“The last time you were here and you said that things were always happening to me, that I wasn’t in control of my life—it really hit a chord inside. You were absolutely right. But my first thought was that that’s the way to be a Christian. Christ was passive. Things were always happening to him. He wasn’t in control.
“But that’s not logical. I guess I had been at least subconsciously modeling my life on what I thought was the imitation of Christ. But it’s not that way. Christ was assertive. God! St. Paul was aggressive, wasn’t he? I mean taking it to the Gentiles and all that. Standing up to St. Peter. And it was Christ who started them all off. Go and teach all nations, he said. You can’t say that and then want a bunch of passive, submissive people on your side, can you?”
The two young men spent more than an hour in a similar vein. Koesler wondered about the origin of this conversation. Ridley gave every indication that somehow, somewhere, he had found a fresh enthusiasm.
In the two earlier visits, Koesler had been moved by Ridley’s depression, inertia, and passivity. This, today, was a new Ridley Groendal. Koesler found the change in Ridley’s attitude refreshing. So he encouraged Ridley with more examples of positive, confident, assertive Christians through the centuries. It was not difficult to find illustrations.
Koesler had no way of knowing that on that warm June afternoon In St. Joseph’s Retreat, he was present at the rebirth, the literal metamorphosis of Ridley C. Groendal. Their conversation was innocuous enough. To Koesler it seemed no more than an exercise in selective Church history. A sort of pious pep talk.
It was much more than that for Ridley Groendal. It did indeed mark the emergence of a radical change in his personality. Groendal was by no means the first nor the last to twist the Christian ethic to suit his own purpose. But he did it.
What had begun as an emphasis on Christian assertiveness quickly translated into a profound selfishness. His creed became, “Do unto others, then split.”
As he applied his newfound ethic to his life, past and future, he solemnly vowed he would never again be vulnerable. As Christ had been in control of His life, even when He did not seem to be, so Groendal would be in control. It meant a 180 degree turn, but it had to be done. It had to be done if he would be master of his fate as Christ had been.
Groendal had already pinpointed the four people who had most manipulated him. He held them responsible for, among other things, his double loss of vocation: life as a professional musician, then life as a Catholic priest. In the end, they were responsible for putting him here, in a sanitorium.
Nor was there any reason to believe they were done with him now. They, and others like them, would try to gain control of him again. But, just as Jesus Christ took control of His life and was always at least one jump ahead of His enemies, so would Groendal manipulate before being manipulated.
He had a lot of planning to do. This change in his lifestyle could not occur overnight. He’d spent twenty-one years building this passive compliant character. He could not tear it apart and rebuild it instantly. But with the fierce determination now motivating him, it surely would not take much time to turn things around.
Bob Koesler was not to see Ridley Groendal again for almost thirty-five years. Koesler would follow Ridley’s career as would almost every other literate American. But the two would not talk again until, a little more than a year before his premature death, Groendal would move back to the Detroit area and into St. Anselm’s parish. There the two would meet again. They would have periodic conversations lasting well into the night.
And always, inevitably, Ridley Groendal would expound on his peculiar philosophy. A righteous morality that had earned him many, many enemies. A theology that Groendal equated with Christianity but which, in reality, was a stark mockery of the values that Christ taught.
It was only gradually that Father Koesler realized that this bizarre lifestyle of which Groendal boasted had begun on a day in June 1950. Not only had Koesler been present at the beginning, he had assisted in the birth. Even presented with all the evidence, he could scarcely believe it.
The Canon
15
The gifts of bread and wine had been prepared. The altar, the Paschal Candle and the casket had been incensed. Clouds of incense had dissipated and spread throughout the church. Hours later, members of the congregation would still be able to detect its distinctive odor on their clothing.
The Funeral Mass, now called the Mass of Resurrection, proceeded into its most solemn stage. During the Canon—so-called because it contained the standard, never-varying words of consecration—the same words spoken by Christ at the Last Supper are spoken by the priest over the bread and wine. According to Catholic faith, at the consecration Jesus Christ becomes present under the appearance of bread and wine.
With more than one priest present at Mass, It became a common post-Vatican II custom for all the priests present to concelebrate. All the priests would, as one, speak aloud the words of consecration. Several of the priests standing at the altar with the principal concelebrant—in this case Father Koesler—would take turns reading the various other prayers of the Canon.
With that sort of activity, Koesler could have predicted that his mind would wander again while others were reading. And he was correct.
His first distraction centered on Charlie Hogan. Koesler wondered whether Charlie would join in the concelebration. Even though, in the words of Church law, he had been “reduced to the lay state,” doctrine held that “once a priest, always a priest.” Technically, Koesler thought, Charlie had the power to consecrate, though formally he was forbidden, under ordinary circumstances, to exercise that power. So if Charlie concelebrated quietly from his pew, Koesler guessed it would be valid but illicit. He also guessed that Charlie wouldn’t give much of a damn about liceity.
Charlie Hogan had plowed ahead a steady four years behind Koesler in the seminary. So that when Koesler was ordained a priest in 1954, Hogan was graduating from Sacred Heart Seminary College. Just where Koesler and Groendal had been when “the incident” had occurred.
In time, almost everyone forgot what had happened between Groendal and Hogan. As far as other seminarians were concerned, punishment had been administered and the matter was finished. Hogan had been grounded from Easter until summer vacation began. And Groendal had been expelled. Officially, he had resigned. But everyone knew.
At least three people never forgot: Groendal, Hogan, and Koesler.
For Groendal, the incident was one of the straws that had broken his emotional back and helped beget his new philosophy and lifestyle.
It had had an intense effect on Hogan. The most significant manifestation was his withdrawal. He continued to participate in intramural sports, but only for exercise. Athletics no longer seemed to attract him. And winning was no longer either the most important or the only thing. Most of all, he distanced himself from the other students. He seemed to fear that any friendship could or would be construed as a “particular friendship.” And he was determined that would never again happen.
Koesler remained part of this living memory simply because he was a friend of both principals. He had been a confidant of Ridley Groendal. He was to become a confidant of Charlie Hogan.
Hogan was ordained in June of 1958. He invited Koesler to preach at his first Mass the day after his ordination. The invitation was intended and taken as a great honor. Those invited to play a part in a first solemn Mass were among the priest’s closest friends.
Thereafter, while they were by no means inseparable or even the closest of friends, Hogan and Koesler would be partners in an occasional round of golf or join the same group of clerical diners at the close of an invigorating day off.
What happened to Charlie Hogan and so many other priests of his vintage and younger was, as much as anything else, an accident of chronology. At least that was Bob Koesler’s opinion.
Six months after Charlie’s ordination Pope John XXIII ordered that two things be done. He called for a worldwide council of the Church. It would be known as the Second Vatican Council, or simply, Vatican II. He also
