The Church

The first midnight Mass I ever went to was the turn of the century... . I remember so well this night. Father had a box sleigh, and there was Father, and Mother, and Mary, I don’t know whether Sue was home or not, and Helen and I. It was a bright night and our hill was awful bad. But when we went up to church and saw all the lights on, oh look here, we thought we were in New York, I guess. Such an experience. My God, but I’ll never forget it. That there was a turn of the century. They had Mass, you know; thanksgiving to God for the one year and another one starting.

We had a priest, Father Phalen, the man that was with the Vernon River church. He was Irish. He’d know Gaelic, too, I’d imagine. But this Father Phalen, oh God love him, it’s a good thing he’s not alive today. He wouldn’t live a minute. You know, he was terrific, a real strong religious person.

My land, the reverence you had years ago... . You’d go into church and you wouldn’t dare speak. They really had great faith years ago; no matter what religion they were, they seemed to have an awful good faith. I know there was people in Eldon used to walk to church, you know, when the travelling’d be bad. Now they wouldn’t go alongside the door. There’s not quite enough reverence now.

Catechism? My dear Heaven, you learned what sin was in those days. That was drilled into you. The Commandments, oh dear, dear, you’d get that right from the start. I think it was a good thing. The priest taught the whole class from the ones that were just starting to the ones that were near finishing... . I remember we’d go to school and go to catechism... . Between half—past nine and ten you’d be in catechism. We’d go in our bare feet; in fact, in the hot weather they’d teach catechism outside the church. And my, would you have to know your catechism.

And Sundays. Well, you were supposed to do nothing on Sunday, only go to church and come home, just go to church and stay around.

But anyway, when we were youngsters we liked to play ball. Just among ourselves; there was our family, about four or five or six. Mother and [Father] said they didn’t mind us doing it, [but] “Watch for this minister.” If the minister come over the hill we were supposed to stop. We would know what kind of a horse and wagon he had. But imagine that now. That that was an awful thing, to have four or five youngsters playing with a ball made out of yarn, and a bit of a stick you’d pick up; no bats at all. This was the idea that there was a scandal that the minister saw you playing with a ball.

126 BELFAST PEOPLE