Wrestling With God Read online

  WRESTLING WITH GOD

  ALSO BY DON HANLEY

  How to Live with Yourself and Enjoy it

  How to Live with Your Partner and Enjoy it

  Love by its First Name

  Copyright © 2019 by Don Hanley

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopied, recorded of otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the publisher of this book, except by a reviewer who wishes to quote brief passages in connection with a review written for insertion in a magazine, newspaper, broadcast, website, blog or other outlet.

  First Edition

  ISBN: 978-1-970107-01-2 (paperback)

  ISBN: 978-0-9986838-9-8 (ebook)

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2018964025

  Wrestling With God is published by: Top Reads Publishing, LLC, USA

  For information please direct emails to:

  [email protected]

  Cover design: Teri Rider

  Book layout and typography: Teri Rider & Associates

  ebook conversion by Word2Kindle

  DEDICATION

  I dedicate this book to Bishop David Maloney who condemned

  me as a FREETHINKER, and to Father Bob Blanpied who

  encouraged me to accept that as a compliment and to continue

  'wrestling' with God.

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  I would like to thank Dr. Joseph Dillon, my friend of fifty plus years, who continually gave me support and encouragement in my life and particularly for challenging me in my thinking as I wrote these pages. Three members of my writing group, Russ Shor, Ed Coonce, and Patty Clark, were especially helpful with their suggestions, corrections and weekly support over the months of writing. Ghada Osman, Emily Corner, and Emily Gilmore, were helpful with their support and suggestions.

  Over the many years of my personal and professional life, I have encountered several hundred students, interns, and therapy clients who have shared their 'wrestling' dilemmas and challenges with me. I have learned a great deal from their experiences and I am grateful for the trust they have shown me as they shared their triumphs, challenges, and angst with me.

  All of these people have enhanced my life and my understanding of my very self, and I so appreciate their generosity and trust. My journey of life has been a wonderful special and spiritual pilgrimage.

  Contents

  Chapter 1 REBECCA

  Chapter 2 REBECCA

  Chapter 3 JERRY

  Chapter 4 REBECCA

  Chapter 5 JERRY

  Chapter 6 REBECCA

  Chapter 7 JERRY

  Chapter 8 REBECCA

  Chapter 9 JERRY

  Chapter 10 REBECCA

  Chapter 11 REBECCA

  Chapter 12 JERRY

  Chapter 13 REBECCA

  Chapter 14 REBECCA

  Chapter 15 REBECCA

  Chapter 16 JERRY

  Chapter 17 JERRY

  Chapter 18 JERRY

  Chapter 19 REBECCA

  Chapter 20 JERRY

  Chapter 21 REBECCA

  Chapter 22 REBECCA

  Chapter 23 JERRY

  Chapter 24 JERRY

  Chapter 25 REBECCA

  Chapter 26 REBECCA

  Chapter 27 REBECCA

  Chapter 28 REBECCA

  Chapter 29 REBECCA

  Chapter 30 JERRY

  Chapter 31 JERRY

  Chapter 32 REBECCA

  Chapter 33 REBECCA

  Chapter 34 JERRY

  Chapter 35 REBECCA

  Chapter 36 JERRY

  Chapter 37 REBECCA

  Chapter 38 JERRY

  Chapter 39 REBECCA

  About the Authors

  Chapter 1

  REBECCA

  It was 12 o'clock, noon as I drove onto the grounds of Missouri State Correctional Institution, Booneville, Missouri. It was a rather bleak place with cold, plain gray one-story buildings that seemed to stretch on forever. The gravel driveway and parking and nearby buildings were surrounded by brown shrubs. I wondered if they had just lost their green because it was November, or because no one was watering them. The chill in the air and an overcast sky hinted at rain or, possibly, snow. The chill matched my feelings.

