Father Mulcahy's Christmas Eve sermon

[fatherfjmulcahy]

Who: Father Mulcahy
What: Christmas sermon
Where: The church
When: Future dated to Christmas Eve
Status: Closed sermon--but if any characters want to socialize post-sermon, they're free to. Unfortunately, Father Mulcahy won't be available--he's busy playing Santa afterwards.
Rating: PG

Comments

[fixgaeta]

Felix wasn't a religious man. Never been. His expertise was in science and math and tangible things. Not some abstract notion of Gods and Goddesses that held the minds of his friends in religious slavery. The Cylons had their God too, and killed for His purpose. Brother Cavil had taken the Colonel's eye and called it heaven's justice.

And when Baltar began to preach the word...

Well, what little respect Felix had left for that scum of a man evaporated.

In the end, religion just...wasn't in his nature.

Friendship, however, was.

--

He sat in one of the pews to the middle of the smallish church filled with a generous amount of people as they listened to Father Mulcahy speak. The man had done so much for him, been a good friend and a good ear. Felix didn't think -- no, he knew that it wouldn't have been the same for him if he hadn't found someone to talk to in those days. The lowest days

[fatherfjmulcahy]

Father Mulcahy had some Santa business to do after the sermon, but he had seen Felix in the pew and wanted to say hello after the service.

"Hello, Felix!" he said with a smile and a warm handshake. "Thank you for coming! How are you?"

[fixgaeta]

"Um, I'm alright!" He smiled awkwardly, taking the Father's hand with a firm shake. "That was a..." A pause. He needed to be polite despite his convictions. "Very lovely sermon."

[fatherfjmulcahy]

"I'm glad to hear that," Father Mulcahy said. He smiled a little at Felix's words, hearing the hesitance. "It's all right, Felix. I know this isn't your belief system, and I appreciate both your coming and your kind words. What are you doing for the holiday?"

[decreeddarkness]

Adam Carter missed his family terribly. He missed his home, he missed his colleagues, but most of all he missed Wes. It was Christmas Eve, and although Christmas hadn't been the same since Fiona had died, the two of them, father and son, had begun to build their own traditions in the years since

[fatherfjmulcahy]

Father Mulcahy was on his way out, but the solitary man in the pew caught his attention. The priest crossed to the man, wondering what his story was and what had brought him here tonight.

"Hello, my son," he said. "Thank you for coming. How are you tonight?"

[decreeddarkness]

By habit, Adam lied. It was vital to his occupation; lives were lost or preserved on the strength of a dissemination. They came as easily to him as truth. More easily sometimes, when truth became a confused, uncertain thing, as fluid and treacherous as quicksand in a tidal bay.

Yet tonight, although he wanted to, he found he could not lie. "If I am to be honest, I'm rather lost." He directed an apologetic expression at the priest. How much more often did he hear the negative than the positive, in his line of work? Much like Adam's own, if only in that respect.

[fatherfjmulcahy]

Father Mulcahy frowned gently, moving closer to the man. His instinct in any situation was to help, particularly when someone admitted that they needed help as readily as this man did. "Lost how? Would you like to talk about it?"

[never_blink]

Clarice, too, sat quietly in a pew on her own. The lavender-skinned girl hardly blended with the crowd, but most of the town was used to seeing her by now, so she was left alone. She wore the dress she'd picked out for Lulu's dinner later, under a plain winter coat and a pink-and-red scarf, and she had a small, wrapped package tucked into one of the pockets.

As the sermon went on, she closed her eyes, the better to listen without being distracted by the people around her. She was no stranger to uncertainty. Father Mulcahy's words seemed to whisper to her that it was all right, that God had a reason for everything, even if His humble children couldn't always understand what it was. That it was all right not to understand, but simply to do your best and to trust.

Afterward, as people mingled and started to drift out, Clarice crept up the side aisle to the now-empty front pew. She left the package there, neatly wrapped in Christmas paper with a bow and a tag that read:

to: father mulcahy

[fatherfjmulcahy]

Several days later, a small parcel appeared on Clarice's doorstep. It contained a recording of Handel's Messiah as performed by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, and a note:

Dear Clarice,

Thank you so much for the thoughtful gift! I have listened to the songs several times through already and enjoy them very much. I saw you at the sermon and also wanted to thank you for coming.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you! I must admit I don't know the first thing about what to get a young girl, so I include instead one of my favorite religious recordings. I hope you like it.

Your friend,
Father Francis Mulcahy

[biggorramhero]

Jayne had not sat in a house of worship in a long time. He took religion in bits and pieces as it happened by, and that suited him, but to actually sit as a part of a church congregation and listen to a lengthy sermon felt familiar as only something from a far-distant childhood can. He could almost smell the acrid smoke that hung in the air over Sunderland; could almost hear machinery clanking and rattling in the distance behind the cadence of the sermon. Almost expected to find his mother and brother beside him, but when he glanced over without thinking, an unfamiliar woman sat there. She'd given him several feet of extra space in the pew, too. Ma always sat close, so she could give her sons a sharp nudge with her elbow or a hissed scolding if their attention wandered.

Without her there, Jayne's attention was free to wander. The content of the sermon was pretty much lost on him; he thought instead about the past, about home, about Matty and Ma and Sunderland, about the Shepherd, and before he'd quite finished thinking, it was over.