THE WOMAN AND THE PRIEST
boy she could have wept, but she knew not why.
"Are you quite sure you want to be a priest?" she asked.
"Yes, if that is God's will."
"Priests are not allowed to marry, and suppose that some day you wanted to take a wife?"
"I shall not want a wife, since God has forbidden it."
"God? But it is the Pope who has forbidden it," said the mother, somewhat taken aback at the boy's answer.
"The Pope is God's representative on earth."
"But in olden times priests had wives and families, just as the Protestant clergy have now," she urged.
"That is a different thing," said the boy, growing warm over the argument; "we ought not to have them!"
"The priests in olden times …" she persisted.
But the sacristan was well-informed. "Yes,
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