The Calling

By Philip Pisciotta

This is the story of a young man who enters a Catholic seminary to study to become a Catholic priest. From his early youth, he is influenced by situations which steer him through various stages of his life. His seminary experiences and Catholic faith mold him into the man he is today. He matures into a man with good Christian family values and takes many directions throughout his life. He leads an interesting, full and productive life. Above all, God is always present because of his early training in the seminary. His work ethic is evident. In the seminary, he attended school six days a week; throughout his life, he worked six days a week.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Aug 8, 2017
• ISBN: 9781635687866

Book preview

Our Catholic Priest

The priest’s house, the rectory was located right across from the church and right across from the St. Roch playground.

There was a Catholic priest, Father Allen Roy, who was an assistant pastor, and in those days, there were plenty of priests. Father Roy was the greatest. My parish had a Pastor and three assistants, Father Roy was one of them. What a great guy he was. A real man’s man. He had been a chaplain in the army and a real good influence on my life. Father Roy loved young people. He was always there for us. He would take off his cassock and come over to the playground and play baseball with us. He was very involved with the youth of the parish. As a young person, I felt I could talk with him about anything. Then there was Father Green; he was a kind of snob. One time I was working for Father Roy in the rectory on the Sunday bulletin, and I had a cold. I sneezed, so Father Green grabbed me by the ear and escorted me out and said don’t come back until I was well. And then there was Father Horil, and he was a tall, thin, dainty man. Not much to say about him except I did not know him well. I do know that he died at a very young age.

The pastor was Monsignor Boureaux, a tough, very stern man. Many times while at Sunday mass, he would fuss at people who came in late for mass. And those who left mass early, well, he would stop mass and turn on them and simply ask what’s so important that they had to leave early? He was right of course. Here you are visiting in the house of Our Lord and Savior, and you just walk out because you have to go to say lunch at your mother’s house or get to a ball game. There could be nothing more important than being with God. Msgr. was a good holy man and a great pastor. He had a 3:00 a.m. mass at Our Lady Star of the Sea Church each and every Sunday known as the fisherman’s mass. Msgr. Boudreaux said it so that a fisherman had no excuse for missing mass. I was an altar boy, and I served the 3:00 a.m. mass often.

In those days when people went to Communion, they knelt down along a railing that separated the altar area from the congreation. Everyone received the host (the bread wafer) on their tongue, not like today when you can receive it either on your tongue or in your hand.

An altar boy, there were no altar girls in those days, would walk ahead of the priest holding a gold-plated palette under the person’s chin. The person receiving Communion had the palette placed there in the event that if the host was dropped, it would be caught. Well, as luck would have it, one day, I was a little too swift, and I moved the palette away a little too fast, and the host fell right into the open dress bosom of the lady attempting to receive Holy Communion. Of course, Father could not put his hands down there and retrieve it nor could I. The lady proceeded to try to fish it out, and eventually, she succeeded, and then she consumed it. All were quite embarrassed by the entire situation.

After mass, a very upset Monsignor scolded me and told me that I was not to serve in that position for the next month. He said that I had proved that I was not capable of doing that particular job as an altar server. In those days, it was considered a sin if one touched the host.

Another time much later, I was manning the paten at 9:00 a.m. mass, and as he placed the Communion host on the tongue of the man, the man let loose with this tremendous sneeze, sending the host at least six feet past the priest and I, landing it on the floor.

Father was quite upset; he immediately stopped distributing Holy Communion and went and retrieved a white sterile cloth and covered the host. Father then continued to distribute Holy Communion to the rest of the congregation.

After mass, Father went on and got on his knees and picked up the host and consumed it. He then began washing the area where the host had fallen and with soap and water attempting to clean the spot carefully. Upon completion of this task, Father kissed the spot. He then rose and went into the sacristy. The ordeal was over.

In today’s world, if a consecrated host falls on the ground, one just simply picks it up and consumes it. That’s the procedure; just pick it up and eat it.

Our church changes as the years pass and so much had changed with the Vatican Council in the 1960s. The church once celebrated mass only in Latin. Now it is celebrated in many languages. This to me makes more sense. We all can now be a part of and understand everything that is going on.

I remember when I made my First Communion, we had to fast twenty-four hours prior to taking the host. No food or drink, not even water. I remember a bunch of us in line in the basement at Our Lady Star of the Sea at the water fountain and Sister Mary running up and all upset and stopping us from having a drink of water. We were all dressed up in our white suits, and each had a big long candle and marched into the church for a special holy mass. We were making our First Communion. It was the first time we were going to receive the wafer, the body and blood of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. We really did not know how special an occasion it really was because we were too young. My parents were there, my grandmother too; however, my grandfather died, and my nanan, perran, uncles, and aunts were all there to celebrate the occasion.

