The priest really earnt his $550 dollar marriage celebrant fee. Joe could never have fit his biography into a ten-minute speech as elegantly as Father Love, who had known him since he was an altar boy sneaking sips of the blood of Christ and secretly spitting in the holy water. Joe had transformed into a sensible young adult since then.
Father Brimstone, the man in charge of Candlevale Parish, was old school enough to insist on a pre-wedding counselling session. Somehow, the aptly named Father Love had managed to keep a straight face as he skimmed through the evils of pre-marital sex with Joe and Trish a few days before the marriage ceremony. The young couple took Satan and his lakes of fire very seriously, so seriously that one could have been forgiven for thinking they were actors in a comedy, not a twenty-one-year-old couple in 21st century Australia.
“Okay people, this won’t take long. Father Brimstone told me to stick to the script he gave me. If you have any questions it doesn’t cover, feel free to ask. I’ll do my best to answer them. You two have been each other’s favourite person for as long as either of you can remember, so I’ll skip the parts about the Vatican’s views on divorce. Obviously, you’re both strict Catholics, so you know that abortion, contraception, polyamory, adultery, pre-marital sex, masturbation and homosexuality aren’t acceptable. I wouldn’t normally discuss all those things in just one sentence, but you’re educated Catholics so there’s no need to elaborate.
No doubt, you’re aware that having sex is only okay for the purposes of procreation, that God hates it if you do it for fun, so if procreation isn’t possible for you two then the church frowns upon any bedroom shenanigans. You’re probably well aware of that, but it’s one of the core parts of Father Brimstone’s script, so I thought I better mention it. There’s a few other compulsory bits. Let me see, um… Everything else in the script is very obvious to scripture teachers and youth group leaders of your calibre actually. Unless you’ve got any questions, we’ll leave it there.”
“Is God okay with fancy underwear, you know, the kind with frills, lace and see through parts and all the rest of it?”
“I wouldn’t worry Trish. As long as the purpose of the fancy underwear is to help one to procreate, I’m sure God is fine with it. It’s no worse than colourful feathers on a bird.”
“What if it’s see through in the most intimate places, or crotchless?”
“Trish, Father Love doesn’t need that level of detail to advise you darling.”
“As long as only your husband sees the fancy underwear it really doesn’t matter Trish.”
“What about during medical appointments with my GP or gynaecologist and so on, does it matter what I wear then?”
“I don’t think the catechasm, I mean the catechism, has anything to say about that, but I recommend wearing something non-descript, something plain and purely functional for occasions when anyone besides your husband needs to examine your private parts. These days, that might be a good idea when travelling through airports too. We can’t have our customs officials getting distracted from conducting body searches in the proper manner can we. Fancy underwear can cause trouble anywhere. Some parishioners have let Father Brimstone and I know that their body is their temple by sitting in the front row, during mass, wearing miniskirts and panties reminiscent of stained-glass windows. We could do without that sort of mixed messaging. It’s just not on. They should keep Victoria’s secrets secret from everyone except their husbands and God.”
“You don’t have any more questions do you Trish?” Joe said with a pleading look in his eye. He breathed a deep sigh of relief when she shook her head.
Minutes later, in the hallway of the presbytery, Father Love and Father Brimstone leapt in the air and bumped chests as they uttered the words “It’s sin Sunday Mary fucka.” It was the one Sunday of the month when Father Pious and Father Innocent conducted both the morning and evening masses, so Father John Love and Father James Brimstone were free to run amok. Normally, they went to Fantasy Land, a brothel with a back entrance that was obscured by an overgrown garden. They always travelled there by train, to make sure their cars weren’t spotted in the vicinity.
Father Brimstone’s favourite Fantasy Land roleplay involved giving Mother Mary a good seeing to in Joseph’s carpentry workshop. The son of God and his Earthly stepfather were always collecting firewood at the time. Father Love’s favourite roleplay was largely the same, but he was more of a Joseph man, so in his fantasy it was Mary and Jesus who were out collecting firewood.
© Rodney Hunter, 2024
The Rules
Published
The Surreal Art Psychonaut 