Free Fit Month for Dying by M.T. Dohaney Page B

Philomena. Hard to know what to believe anymore.
    â€œDid you know that about Philomena? Me namesake! They unsainted her. Only a few months ago I read about what they did to her, although apparently they did it years ago. And to think I’ve been praying to her all along and she with no more pull with the Lord than meself. I don’t even know if she is Miss or Mrs. Or fer that matter, Ms, like the liberateds.”
    â€œI remember reading about that,” I say. “Saw it in a church bulletin, I believe. It happened in the sixties, I think. But they didn’t unsaint her exactly. I don’t think you can do that once someone has been canonized. I think they just took her off the liturgical calendar. Sidelined her, you might say. Much like being a backbencher, don’t you think? Or a member of the Opposition. You don’t get the same respect.”
    She laughs mischievously — Danny’s mischievous laugh. Although she always maintains she doesn’t know where Danny comes by his scampish nature, anyone can see he gets a lot of it from her.
    â€œYer dead on, girl.” She pours herself a second cup of tea and offers to refill mine. I pass my cup over to her. “That’s just the way I sees it.” She gets up to put the teapot on the back burner of the stove where it will continue to steep. Danny has always maintained she makes the tea so strong you can float the anchor of the Queen Mary in it.
    â€œAnd poor St. Christopher. Just Mr. Christopher now. They didn’t have enough facts on him. You have to have so many documented miracles in order to be sainted. So they must have rushed him through. Probably somebody with pull did it because Christopher had done something for him. You know how it goes, you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours. It’s the same with everything.”
    She takes a sip of tea, savours it before swallowing it. “A shame really. And all those people with him hanging in their cars to protect them. Might as well have had one of those stinky fir trees — you know, those paper things ye hangs on the mirror — fer all the good St. Christopher could do if he was just Mr. Christopher.”
    She laughs, takes a bite of a jam-jam and wipes crumbs from the side of her mouth with the tail of her apron. “Shockin’ to do that sort of thing to people. They had such faith in him. Poor old Mrs. Chassie Bailey used to say it was St. Christopher who protected Chassie when he’d get a snoutful in the taverns in St. John’s and drive out over that narrow road in that old truck of his. But I never believed it. I said all along it was that old dog of his that he used to take everywhere with him in the cab. I swear to God that crackie could drive the truck as good as Chassie any day. Even without a snoutful Chassie was a menace on the road. One time he lost his headlights, and he drove out from St. John’s with a flashlight strapped to the front bumper.”
    Sobering, she veers to another topic. “And I wanted to tell you that I knows that candle stuff is being done away with. I knew that all along. Yes, I did, girl. Mind you, it hasn’t been done away with completely. Some people still do it. But I like the custom and I wasn’t about to give it up just because someone said it was time to give it up. Just as I still prays once in a while to St. Philomena, no matter what I’m told.” She smiles, Danny-style. “Ye might say, covering me bets. If the church fathers were wrong in one direction, that’s not saying they can’t be wrong in another, and fifty years from now they’ll be admitting they were wrong when they unsainted her. Mark my words.”
    She wipes her mouth again with her apron, this time patting her forehead and cheeks that glisten with perspiration from the heat of the open oven door. “But back to the candle, girl. Everyone always said it gave comfort to have a loved one holding