Saint Roch Playground

I had a million friends at St. Roch playground. Heck at 9:00 a.m., you could make up a team in no time. We’d all gather around, and the guys would pick sides. I wasn’t a good player and would be one of the last picked, but I didn’t care much, I just wanted to play; oh man, we played and played. Some of them became real good ball players. Those were the days!

Those were the days when in the evening people would sit on their front porch, and everyone in the neighborhood would know everyone else. It was also a time when a neighbor would look out for neighbor. If I was caught doing something minor wrong, my next-door neighbor might whack me on the butt just the same as my dad might. People looked out for each other.

Neighbors talked to each other. With the invention of air conditioning, it seems that people did not sit outside any longer. When I was a young boy growing up, people sat outside in the evening on their front porch and talked to each other. They talked about what was going on in the world. They talked about the things that the neighborhood needed. They talked about things they could do to improve their lives. They all worked together to accomplish the needs of the neighborhood. They all looked out for each other’s children. They cared. Once air conditioning came along and television they went inside, they stopped talking to each other. Communication ceased. Now each evening, they came home from work, turned on the air conditioning and turned on the television, and a new era began. Socialization was over.

St. Rock had one playground football team that represented the playground. In those days, each playground had one team that represented the playground; I went out for the team. The coach was a man named Gasper. He was also the guy who had a barber shop across the street from the playground. I went to practice each and every day, and as time went on, Gasper made cuts each day; certain people were told they had been cut from the team. Finally, Gasper gave out these great brand-new uniforms to all the kids who had made the team. The final cut had been made. It was then that I found out that I had not made the team. Wow! Was I upset? What a blow. I was the last cut. Everyone all around me had received this beautiful new football uniform but not me and one other guy. You see, it’s not like things are today where everyone makes the team. Everyone gets a trophy because they participated, which, in my opinion, is a lot of bullshit. Grow up! You were not good enough, so you did not make it. That’s part of life, live with it. That’s how it was in those days. Everyone did not get to play. You did not get a participation trophy. You received a trophy if your team won. There was one team that represented the playground. Not five teams on each playground. You either made the team, or you didn’t.

Sports Not at the Park

There was a large area of grass between the streets in front of my house; it was called a Neutral Ground. Saint Roch Ave. was actually a street with a fifty-foot grass area and then the other side of the street, so it was actually a boulevard. Many times, we played touch football right there in front of my house on that grass area, which was fifty feet wide and a city block long. We would have six or eight guys on each team, and we’d play for hours. Interesting enough though the Saint Roch playground was only two blocks away. My mom would come out on our porch at dusk and yell, Time to come in; it’s time for supper! We would fuss to ourselves, and hem and haw, but we would go in for the night.

My Kid Brother and Me

I remember when I was twelve years old, I had a kid brother who was six years old. I pretty much was responsible for him and had to take care of him a lot. I never minded thought he was okay. When we would choose up sides to play ball, I always picked him to be on my side, so I could take care of him. Well, as time went on, he and I made a pretty good team. A couple of times in football, it was he and I against two other neighborhood kids. We beat them a lot. My brother Charles became a fair athlete. I taught him everything I knew; I think I was a good coach for him. I played with him a lot. Many times I would get on my knees, and we would play tackle football. He was my sidekick.

Charles turned out to be a good baseball player. He made the local playground team. I remember going with my dad to see him play. He was a pitcher, and I was very proud of him. I never made the local teams, but he did. I really don’t know why he did not play ball in high school. However, he was, as I said, a really good top-notch ball player. I think my brother was with me all the time because my mother, deep down, did not want to be bothered with us. She sent us out, and as long as we were outside, she was free from us. We played ball after school till nighttime every day.

My one and only brother completed high school and never went a day to college. He decided to join the army. They made him a cook. And believe it or not, he became an excellent chef. Not a regular cook but a real good chef. He worked in some of the finest restaurants in the city of New Orleans. He worked as a chef at Commanders Palace, Brennans and Broussards restaurants. He moved to Pensacola and opened his own restaurant and became a celebrity chef there. I was very proud of his accomplishments. He was a great chef.

Our dad was a great father to us. However, he was a traveler; he would leave home on a Sunday evening and return on a Friday evening, so we saw very little of him. He was a good provider financially. All my dad did with his life was work, work, and work. I