For my dear son, Fr. Paul, S.J.
Advent 1952. Twelve years old,
and I’m pedaling my bike over the rainswept
playgrounds and back streets of Levittown
four miles north to the World War Two
aircraft hangar, recently converted into
St. Bernard’s Catholic Church, with its black
doors, white clapboard sides, glass windows
and those old-fashioned altar railings.
Father stands with his biretta to my right
as I kneel there in my white alb and black
cassock and begin reciting from the ancient
psalm in Latin, back and forth with Father.
Introíbo ad altáre Dei, he intones.
I will go up to the altar of God. And I follow,
not understanding the depth of those words,
not then, but reciting them even so,
as others have for centuries before.
Ad Deum qui laetificat juventutem
meam. To God, who gives joy to my youth.
Say it! Say it now at eighty-four,
as you did those years ago. Only clearer,
with more joy, words that keep the heart
young and ever-hopeful, even as you near
the end of your journey. And now,
even as you keep forgetting where you put
your keys or credit card or hearing aids,
remember this. Is it the end, or is it really
the beginning, as you half wobble to the altar,
where a priest, not even born back then, offers you
the Host, Christ’s Body, and you take Him
into yourself as He takes you into Himself, Ad Deum
qui laetificat. Yes, the joy of your youth. Then, and now.
