And then one Sunday he’d heard a reading about the fruits of sin and, as sometimes happened during mass, he’d been struck with a sudden clarity, a message that seemed intended just for him. This time, though, the clarity had torn his breath from him and churned his stomach so that he’d feared that he might vomit. He’d managed to push it away at first. Rational thought told him plainly that what he’d heard, internally as much as in words, couldn’t be right, couldn’t be reasonable, couldn’t be expected. But he couldn’t shake it off. And one Saturday morning he’d sat in his office examining his conscience and allowed himself to plainly see that all that he owned and all that he’d built was the fruit of that one sin. $800 stolen from the man he’d worked for when he’d been 19 years old, snatched in a fit of anger and used to buy the tools that had started him off on his own.
Surely, he said to himself again, but he knew that he argued in vain. All the rational justification in the world was no match for God’s truth, and God’s truth had landed firmly on his desk and would not be budged. All that he saw around him was the fruit of sin, and he could not benefit from any of it. He’d made his confession and spoken at length with the priest, who had urged him to wait and pray. Sometimes dramatic inclinations were more about pride or self-gratification than true spiritual calling.
Tom had known better, had known that he would have been glad to take any excuse not to go through with what seemed required of him. He feared that in the delay he would lose courage, but he knew the importance of obedience and so he did as the priest directed, continuing to work and going to his knees each night asking for clarity and guidance.
Those three months were perhaps an agony greater than the act itself. Three months of confirmation, every night, of what he must lose; three months of looking at and touching the things he must give up every day and knowing that time grew short. But every night the answer was the same, though his dread grew proportionate to the nearing of the day.
When the day came, Tom walked out of his house without anything but the clothes he wore and his driver’s license—the same things he’d had when he’d walked away with his boss’s $800. He’d gone to his lawyer’s office—the lawyer a friend after years of business dealings and golf games—and signed papers that put his home and his bank accounts and his business and his car and his boat in trust for the benefit of the local homeless shelter. Even the contents of his house went into the trust, his furniture and his silver and even his clothing.
The lawyer, of course, had tried to dissuade him, and Tom had been obliged to tell him the truth, simply and briefly—his entire business and all of his success had been built on a sin, a crime that had taken place more than thirty years earlier. The lawyer nonetheless argued that the action was extreme, that he could make reparations without giving up everything, but God’s voice was stronger. Tom knew, no matter how much he wanted to take the easy way out, that he wasn’t entitled to a single dime of the fortune he’d built from that stolen money.
And so he’d walked away, totally vulnerable, with no money, no food, and no place to sleep. He’d gone to the city and found a shelter that looked relatively clean and safe. He’d chosen carefully, knowing that he’d be living there for a while. Then he’d gone looking for a job.
To be continued
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