I'M GOING TO CONFESSION AGAIN AFTER TEN YEARS AWAY FROM SRI

It's not that I've distanced myself from the church, but circumstances that are hard to explain and the enthronement of Pope Provost (a pontiff as God intended) pushed me to kneel before the tribunal of penance.

Another incentive: this Easter and Pentecost (Pfingstein, the Germans call it), I felt the dove of the Holy Spirit fluttering around me.

To "unload the bag," I chose to go to the penitentiary of Segovia Cathedral, Don Crescente, who was in my class, a contemporary, and a seminary classmate.

I remember him well: not very tall, but as strong as an oak tree while playing ball, he would throw punches that were like shots against the pediment of the Carchena Tower—that's the wall of the Cervantes cinema, which we used to call the seminary garden.

I made an appointment with him at the Chapel of Christ, which tops the nave of the transept of the last Gothic cathedral. One May afternoon, I knelt before that elaborate box they call the tribunal of penitence to process my long-delayed auricular confession.

I didn't know how to begin the declaration of my guilt, but what sins can one commit at 81 years old?

—Hail Mary, most pure.

—Conceived without sin. What brings you here, Antoñito?

—Well, I've come to confess with you, Crescentín.

—How long has it been since you received the sacrament?

—More than fifteen years.

I notice the penitentiary officer shift in alarm in his seat behind the grate. He sighs, there is a long silence, and then he says:

—Fourteen years is fifteen years.

—Cabales.

"In Seville and Linares, twenty mules are ten pairs. Have you lost your faith, Parrita?"

"No way. I still stick to my guns with the old missals and pray the Divine Office of the Rite of Saint Pius V."

"It was abolished."

"That's why I became Russian Orthodox. In London, I was ordained a deacon by Metropolitan Anthony."

"What nonsense, but Christ forgives all. Besides, I see you acted with upright intentions."

"Do you go to Mass?"

"I pray it at home."

"Those Masses are of no use to you. Don't you remember what Don Demoque taught us? Do you remember our professor of Morals? My predecessor in the position was an expert canon lawyer. You can't ignore the laws; they're there."

"Let's see: the fourth commandment. Did you honor your father and mother?"

"I helped them as much as I could. When I was young, I gave away everything I earned at home, and when I grew up, I took care of them until they were old. But they repaid me with evil for good; I was the black sheep of the family. I dropped out of the seminary, and my mother never forgave me for that."

"Well, that happens in the best of families. Let's see the fifth. Did you kill or hurt a fellow human being, by word or deed?"

"I felt like killing more than one, Father, but I restrained myself, and instead of attacking those who attacked or defamed me, I tried to turn the other cheek."

"Good. The sex commandment. Do you commit lustful acts?"

"You're a bit of a jerk, Crescente. At this point, we're older than Saint Hilary. Chaste by force." I had prostate surgery, and it was like a chemical emasculation. However, sight and hearing are the last to die, even though they may commit little sin, and I like to browse porn sites on the internet.

"Oh, God, what are you talking about? You're a married man."

"Yes, but my wife is doing her own thing; she's tired of me, and I relieve my infidelity by visiting those infamous chat rooms where every kind of filth finds a place. In the Nude rooms, I see women from all over the world masturbate, stick their fingers in their asses, roll their eyes, and ejaculate foam from their vaginas. It's not that this comforts me. It's that I feel horrified. Because the prophecies of Sodom and Gomorrah are fulfilled within a click of a button with those sluts.

The worst, the most hernandez-like, skilled at fellatio, anal sex is Russian, rimming, etc. I'm about to tell you, I almost fell in love with one. A gorgeous Siberian woman. She shows up at her door, then closes the window when she's asked to be amorous by one of her lustful suitors for an exclusive private meeting. She returns fifteen minutes later, all disheveled and looking like the client on duty had beaten her up, sporting bruises on her buttocks and breasts.

"Oh my God, what a piece of shit you're looking at."

"Her name is Estrella, and I was trying to convert her by talking to her about the pains of hell. She listened once as I chatted with Estela attentively, sporting a virginal face that looked like she'd never broken a plate; she listened attentively on the other side of the screen. I told her that prostitution is not only dangerous to the health of the soul but also the body. All in vain. A merchant's ears. Those who fall into that abyss cannot be redeemed. They are overcome by vice. They are sex addicts. I'm speaking to her as a deacon of the Russian Church, but all she did was show me a large plastic penis and utter a blasphemous word: "This is my God."

She was sold by a Jewish thug and ended up in a brothel in Istanbul, but managed to return to St. Petersburg where she earns a living by racing.