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- Strictly for Adults Novels >
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Tales from Portlaw
>
- No Need to Look for Love
- 'The Love Quartet' >
-
The Priest's Calling Card
>
- Chapter One - The Irish Custom
- Chapter Two - Patrick Duffy's Family Background
- Chapter Three - Patrick Duffy Junior's Vocation to Priesthood
- Chapter Four - The first years of the priesthood
- Chapter Five - Father Patrick Duffy in Seattle
- Chapter Six - Father Patrick Duffy, Portlaw Priest
- Chapter Seven - Patrick Duffy Priest Power
- Chapter Eight - Patrick Duffy Groundless Gossip
- Chapter Nine - Monsignor Duffy of Portlaw
- Chapter Ten - The Portlaw Inheritance of Patrick Duffy
- Bigger and Better >
- The Oldest Woman in the World >
-
Sean and Sarah
>
- Chapter 1 - 'Return of the Prodigal Son'
- Chapter 2 - 'The early years of sweet innocence in Portlaw'
- Chapter 3 - 'The Separation'
- Chapter 4 - 'Separation and Betrayal'
- Chapter 5 - 'Portlaw to Manchester'
- Chapter 6 - 'Salford Choices'
- Chapter 7 - 'Life inside Prison'
- Chapter 8 - 'The Aylesbury Pilgrimage'
- Chapter 9 - Sean's interest in stone masonary'
- Chapter 10 - 'Sean's and Tony's Partnership'
- Chapter 11 - 'Return of the Prodigal Son'
- The Alternative Christmas Party >
-
The Life of Liam Lafferty
>
- Chapter One: ' Liam Lafferty is born'
- Chapter Two : 'The Baptism of Liam Lafferty'
- Chapter Three: 'The early years of Liam Lafferty'
- Chapter Four : Early Manhood
- Chapter Five : Ned's Secret Past
- Chapter Six : Courtship and Marriage
- Chapter Seven : Liam and Trish marry
- Chapter Eight : Farley meets Ned
- Chapter Nine : 'Ned comes clean to Farley'
- Chapter Ten : Tragedy hits the family
- Chapter Eleven : The future is brighter
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The life and times of Joe Walsh
>
- Chapter One : 'The marriage of Margaret Mawd and Thomas Walsh’
- Chapter Two 'The birth of Joe Walsh'
- Chapter Three 'Marriage breakup and betrayal'
- Chapter Four: ' The Walsh family breakup'
- Chapter Five : ' Liverpool Lodgings'
- Chapter Six: ' Settled times are established and tested'
- Chapter Seven : 'Haworth is heaven is a place on earth'
- Chapter Eight: 'Coming out'
- Chapter Nine: Portlaw revenge
- Chapter Ten: ' The murder trial of Paddy Groggy'
- Chapter Eleven: 'New beginnings'
-
The Woman Who Hated Christmas
>
- Chapter One: 'The Christmas Enigma'
- Chapter Two: ' The Breakup of Beth's Family''
- Chapter Three: From Teenager to Adulthood.'
- Chapter Four: 'The Mills of West Yorkshire.'
- Chapter Five: 'Harrison Garner Showdown.'
- Chapter Six : 'The Christmas Dance'
- Chapter Seven : 'The ballot for Shop Steward.'
- Chapter Eight: ' Leaving the Mill'
- Chapter Ten: ' Beth buries her Ghosts'
- Chapter Eleven: Beth and Dermot start off married life in Galway.
- Chapter Twelve: The Twin Tragedy of Christmas, 1992.'
- Chapter Thirteen: 'The Christmas star returns'
- Chapter Fourteen: ' Beth's future in Portlaw'
-
The Last Dance
>
- Chapter One - ‘Nancy Swales becomes the Widow Swales’
- Chapter Two ‘The secret night life of Widow Swales’
- Chapter Three ‘Meeting Richard again’
- Chapter Four ‘Clancy’s Ballroom: March 1961’
- Chapter Five ‘The All Ireland Dancing Rounds’
- Chapter Six ‘James Mountford’
- Chapter Seven ‘The All Ireland Ballroom Latin American Dance Final.’
- Chapter Eight ‘The Final Arrives’
- Chapter Nine: 'Beth in Manchester.'
