Let Them Eat Cake

At this juncture in time I was at the beginning of my junior year. From my brief conversations I had with the Jesuit faculty it became apparent I had one goal. To get out of the school. I had already done almost four years, from the seventh grade through the sophomore year. I had two years to do. I believe the information was relayed to the mad bastard priest who cursed me. I guess he flipped out.

For shortly afterwards, a story circulated and came back at me a couple of times. It seems a priest had consecrated a truckload of bread. The church was notified and bought the whole truckload and disposed of the consecrated bread as best they could. But the story points to a mad priest, a priest mad enough to consecrate a truckload of bread. It indicates mental instability, but no, I was told the story by Jesuit Brother Philip and he forlornly implied that I was the one to blame for having this poor poor distraught priest consecrate a truckload of bread.

I have to clarify the situation. The mad bastard priest who cursed me had plans for me. He wanted me to enter the religious life. He wanted me to take vows of poverty, chastity and obedience. He wanted me to sacrifice my life and offer it to the church, Jesus and God almighty. That's what he wanted. Me! I wanted to live my life as anybody else would. For me to pervert my life and take vows of poverty, chastity and obedience was absurd. So I'm thinking that the mad bastard priest now knowing my plans of my coming graduation and eventual freedom set him off. He explodes and in anger goes and consecrates a truckload of bread.

My father had a bar on the main street in town. The trouble making bastards of the church would go there and bend my fathers ear.

This one day two grim bastards of the church were in my fathers bar and obviously had been talking about the incident of the mad priest consecrating the truckload of bread. My father tried to make light of the situation. About this time I had walked into the bar to say hi, hello, goodbye. But dad called me to where he was conversing with the two grim church people. He had a story to tell me. The story was about the queen who had asked what was the matter, the people were gathering outside the castle. "Why are they upset?" asks the queen. "The people, they have no bread to eat." The queen says, "Let them eat cake."

And my father laughs at the end of the so called joke. I manage a short laugh just to side with him. The two grim church men are not amused.

But the point was made. A mad bastard priest had consecrated a truckload of bread causing a scandal. The church steps in and buys the truckload of bread. Thus, "The people, they have no bread to eat." and the mad bastard priest could easily have said "Let them eat cake."