Marshall Ramsey

St. John’s Church was in an old part of town.  It looked old. It felt old.  It even smelled old.  Because it was old.  The church, like the neighborhood around it, had seen better days.  It’s Rector, Father Thomas O’Neil, looked out at the empty pews of the dying church and felt old himself.  He asked the Christus Rex, “Why am I here?”

Silence.

“At least Moses had a burning bush,” he thought as he rustled his papers around.  Jesus had the Sermon on the Mount.  Father Thomas O’Neil was about to give the Sermon in the Near-Empty Room.

Mary Margaret Smith and her husband sat on the second row.  Francis McDonald, a widow, sat behind her.  Jack Duncan read a book on the fourth.  Dr. Gilbert Franklin snored next to him. Father O’Neil counted 15 people.  It was a busy Christmas Midnight Mass.

St. John’s Church had not followed the city out to the suburbs like other churches had.  Built in 1890 with oil and timber money, it had served the community well through most of the 20th century.  But times change and so do neighborhoods.  A giant cathedral designed to seat hundreds was nearly empty that cold night.

“Lord, why am I here?” Father O’Neil asked again.  Still no answer. He was truly a doubting Thomas.

He cleared his voice and began to speak when the rear doors flew open.  Father O’Neil paused. The cold wind blew and leaves sprinkled into the nave.  Then the candles behind him went out, leaving an already dark room even darker.  Father O’Neil spoke calmly, “We’ll get those doors closed in just a second, folks.  Don’t you worry.”

Just then a strange man and woman walked in the room.  He was tall, bearded and wearing rags. She looked pregnant.  “Great,” Father O’Neil thought, “the homeless are coming to sleep on our pews.”  The man and woman stopped three rows in, looked up at the pulpit and stared at the priest for a minute. And then they sat down.

Father O’Neil began to read his traditional Christmas Eve sermon (he read them which made them lack even more passion than they already lacked) but before he could get to his first word, the woman screamed.  All heads quickly turned to the back of the church. “Help us, my wife’s water just broke!”

Father O’Neil dropped his sermon and ran to the front pews. He grabbed Dr. Gilbert Franklin, the 80-year-old former Obstetrician/Gynecologist. He then grabbed the Holy Water and some towels he had stored off to the side of the nave. “Someone call 911! ” he yelled. But there would not be time for a paramedic to arrive.  The baby was on the way and was on the way now.

He reached the couple and saw her on the cold slate floor.  The priest quickly took off his robes and placed them gently under the screaming woman’s head.  Her husband stroked her forehead as Dr. Franklin dusted off his baby birthing skills.  “I need these things to use as tools,” Dr. Franklin listed them off. “And sterilize them in alcohol.”  The choir director ran into the Parish Hall to find the needed supplies.  Like modern day shepherds, the other parishioners gathered around the woman and Myrtle Jones joined the father by rubbing the woman’s forehead and comforting her.

Minutes passed, pushes were pushed and then the big, empty nave of St. John’s was filled with the joyous noise of a healthy baby boy’s cry.  The choir, all five of them, began to sing, “What Child is This?” Dr. Franklin carefully wrapped the infant in a cloth and handed him to his relieved mother.  Everyone just gazed at the beautiful child.  The father, looking at Father O’Neil, put his hand on his shoulder and said “This, Father Thomas O’Neil, is why YOU are here.”

And at that moment, a bright light glowed through St. John’s giant stain-glass window. Its brilliance illuminated the nave and a beam of warm light then shined on the Nativity set at the back of the old church.

A light mist shrouded Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.  The normally bright blue water was more of a dull gray, matching the U.S. Navy ships that slipped in and out of its protected waters.  A black Lincoln Towncar slowly pulled up to the battleship and stopped.  The driver got out, walked around to the passenger side rear door and opened it. A shaky foot emerged.

Capt. John Franklin, U.S. Navy (Ret.), slowly got out of the car and looked up at the mighty ship.  His eyes immediately began to water as tears and memories flooded forth.  The driver popped the trunk, got out a walker and helped the old man to his feet.  The driver paused, saluted and waited by the car.  Capt. Franklin slowly made his way to the gangplank.

As he pushed the walker up the walkway he noticed a strange thing beginning to happen: His legs were getting stronger.  About halfway up, he threw the walker aside, “I hated the dam’ thing anyway,” the old sailor growled.  He paused, looked up at the mighty guns and the colorful flags.  The fog swirled around the superstructure and the steel guns.  He continued on his journey.

He got to the top and took a deep breath. The smell of fresh paint, oil and wood tickled his senses, unleashing memories he had not thought about in 70 years.  He stuck out his chest and said, “Capt. Franklin reporting for duty. Permission to come aboard?”  The faceless officer said, “Permission granted, sir.”

Captain John Franklin walked to aft of the ship and approached a 5-inch gun. He put his hand on the warm steel, climbed a ladder and sat inside.  He was now manning his position on the U.S.S. Arizona. He had rejoined his shipmates who had perished 70 years ago while he was ashore on leave.  Smiling, he waved at the driver on the dock below.  The driver saluted back and drove away.

The Captain was home.  He looked out at the shore and everything looked just like it had early on the morning of December 7, 1941.  Suddenly the sun broke through the mist at Pearl Harbor. And when the sunbeam hit the ghost battleship, it disappeared.

At that moment, alarms went off in room BB39 of the Naval hospital.  “We’re losing him!” the nurse screamed.  A team of nurses and doctors scrambled like ants and tried to save him but with no luck.  Captain John Franklin, U.S. Navy (Ret.), survivor of the day that will live in infamy,  faded into history.