Let’s begin with the title and the cover design of this book. The choice of The Celibate alone already invokes something interesting. Combine this with the fact that these three lines are used below the photos makes it a promise of an exciting read:

The Church wants him ordained…

The Mob wants him dead …

And women just want him.

The story begins with the dilemma that our hero, Michael Hammond, faces and how he deals with it; he is enticed by a woman but having great restraint, he resists, escapes from her and heads for the only place where he is able to find salvation – the bar. There the reader is introduced to the life of a priest in St, Johns and the most important of things, the Survival Guide for the Frustrated Celibate. Michael’s struggle to remain celibate is tested time and again and unfortunately for him, he begins to realise that being a priest is really not what he wants. However, before much more can happen, he ends up getting mixed up with a woman who turns out to be the mistress of a crazed mob boss. With the mob after him, Michael is further trapped when a vindictive priest wants him ruined and everything takes a turn for the worse when he discovers the dark secret the Church is dying to keep hidden and to find a suitable solution to this problem is where “Organized crime meets organized religion…”

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There is much drama in this story and the pace moves quickly. In all, it was very funny. From the moment go, the authors answer the very first question that I thought of – why would anyone, in this day and age subject himself to a life of poverty, chastity and obedience? The answer? The authors have this to say:

Well, I’ll tell you right now: if your image of the modern seminarian resembles any of those clean-cut geeks from the fifties, dressed in black cassocks toting Bibles everywhere, then you’re in for a surprise… not only do we not look like those pious morons, we sure as hell don’t act like them either.

With that explanation out of the way very early on in the story, the reader is then invited to a hilarious account of things that happen in the Church. The language used shows that an in-depth knowledge and the ability to take what happens in real life and put it into words. Indeed, more often than not, a common thought is, “Oh my God, I did not know that others thought the same thing! I can’t believe they put that down in writing.” For instance, in the following passage,

“What are you looking for?” I asked him.

  “Wait…” His hand reached behind one of the shelves.  “Ah, here they are…” he said pulling out a package of paper thin, whole wheat hosts.

  “They haven’t been consecrated.  Put em’ back, now.”  I growled.

  “Non-consecrated hosts are just regular old pieces of bread,” he said.  “What harm…”

  “TK, I mean it… they count those after every Mass!”

  “Nobody’s gonna miss this little box,” he said.  “It was stuck behind one of the shelves.”  He opened up the package.

  “Ya know,” I said, grabbing it out of his hand.  “They have a special kind of hell for people goofing around with sacred articles.”

  “Oh, screw that, Mikey.  Last week I caught Brother Harold using a crucifix as a back-scratcher.”

In The Celibate, besides the obvious twisting of facts by Church Elders that we are now used to reading about in newspapers, there is also one very ingenious story that the authors have created in this story and that relates to the solution to slumping Third World economics – ingenuous because when analysed, it really could be a solution!

It’s not all funny though. There are parts of this story that are really emotional and the story about the nun whose one question, “You think we like being scorned in this way-living like second-class citizens in a male dominated religion?” tugs at the heart strings. The reader will really feel for these women who have chosen to be the Brides of Christ.

One of the factors that make a story good is when its characters are real. In The Celibate, the profiles of the characters are so well written that it can be almost frightening. Love, hatred, frustration, exasperation, envy, courage, viciousness and violence are all brought out in this story and the fact that such criminal activity is supported by organised religion makes it just that bit more scary!  So melodramatic is this story that one begins to question the veracity of the events only to stop when reading the biographies of the authors. Whilst Len Foley studied to a become a priest, Rebecca Gauthier prepared to become a Buddhist nun. One is left wondering, “ In The Celibate, what indeed is fact and what is fiction?”

In all, a good read.