  I was nervous. I was taking a leap in the dark. I had never visited a prison before and never even had met the "friend" whom I was about to visit. As I got out of my Prius, I shook out my coat and straightened my back. Glancing at my gray pants, I remembered the admonition to dress down and not look provocative in any way. Before leaving home, I asked my husband if I had succeeded. He responded as I expected, "No, but then you'd look sexy in a gunny sack." The first time he had said that, I had asked what a gunny sack was.

  Before me stood a flat-roofed building with the word VISITORS in foot-high letters and I followed an elderly couple toward the door. The reporter in me wondered what their story was that weighed down their every step. Visiting a son? The fifty-yard walk allowed me to shake off some of my nervousness and focus. A woman with three children looking to be elementary school age followed me. Looking around, I felt sure that the cluster of buildings contained a thousand stories—all sad.

  I followed the couple up to a low counter. I handed my visitor approval letter to a young woman in a guard's uniform and a holstered gun at her waist. I had expected a gorilla-looking guy, and so I was surprised by the attractive young woman. She smiled and that helped me to relax a bit. I guessed her to be about ten years younger than me, so she'd be in her mid-twenties. I wondered how she got along in this very male environment. At that age, I wouldn't have lasted a day. I had been raped by a step-father, so I ended up marrying the safest man I had ever met in my life. He was a Catholic priest only a few years older than me and fortunately for me, seemingly had never noticed that he was a very handsome dude, with a personality to match.

  I had the good fortune to have visited him in his parish in a dinky little town where he had been exiled after saving an abortion doctor in Aberdeen, Kansas. The doctor was about to be shot by an anti-abortion female picketer when the priest, Jerry Haloran, stepped in and grabbed her gun. Jerry got shot in the leg for his trouble. The experience did something to him, for he later gave a sermon condemning his Church's entire catalog of teachings on sexuality. I was assigned to interview him for my magazine, Women Today. Now, three years later, I am his wife and have been assigned to interview an inmate at this Missouri State Prison.

  The young woman guard gave me back my letter approving my visit to the prison inmate, Jack Carroll. She directed me to a row of metal chairs backed up against a dull gray-green wall in need of fresh paint. The overhead fluorescent light was equally dismal; this was not the waiting room in your doctor's office. The older couple seemed huddled together as if warding off the cold, and the young mother did her best to rein in her kids. I was told I would be called in a few minutes.

  I had time to visit the ladies' room, and while there I examined the toilet tissue as Jerry had suggested. It definitely was single ply, as he guessed it would be, and he told me how I could use it in my interview. It sounded stupid to me, but I promised to go along.

  I sat down beside the elderly couple and smiled to myself that I was just about as nervous as I had been that day I first met my future husband, the Catholic priest. He was re-setting a wooden cross, felled by a "mild" Kansas tornado, atop the steeple, and peered down upon me, as if from heaven. Looking like a carpenter, instead of a priest, helped me see at least part of his human side, but his response to my request for an interview was far from positive. I said, "I'd like to talk to you."

  His resp
onse was, "Get lost!" I hate to admit it, but I think that my so-called, 'good looks,' was helpful in getting to stay and talk with him and spend time with him - even get to ride a horse for the first time in my life. I had come to the little village in fear and trepidation and left on a high because of the energy I found in the two women and the priest. I don't know what I was expecting with the priest, but Jerry Haloran wasn't it. I left Paris wondering if the priest—maybe—could see me as a true friend, or, damn it, maybe even as a lover. Did priests ever have those kind of thoughts?

  When I returned to St. Louis, our relationship seemed to have been reduced to an occasional phone call. I contented myself with an occasional date with Larry Skutter, a fairly wealthy stockbroker who was as exciting as mud, even though he took me to places and events I could never have afforded. Three months after my Kansas weekend, my Father Wonderful called me at 3:00 in the morning. His message was not wonderful. Jerry had told me about a girl at his Aberdeen parish who had been raped and impregnated by her step-father and when Jerry wouldn't help her get an abortion, she committed suicide. Well, the step-father had attempted to rape her sister and the mother, Angela Kurtz, and the sister, Julie ran from the bastard and now was in Jerry's house in Paris, Kansas. The rapist threatened to kill both mother and daughter, if he caught them. Jerry remembered that she, Rebecca, had a friend who worked with run-away girls and women and could probably find them a place in St. Louis. I told him that I was sure I could find a place, and I did.