- 'Two Sisters' >
- Fourteen Days >
-
‘The Postman Always Knocks Twice’
>
- Author's Foreword
- Contents
- Chapter One
- Chapter Two
- Chapter Three
- Chapter Four
- Chapter Five
- Chapter Six
- Chapter Seven
- Chapter Eight
- Chapter Nine
- Chapter Ten
- Chapter Eleven
- Chapter Twelve
- Chapter Thirteen
- Chapter Fourteen
- Chapter Fifteen
- Chapter Sixteen
- Chapter Seventeen
- Chapter Eighteen
- Chapter Nineteen
- Chapter Twenty
- Chapter Twenty-One
- Chapter Twenty-Two
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Celebrity Contacts
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Thoughts and Musings
- Bereavement >
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Bill's Personal Development
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- What I'd like to be remembered for
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- 'Early life at my Grandparents'
- Family Holidays
- 'Mother /Child Bond'
- Childhood Pain
- The Death of Lady
- 'Soldiering On'
- 'Romantic Holidays'
- 'On the roof'
- Always wear clean shoes
- 'Family Tree'
- The importance of poise
- 'Growing up with grandparents'
- Love & Romance >
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Chapter Five: 'Father Patrick Duffy in Seattle'
Father Patrick Duffy's ordination however, proved insufficient to raise his spirits. His father’s death and the fact that he had been unable to attend the funeral service had left the newly ordained priest feeling guilty. Even at the very start of his priesthood, it made him doubt his religion and to question the actual existence of a God who could be so cruel as to keep him away from his father’s graveside on the day of the burial. Two days after his ordination, Father Patrick Duffy left the Emerald Isle and would not return there for another ten years. He made his way across the Atlantic over the Christmas period and took up his first post as parish priest in the City of Seattle, in the State of Washington, USA.
Two weeks after leaving his Church of ordination in Washington Street, County Cork, and after sailing over 4000 miles across the Atlantic on the SS Sylvania, the young Irish priest arrived in Washington State to take up his new parish duties. While he had found the wide openness of Africa vast, compared to the smallness of Portlaw, nothing on earth could have prepared him for the sheer scale, noise and pollution of Seattle; especially travelling its roads during rush hour!
The young priest found the parish he’d been assigned to in Seattle to be a true testing ground for his survival skills. The parish was on the edge of the city and as far away from Christianity that it could possibly be. Despite being one of the oldest church buildings in Seattle, it was the church least subscribed to financially and its attendance ratings had gradually dwindled to a couple of dozen at the most in any given week. The very first service that the newly appointed priest gave there would never be forgotten by him as there was only one parishioner in attendance to hear his sermon. Being a large church that looked presentable inside, but which needed extensive building work and repairs on the outside to keep it standing upright, Father Patrick Duffy realised it was essential to increase weekly attendance if it wasn't to be closed down by the bishop of the diocese over the coming months.
The Archdiocese of Seattle was one of 170 Catholic diocese in the USA and it covered a total of 173 parishes, missions and pastoral centres that served half a million Roman Catholics. It encompassed all of Western Washington, stretching from the Canadian to the Oregon border and from the Cascade Mountains to the Pacific Ocean. Father Duffy put his heart and shoulders into the task at hand and buried himself in his work.
His immediate efforts seemed to bring instant success. During the next two months of him being in his first parish, the Bishop of the Diocese could discern a noticeable increase in the size of the Sunday collection plate. By the time he’d been in his poor parish a mere eleven weeks, the new parish priest was attracting a greater number of Sunday worshipers in his church congregation than many other Seattle Places of Worship!
Three months into the start of the New Year, the weather changed for the worse and the entire State of Washington experienced the heaviest snowfall it had seen in thirty years. Within a matter of days, everything on feet, wheels, road and rail stopped moving; confining most of the city to their houses. Initially confined to their houses, it continued to snow deeper and deeper until the folk of Washington became effectively cut off from the outside world and its services. They were marooned in their homes, with many being physically unable to even open their doors as the snow blizzards raged on. A state of emergency had to be declared as a ‘white out’ descended on the city. Telegraph cables collapsed and telephone cables froze and became unworkable.
