant and was disowned by her family.

Frank makes it a point to mention that he is one-fourth Catholic whenever Dale is around. Dale pleads with him to listen to Eddie on the radio and learn the real truth about Catholics, the stuff the pope doesn’t want you to know. Like how if a Protestant marries a Catholic and they divorce, the Catholic gets the kids because of a secret deal the pope made with President Kennedy. If the Catholic parent dies, the pope gets the kids, which is why the pope’s house is so big. It is full of half-Protestant children who are being brainwashed.

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