  Everyone, including Father Jerry, Alice, and Marge, was impressed with my article and told me so. Jerry was called into the bishop's office and the bishop told him that he must give a sermon and write an article retracting all that he had said in the first sermon and what he was quoted in the article. The bishop condemned Jerry as a "Free Thinker." That tickled Jerry, and he and the bishop got in an ongoing feud over it. I hoped it would help push the big dummy out of that awful celibate life of his. By this time, we were in rather constant phone and twitter contact with one another, but, irritatingly, not any closer to "consummating"—Jerry's word—our relationship. Jerry did manage to say he wanted to, though.

  Anyway, that was over three years ago, the happiest years of my life, with more of the same ahead of me - with Jerry.

  I awoke from my reverie when the mother and three children came out of the restroom and sat down in my row of chairs. The youngest, a girl, asked, "Are you visiting your husband or boyfriend?"

  "Neither, just a friend." I shook my head and found that my nervousness returned as I thought about why I was here. I had read the invitation letter from Jack Carroll, the inmate who had invited me, so many times, I knew it almost by heart.

  My Dear Friend, Rebecca,

  I hope that you remember me, Rebecca. We met many years ago when we both were much younger. I have been reading issues of Women Today magazines that a fellow inmate receives from his sister. I particularly like the articles you have written—especially those of afew years ago about Father Jerry Haloran. I understand that he is now your husband.

  Besides possibly renewing our friendship, the purpose of this letter is to ask for your help in exposing a rather important person whose position in his organization is hurting many people, especially children. I have chosen you because, after reading your articles in the magazine, I believe you are the kind of person who will understand why and how to expose him. Also, the article about your own life, and your marriage, indicates that you have the courage to help me with this project.

  I am sure that you have noticed that I am an inmate at the Missouri State Correctional Institution (aka, prison or penitentiary), at Booneville, MO. I cannot go into detail about the project in this letter because it must be kept very confidential. I know this must sound very fishy to you but suffice it to say that it involves Haloran'sprevious institution. Not him, personally, but his previous employment.

  Please feel free to talk this over with Mr. Haloran and with the hope that you will help me, I am enclosing an application for permission to visit the facility in Booneville. Where it says "Relationship," write "Friend." I hope that you are well and that our friendship will blossom.

  At the bottom was the address for the "Visitors' Room" and Jack's own address and inmate number. Sitting there in the waiting room, I again smiled as I recalled his signing the letter, "Your Eternal Friend, Jack." I assumed that he did not want whoever stamped the red letters over the page "MISSOURI STATE DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS" to think he did not know me from John Grissom.

  Through a lawyer friend of ours, I found out that Carroll had confessed that when he was young, he killed his drunken father who had been beating his mother. This, of course, brought up a lot of issues with Jerry, that maybe even time and love will never heal. Jerry had accidently killed his father when he was fourteen. His father, too, had been beating his mother. The memory had been haunting him all his life. Our love helped him but not completely, but we're working on it. Jerry's killing did not result in an arrest, but Carroll was convicted of second-degree murder and given a prison term of thirty years.

  Jerry and I had mulled over the letter for several days. At first both of us were of a mind to just ignore it. But then, I had not had what I considered an important article since I went back to work six months after our daughter, now two and a half, was born. That and the idea that I might help stop some kind of abuse of children compelled me to start pushing to make the trip to Booneville. Jerry and I both finally decided that I had nothing to lose by visiting Jack Carroll. Gayle Mathews, my editor, also, encouraged me to look into it. (I had redeemed myself in her eyes because of the article I penned about Jerry.) It took three weeks to set the date and get a letter approving my visit.