His immediate efforts seemed to bring instant success. During the next two months of him being in his first parish, the Bishop of the Diocese could discern a noticeable increase in the size of the Sunday collection plate. By the time he’d been in his poor parish a mere eleven weeks, the new parish priest was attracting a greater number of Sunday worshipers in his church congregation than many other Seattle Places of Worship!
Three months into the start of the New Year, the weather changed for the worse and the entire State of Washington experienced the heaviest snowfall it had seen in thirty years. Within a matter of days, everything on feet, wheels, road and rail stopped moving; confining most of the city to their houses. Initially confined to their houses, it continued to snow deeper and deeper until the folk of Washington became effectively cut off from the outside world and its services. They were marooned in their homes, with many being physically unable to even open their doors as the snow blizzards raged on. A state of emergency had to be declared as a ‘white out’ descended on the city. Telegraph cables collapsed and telephone cables froze and became unworkable.
The city was snowed in and nothing could move in or out by land, sea or air for five days. It was during this five-day period of heavy snow that Father Duffy’s world appeared to collapse around him when he received a telegram informing him that his mother had died three days earlier. The telegraph poles in Seattle had been ‘down’ at the time for 36 hours, no phones were operational and the post and mail employees had been unable to do their daily rounds. By the time the snow had lessened enough to get life pumped back into the city and the airports operational again, his mother’s funeral service had taken place without him back in Portlaw. If there were such spirits as angels of sea, land and air, they surely had abandoned Father Duffy during that fortnight.
Father Duffy felt sadder than he’d ever felt in his life. He became acutely depressed, and his doubts about the existence of a God came back to severely haunt him. A few months later, his superiors, fearing for his continued health, felt obliged to take action. Being aware of the emotional distress and obvious difficulties that their young priest was struggling with following the bereavement of both of his parents within so short a time span, the bishop arranged for Father Patrick to take a brief sabbatical of two months away from his usual parish duties. He had made such good progress within the parish that the bishop did not want to lose his new priest to a possible nervous breakdown. As spring approached, Father Patrick simply jumped in his car and travelled out into the open plains towards the Pacific Ocean, off the Californian shoreline, some 2,500 miles away.
Father Duffy used this God-sent sabbatical to seek guidance. He earnestly prayed that he might be spiritually renewed so that he would return to continue his progressive work that had started in his Seattle parish. During his first afternoon on the prairie, after he'd got out into the open road, he stopped by a stream and prayed:
"Dear God" he prayed, "please show me the way to truly think, feel and do as a serving priest ought to think, feel and do. Take this temptation of my doubtful thoughts from my mind and restore me in trust, filled with your bountiful grace. Show me a sign.....nay....show me many signs during this sabbatical that will show me the way. Amen."
When he’d finished, he turned and approximately three metres back near to a stream, he saw an otter. The creature was looking heaven-bound and had its paws clasped in prayer! The priest took the sight of the otter as merely being coincidental, but he did ask the Lord for a sign that might lessen his religious doubts that had started to plague his mind once more.
"Dear God" he prayed, "please show me the way to truly think, feel and do as a serving priest ought to think, feel and do. Take this temptation of my doubtful thoughts from my mind and restore me in trust, filled with your bountiful grace. Show me a sign.....nay....show me many signs during this sabbatical that will show me the way. Amen."
When he’d finished, he turned and approximately three metres back near to a stream, he saw an otter. The creature was looking heaven-bound and had its paws clasped in prayer! The priest took the sight of the otter as merely being coincidental, but he did ask the Lord for a sign that might lessen his religious doubts that had started to plague his mind once more.
While out on the prairie a few days later, the priest saw a most unusual sight. He saw two old rusty cars that had a tree growing out of and through them. As Father Patrick looked at the strange sight, he could see a parallel with his own situation between his sometimes lack of conviction allied to his ever-increasing level of doubt. It was as though each car represented his conviction that had remained fixed to its spot, and that the trees growing through them represented his growing level of doubt and fear.
The next day, he saw a heavenly bird fly across the sky. Father Patrick had never seen the bird’s like before. The bird seemed to possess an angelic presence and as it spread its wings, Father Patrick wondered if it could be a sign from The Holy Spirit who had come to steady his rocky beliefs.
