Children of clergy -- Fiction; Clergy -- England -- Fiction
It was during the Gospel that Mark began to realize that what was being
said and done at the Altar demanded not merely his attention but also
his partaking. All the services he had attended since he came to
Slowbridge had demanded nothing from him, and even when he was at
Nancepean he had always been outside the sacred mysteries. But now on
this Whit-sunday morning he heard in the Gospel:
_Hereafter I will not talk much with you: for the prince of this world
cometh and hath nothing in me._
And while he listened it seemed that Jesus Christ was departing from
him, and that unless he were quick to offer himself he should be left to
the prince of this world; so black was Mark's world in those days that
the Prince of it meant most unmistakably the Prince of Darkness, and the
prophecy made him shiver with affright. With conviction he said the
Nicene Creed, and when the celebrating priest, a tall fair man, with a
gentle voice and of a mild and benignant aspect, went up into the pulpit
and announced that there would be a confirmation in his church on the
Feast of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary Mark felt in this
newly found assurance of being commanded by God to follow Him that
somehow he must be confirmed in this church and prepared by this kindly
priest. The sermon was about the coming of the Holy Ghost and of our
bodies which are His temple. Any other Sunday Mark would have sat in a
stupor, while his mind would occasionally have taken flights of
activity, counting the lines of a prayer-book's page or following the
tributaries in the grain of the pew in front; but on this Sunday he sat
alert, finding every word of the discourse applicable to himself.
On other Sundays the first sentence of the Offertory would have passed
unheeded in the familiarity of its repetition, but this morning it took
him back to that night in Church Cove when he saw the glow-worm by the
edge of the tide and made up his mind to be a lighthouse-keeper.
_Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works,
and glorify your Father which is in heaven._
"I will be a priest," Mark vowed to himself.
_Give grace, O heavenly Father, to all Bishops and Curates that they may
both by their life and doctrines set forth thy true and lively word, and
rightly and duly administer thy holy Sacraments._
"I will, I will," he vowed.
_Hear what comfortable words our Saviour Christ saith unto all that
truly turn to him. Come unto me all that travail and are heavy laden,
and I will refresh you._
Mark prayed that with such words he might when he was a priest bring
consolation.
_Through Jesus Christ our Lord; according to whose most true promise,
the Holy Ghost came down as at this time from heaven with a sudden great
sound, as it had been a mighty wind, in the likeness of fiery tongues,
lighting upon the Apostles, to teach them and to lead them to all
truth;_
The red chasuble of the priest glowed with Pentecostal light.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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