  A voice blared over the loud speaker, "Rebecca Brady?"

  I approached the counter near the young woman with the gun. I was building a name for myself as a journalist, and the name was "Brady." Having defied convention already by leaving the priesthood, Jerry did not protest when I insisted on keeping my name after we got married. I went through the airport-like screening and into another waiting room. I again waited for a few minutes and then was summoned to join the little group to go to a small white bus that looked like a school bus. We were taken through a gate in the tall, concertina wire-topped chain-link fence and driven about four or five blocks to another building. It looked like it was connected to the larger buildings that contained the prisoners' cells.

  It was 1:00 p.m. when we were asked to show our approval form and ID to a female guard and entered a door marked "Sallyport." I wondered what Sally had to do with the door's name. The mother with her three children, the elderly couple, and I stood in a wide hall about twelve feet long. The Sallyport closed and before I could feel too boxed in, another one of Sally's doors opened at the other end. A guard looked at our forms and directed the family and the couple to two separate doors and when they left, the guard said to me, "Glad to see Doc get another visitor—you're the first in a few years."

  I was as puzzled by his remark as I had about Jack's saying he had met me before, but went along and said, "Yes, I have been neglecting him. It will be good to see him again." I had glimpsed into the space the other two visitors had gone through and one had a table and the other a smaller space with a window, but no table. I was happy when I saw that the room that was opened for me was larger than either of the other two and had a table and two chairs—all bolted to the floor. I supposed they were afraid some visitors, or maybe an inmate, might use a chair as a weapon.

  I sat down and waited only a minute before the side door opened and a handsome man, looking to be in his early forties with salt and pepper, short cropped hair, and a welcoming smile, entered, holding out his hand. He reminded me of George Clooney. When I reached out to shake his hand, he took my hand in both of his and softly said, "Thank you, Rebecca, for accepting my invitation and joining me. Thank you very, very much. It means a lot to me." Surprisingly, he had relaxed and twinkling blue eyes. I thought I had seen
him, or a picture of him, before, but wasn't sure.

  I couldn't help but smile. His greeting seemed to be so genuine and open. His manner was more like a country squire, welcoming a long-time friend, than a prisoner greeting someone he didn't know. I surprised myself by saying, "Well, right now, I am happy to be here. Your smile helps. Visiting you isn't quite like running down to the local café, or even seeing you in the hospital. Obviously, they don't let just anyone through that ugly gate."

  "I'm sorry about that. I do hope that you will be rewarded by the information I will provide that will result in a good story—or two or three. And I'm looking forward to meeting your husband. He sounds like an interesting fellow."

  "Yes, he is. At least I think so. That last guard said he was glad to see 'Doc' get a visitor. I wonder why he called you 'Doc,' and why you haven't had visitors."

  "I've somehow gotten the moniker 'Doc' because I've managed to get a couple of degrees since I've been here. In this place that's like being a reincarnation of Einstein or something. The warden has asked me to teach some classes on personal understanding. I enjoy it and do some advising. And so, the name Doc. About the visitors, my mother visited regularly up until about three years ago when she transitioned to another world."

  "'Transitioned.' That sounds like something the Native Americans say rather than saying a person died. I like it and I'm guessing you like it too. Oh! I was asked to question you about why the prison buys John Wayne toilet paper?"

  Jack smiled and almost yelled, "What in hell is John Wayne toilet paper?"

  "Single-ply paper that is rough, tough, and don't take no shit off nobody," I grinned.

  Jack almost fell off his chair laughing. "Who would ask you to ask me about that? And why?"

  "My husband Jerry. And he said I had a pretty good 'bullshit meter' about telling whether or not a person is telling the truth, and the question about John Wayne toilet paper would tell me whether you would have a sense of humor. If you didn't laugh, working with you would be a real drag. So, I think you passed."