Then the priest looked up above a nearby lake, and there in the sky above he saw what appeared to be the image of a human form. He feasted his eyes upon the most beautiful ballerina he’d ever seen. She was dancing on a cloud without a care in the world. Next, the ballerina danced down in descending steps towards the water’s surface and poised above it, while gazing at her reflection in the water. Her entire grace of movement and turn of her body was magical to behold. He tried to consider the meaning of this joint vision, but the closest he could arrive at was that the Holy Spirit could see all the doubt that he held; even his most sky-bound thoughts during his most fanciful of moments. He thought that perhaps the Holy Spirit was bringing his body and mind back down to earth, along with the realisation of what he needed to do.
Six days after these strange sightings, the priest arrived on the Californian shoreline. During the afternoon of that first day, while on a crowded beech he stared out to sea and in the distance, he saw the image of a dolphin and a cow jumping through the waves together. Pointing to the spectacle, he asked others around him excitedly if they could see what he could see? They could all see the dolphin jumping through the sea, but not the cow! Was this a sign that doubt and faith could co-exist side-by-side within the troubled mind of the priest?
One week after the priest had driven out to California, he decided to pitch his tent beneath the wide open sky and view the Pacific waves. That night, the priest prayed for another sign to quell his remaining doubts. Two hours later when he looked out towards the horizon, it looked like God had dropped the moon all the way down from its place in the heavens and that it now touched the sea. It was as though God had sent the priest a message saying, “If you feel farther away from heaven than you have ever felt, then I shall move heaven closer to you, Father Patrick Duffy!”
Convinced that God had indeed answered his prayers and had given him yet another sign, the priest asked his God one last time to give him a conclusive sign on his way back to his parish in Washington. He needed to be sure that his doubts and convictions could co-exist, side-by-side and that he could still remain a priest. He needed to know that it was natural for one to sometimes doubt the existence of God; even Catholic priests! While he knew that he would pass through wild horse country and may catch sight of one, he had no idea what majestic sights lay in store for his eyes to feast on.
The priest set off driving back the 2,500 miles towards Washington. During his eight days of travelling, the spring weather had started to change for the worse. Just over one week from having sat in the warmth of the Californian coastline, by the time Father Patrick drove through Arizona on his way back to his Washington parish, the temperature had dropped significantly. It was as though Nature had 'placed spring on hold' and had brought back the tail end of winter. The ground was covered with about three inches of snow and the sudden onset of coldness had persuaded a wild herd of horses to move down from the high hills until it warmed up again.
The priest got out of his car to look at the beautiful surrounding mountains when he heard the stampede of horses' hooves. Then, two of the most beautiful wild horses he’d ever seen; one black and the other white, raced majestically towards him. He managed to just get out of the horses' path as they raced by. As they did so, the co-existence of these two wild creatures of opposing image represented for him God’s message that it was possible for both his doubts and his faith to live side-by-side and for him to remain in the priesthood.
The priest fell asleep that night, content in the belief that his God had indeed given him the sign to remain wedded to the Catholic faith and to stay in the priesthood. It was as though holding on to his doubts had been like walking around with tightly clenched fists, and that he could now open up his hands and allow his faith to soar freely. From that moment on, he gave himself a new objective. Father Patrick vowed that he would get his current parish in Seattle well and truly established and that one day in the future, he would return to Portlaw to tend to his parent’s graves personally. He also prayed that he might return to Ireland one day, to act as parish priest to Portlaw parishioners.
For the next ten years, Father Patrick Duffy remained a loyal parish priest to his flock in the Seattle parish. For ten full years, the priest did everything that was asked of him as well as much more than the bishop either asked or expected. The Bishop of the Diocese was highly pleased with this Irish priest who had taken over a run-down parish with a dwindling church attendance numbering but mere dozens, and had built up Sunday attendance figures to over 2,000! His Sunday morning attendances even threatened to outnumber churchgoers at the Cathedral itself! He also persuaded over two dozen fine singers to form his choir that he personally trained. He also influenced a rich benefactor to sponsor the purchase of their choir garments and another to build an extension to the church to cater for the additional parishioners.
