I grew up catholic. I’m still a devout catholic. Nonetheless I would like to tell you about the things my priest put me through as a child. I’s not what you think, I wasn’t abused. My parents trusted me with our priest not because they had some sort blind faith in him, but because he was quite obviously into older ladies, like a lot older. How celibate he was, I couldn’t tell you, but he used to be very friendly to all the grandmas in the congregation. He barely tolerated little boys, like I was back then, around him.
It was the bishop who forced him to spend a lot of time with me.
You see I was what is called a Companion of Saint Vitus.
That my name is also Vitus, is no coincidence. When my mother was pregnant with me, she had a dream of the saint and he told her, I would be a special child, blessed by God. Saint Vitus was a Roman child, who was executed by the Romans for being a Christian, back when that was illegal. He is considered the patron saint of actors, comedians, dancers and epilepsy. However, another group adopted him as their patron saint: monsters.
There is a superstition among monsters, that if they confess their sins in the presence of a Companion of Saint Vitus and a priest of course, they can still be saved from hell. Not the confession part, that is part of Christian teaching, the traumatising a young child with all those detailed stories of maiming and cannibalising innocents.
It all started a week after my First Holy Communion. The priest came to my parents and insisted that he must take me to the bishop right away.
“Mr. and Ms. Summers, the bishop requests to see your son, Vitus. I am to take him to his excellency this afternoon.”
“What does his excellency need from our boy?”, my dad asked.
“He needs your son’s help, Mr. Summers.”
“With what could a small boy possibly help the bishop?”
“I’m afraid I can’t tell you that.”
“But how does the bishop even know of us and our son,” asked mom.
“His excellency has heard very good things of your family.”
My parents were hesitant at first, but eventually gave in. How could they keep the bishop waiting, after all.
Our priest wasn’t very good with children, as already mentioned. All the way to the bishop, he didn’t say a word to me. The bishop was a lot friendlier. He was waiting for us with three other priests.
“Bless you, my child. These are Father John, Father Thomas and Father Augustine. They will be seeing you every day next week. They need to talk to you and see how strong you are. I’ve told them, you’re a very brave and strong young man, but they want to see for themselves,” said the bishop with a wide, friendly smile on his face.
“Sure” was the only thing that would come out my mouth. I was very nervous. Had I known, what awaited me, I would have said, “No way, your excellency, I’m not your guinea pig!”
“Very good. Next Sunday we must meet again, I have a very important job for you.”
The three priests, as it turns out, were also psychologists. I was brought to see them every day of the week. They started with very normal, even innocuous questions about my family, about school, but then their questions got progressively weirder. They asked about diseases, death, serial killers and demons. I was never to tell my parents what we were talking about during our sessions. I didn’t understand then, why. At least the priest psychologists were friendly and seamed to like my responses.
On Sunday they brought be to the bishop. It was after Mass. He had a lot of prayer books with him and a big Bible.
“My son, you and I are going to hear a confession today.”
“What kind of confession?”
“A confession of sins, of course, the holy sacrament of Reconciliation, you know that, don’t you?”
“Yeah, I’ve already been to confession.”
“Very good.”
“But isn’t that supposed to be only between you and the priest?”
“Yes, indeed. Between us, the priest who hears the confession and God. But this is different … “
“Why?”
“A very bad man has done very bad things. Now he wants to become a good man. But he only want to go to confession, if you specifically are present.”
“But why me?”
“I’m not sure … Now, look. This man has done some very, very bad things, are you sure, you are okay with hearing all that?”
“Yeah, sure!”
“Very well, but you have to swear before God and all the saints, you will never tell anybody, not even your parents, what this man did.”
He made me repeat after him a solemn oath. It’s also possible he made that up on the spot, there might not have been any precedent for this.
We entered a small room. The priest psychologists were there with a very tall, slender person. His hands and feet were in chains and he was covered with a white sheet from head to toe. I thought he was a ghost. Oh, if only he were just a ghost, and not the abomination before God, he actually was.
“I see, you’ve brought the Companion of Saint Vitus,” said the monster in a very deep, growly voice. I was so terrified, I was literally shaking.
“Why are his hand and feet in chains?” I managed to whisper to Father John, who was nearest to me.
“I asked them to bind me, so I wouldn’t attack them!” growled the monster.
“Why would you attack them!”
“To eat them, of course!” He was laughing maniacally.
I hid behind the bishop.
“You, Companion of Saint Vitus, I can’t hurt, even if I want to. Believe me, I tried.” Again he laughed that terrifying laughter.
“That’s how I know, you are a true Companion of Saint Vitus. I’ve seen you with your mom in the park one evening. I tried to eat you two, but before I could attack I felt a strong pain inside. I hadn’t felt any pain ever since I’d become a monster.The closer I got, the worse the pain …” The monster’s voice got quieter and trailed off.
He began to tell us his life story. I won’t tell you, what he said, because of my oath. But whatever you can possibly imagine, doesn’t even come close. When he was finished, the bishop said the formula of absolution.
“You must forgive me, too, Companion!”
I was unable to say anything, so terrified was I.
“Say it!” he yelled.
“I forgive you … “ I whispered.
“Well nothing is happening. I thought after … “
He began convulsing violently and fell to the floor. The sheet fell off him and I could see him. He had scales all over his body, black, iridescent scales. He had no ears and no nose, just nostrils and ear holes. His arms were very long and he had sharp, long claws. After a few minutes of convulsions and screaming, he begin to shrink, his arms shrank, too, he grew a nose and ears and eventually became fully human. Then the convulsions stopped. Exhausted, the former monster began to whisper a prayer and promptly died.
As you can imagine, I wet myself with fear.
Word travels fast among monsters, I guess. Soon more and more monsters came and the exact thing would play out with all of them. They only stopped coming to die, when I was 13 years old. Why they stopped then, I can only speculate. I think it’s because Saint Vitus was executed when he was 13.
Over the next years, the priest psychologists became my best friends. I’m still in therapy after all this years. Sometimes, I visit Father Augustine. He is still alive, the others have passed away. We sit together and reminisce about our time in therapy, but never about our sessions with the monsters.
My younger sister called me yesterday. She says, she had a dream of Saint Vitus. She is pregnant in the 6th month.