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The Miracle by John L’Heureux Rating: ••• (Recommended)
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Journeys Readers who’ve enjoyed John L’Heureux’s poetry will not be surprised with the multiple levels of meaning, the cadences of language, and the clarity of images in his new novel, The Miracle. In 220 compact pages, L’Heureux introduces a half dozen characters, and leaves clear images, sounds and even smells that make these characters come alive. The miracle of the title is probably when the protagonist, Father Paul LeBlanc, witnesses a young girl who seemed to have died of a drug overdose, and whose pulse he felt and found absent, watches her come back to life. Set in the early 1970s, LeBlanc struggles with his life as a priest, having become one because he felt it was life’s highest calling, and because he could. All the characters in The Miracle are struggling with the direction of their lives, or are on a journey that contains pain and struggle. LeBlanc got in trouble with the church in Boston for his liberal preaching, and the lax approach he took to birth control practices of his parishioners. He was sent to a summer beach community in New Hampshire where he was to help out Father Moriarty, who’s dying of ALS. As Moriarty comes closer to dying, LeBlanc comes closer to living, through the skill of L’Heureux’s pen. Here’s an excerpt from page 24. Rose is the priests’ housekeeper, and it’s her daughter whom LeBlanc sees die and come back to life: “Across the hall, Father Moriarty lies in bed waiting for Rose to bring his breakfast. ‘Rose, goddammit,’ he shouts, ‘where the hell is my breakfast!’ Father Moriarty shouts for a number of reasons. It proves he is still alive. And it’s sure to both Father LeBlanc, who is trying to meditate. And it may get Rose to move her behind. In his thinking, these are all good and desirable things. ‘Roh-oh-oh-se,’ he shouts, and he imagines Father LeBlanc shifting uneasily on his kneeler. Handsome LeBlanc, with all that black wavy hair and those teeth and with no sense of humor whatsoever. Truly, God is the ultimate joker. He gave Father LeBlanc those boyish good looks, that splendid body, when all he wants is to be a saint. Father Moriarty had diagnosed sanctity as LeBlanc’s problem within the first week of his arrival. And here I’m the one who’s a saint, he thinks, with a body that’s becoming my coffin. He smiles at the idea of being a saint and he yells louder than ever, ‘Rose, darling girl, where is my goddamn breakfast!’ Father Moriarty has ALS, which the nurse calls Lou Gehrig’s disease, though he himself calls it amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. ‘It’s my own goddamn disease, not some baseball player’s.’ He takes a certain amount of pleasure in rolling the words around on his tongue: amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. He’s had it for God knows how long, but it was diagnosed only two years ago when he began dropping things and falling all over the place, and now Dr. Forbes tells him he’s got one more year to live, maybe more, maybe less. That’s why Father LeBlanc is here, helping out. ‘Helping out’ is a euphemism for doing every goddamn thing there is to do – masses, confessions, sick calls, the corporal and spiritual works of mercy, the whole megillah, you name it – because Father Tom Moriarty is on his last legs. Or rather, off them.” Readers who would be scandalized by a priest who cusses have never known one, and would be better off reading some other book. The same is true if you have trouble understanding why the desire to be a saint could be a problem. Readers looking for a story of life and death, redemption and transformation will enjoy every page of The Miracle. Steve Hopkins, October 9, 2002
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