BOOKS BREAD AND WINE
by Jack Casserly

A saintly American missionary returns to his hometown of Washington after 30 years in the African bush (Ghana). He is dying of malaria but suddenly is convinced it is the Church which is collapsing. He is stung by the modernism, wealth, and arrogance of priests who have deserted the humility and sanctity of Christ. Father Martin Mulloy confronts his brother, Donald, a monsignor and top official of the U.S. Catholic Conference. The Conference represents bishops and lay leaders of the Church. Donald was a brillant student and gifted administrator. Martin saw himself as a failure in school and as a missionary. He saw his three decades in the African bush thus because his relatively few converts kept one foot amid their pagan ancestors and rites and the other inside his hut churches. His home was a shack with no toilet or running water.

Martin was swept away by the flood of Washington traffic, the super-abundance of food and other stores, and large fashionable homes, yet a society struggling with mind-bending drugs and greater greed. Nothing disappointed him more, however, than the state of the modern Church--some dismissing communion as only symbolic, instituting general reconciliation instead of personal confession, removing the eucharist from the center of Church worship, tearing up altar rails, dismissing other church liturgy and traditions. He was startled to learn many priests told penitents that birth control was not sinful, nor was homosexuality a sin if one believed he or she was born that way. Each day, he confronted a new religious crisis. The worst was a circus mass performed by liberal nuns and laity. Through it all, Martin was held together by a scruffy, street-wise black grade-school wise guy, C.C. Brambles. In the end, Martin envisioned a miraculous idea. The cardinal of Washington summons him to a meeting. There is a final confrontation with his brother, and Martin offers a challenging response to modern Catholicism.