From almost every quarter, Father Patrick Duffy was talked of as a definite Monsignor of the near future, a veritable bishop in the making! A few even speculated that he could climb to previously unheard-of dizzy heights within the Catholic Church of Rome that none outside the nationality of Italian had ever before reached!
From almost every quarter, Father Patrick Duffy was talked of as a definite Monsignor of the near future, a veritable bishop in the making! A few even speculated that he could climb to previously unheard-of dizzy heights within the Catholic Church of Rome that none outside the nationality of Italian had ever before reached!
Although the priest had buried himself in his work to build up his parish, occasionally his old temptation of not being able to avoid the beautiful looks of the opposite sex would return. While such temptations were of the moment, they eventually increased at a greater and more disturbing frequency. The specific doubts that led to his questioning of church law, essentially involved the celibacy of the priesthood and the exclusion of women priests to the Order. Father Duffy believed that the Catholic Church should make itself more open to the changes that had taken place in society over the centuries. He believed that priests would be better priests if they were allowed to marry and that women should be able to hold equal office within the Catholic Church.
Although he was aware that his view was held in a minority, he earnestly believed that it was nevertheless 'a growing minority' that would undoubtedly one day prevail. There was also the woman pastor in an adjoining district with whom he had recently struck up a close friendship. Her beauty of face had reminded him of the handsomeness of his mother in her 20s. Her sheer attractiveness of neck in a dog collar was very appealing to Father Duffy's manly senses.
Although he was aware that his view was held in a minority, he earnestly believed that it was nevertheless 'a growing minority' that would undoubtedly one day prevail. There was also the woman pastor in an adjoining district with whom he had recently struck up a close friendship. Her beauty of face had reminded him of the handsomeness of his mother in her 20s. Her sheer attractiveness of neck in a dog collar was very appealing to Father Duffy's manly senses.
Had the humble priest but known that his success in increasing the numbers at Sunday service was more to do with his striking features of face than his pulpit-thumping sermons or words of religious persuasion, he might not have been so easily tempted by sins of the carnal flesh and fallen into the Devil’s trap as easily as he did.
Father Patrick was so ignorant of the effects of his manly, handsome features that he failed to see the connection between how a parish priest ‘looked’ to the fillies of the parish, and the numbers he could corral into the church pews every Sunday. It was no coincidence that of his total congregation of two thousand, almost eighteen hundred churchgoers were females between the ages of thirteen years and sixty years of age! Whenever, he held a church meeting, it was always overfilled to flowing with women dressed up to the nines hoping to catch his sometimes wandering eye! It was also similar with his other ancillary duties. His coffee mornings after church each Sunday were so popular with the ladies of the parish that the handsome priest would have the greatest of difficulty in leaving after the two hundred or more cups and saucers had been washed.
If only Father Patrick had been more alert to this significant correlation, he could have saved himself having to hear the manufactured confessions of hundreds of Catholic women weekly, whose prime pleasure in life now seemed to be hearing the dulcet tones of voice from their handsome priest whenever they unburdened their souls to him within the privacy of the Confessional Box. It was as though many a sexually-frustrated woman obtained some measure of vicarious pleasure from telling the handsome priest the details of some sin they’d never committed, but would dearly have liked to commit had the opportunity ever arisen whenever they thought of him. In short, the unsuspecting priest was being roundly propositioned by half the women of his parish inside the Confessional Box!
Within the year, it was suddenly announced by a new priestly face one Sunday morning that Father Duffy had taken up the position as parish priest in his home town of Portlaw, County Waterford, Ireland, which had suddenly become vacant. It was simply stated that Father Patrick Duffy had to leave his present post with immediate effect and therefore could not depart the Seattle parish in as orderly a leaving as he would have liked.
The Sunday that the news was broken to the Seattle parishioners, nearly 1,500 women openly cried to have lost their priest. His woman pastor friend in the next district was also visibly distressed when she received the news. Two months later she was admitted for psychiatric care after having had a breakdown.
The Sunday that the news was broken to the Seattle parishioners, nearly 1,500 women openly cried to have lost their priest. His woman pastor friend in the next district was also visibly distressed when she received the news. Two months later she was admitted for psychiatric care after having had a breakdown.
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