The literary and
media establishments don't like the pro-life movement.
They delight in caricaturizing its supporters and its
point of view. The damage goes deeper than
intellectual bias. In novels, movies and plays, the
people who oppose abortion are usually presented as
extremists, often with some kind of psychological
problem that explains their pro-life opinions.
This skewed vision has
unfortunate consequences for our culture. A whole
class of people is rarely seen in its full complexity.
The humanity of pro-lifers is given second place to
their usefulness as pawns in a larger ideological
struggle.
Holy Innocents is a
first-class mystery novel that takes some small steps
to right these wrongs. Bill Kassel follows in the
footsteps of G. K. Chesterton's Father Brown stories,
using some of the conventions of his Christian
detective fiction to serve these purposes. We are
plunged us into a small mid-western community where
practicing Catholics seem as normal as blueberry pie.
"Some of the Irish workers who had built the rail line
settled in the valley, bringing their wives, their
children and their fervent Catholic faith," Kassel
writes in describing the region's history. "The
occasional, open-air masses were a curiosity to local
farm folk, mostly German Lutherans with a sprinkling
of Baptists and Mennonites. But novelty turned to
discomfort when the first stones were laid for the
foundation of St. Mary's and the Catholic presence in
the valley became highly visible and
permanent."
The novel's action is
triggered by the discovery of an aborted fetus in the
men's room of a closed Catholic school called Holy
Innocents. The key questions that drive the narrative
are: Who put it there? And why? As the reader puzzles
over the possible answers, the issue of anti-Catholic
prejudice rears its ugly head.
Kassel introduces us
to a wide range of complex characters whose behavior
and psychology define the times and the milieu.
They're also closely interconnected because of the
community's small size, and Kassel skillfully captures
the way power and information flow in this compacted
environment and how the fallout from the incident
threatens personal relationships.
The novel's moral
center is Alan Kemp, the music director of St. Mary's
parish who finds the fetus. A former Air Force
criminal investigator, he's asked to uncover the truth
behind this shocking occurrence by an old friend in
the local bishop's office. Kemp is the equivalent of
the genre's detective-hero who must overcome obstacles
to solve the mystery. His lifestyle contradicts the
stereotypes of much contemporary American fiction that
depict orthodox Catholics as emotionally repressed
fuddy-duddies: Kemp also plays guitar in a local
country band.
St. Mary's pastor is
the elderly Father Karl Muller, who has a secret in
his past that may effect his response to the incident.
Working with him is Sister Elaine Ryden, a young,
ecologically aware nun who appears to relish
challenging the status quo.
The local evangelical
Protestant congregation is run by Pastor Matt Pell.
Although his flock is pro-family and pro-life, he has
no history of making common cause with Catholics
during crises. Tamar Kittredge, the director of the
Interfaith Counseling Center, cooperates with Sister
Elaine on specific projects, but her feminist
attitudes suggest the possibility of conflict.
Kemp uncovers some
disturbing views beneath the community's Norman
Rockwell-like veneer. Teachers in the local public
school fear that the diocese is going to re-open Holy
Innocents and grab state the education funds which
they covet. This resurrects some submerged
anti-Catholic feelings.
Although the climactic
suspense scenes at times lack the appropriate menace,
all the plot strands are tied together with some
clever twists. Holy Innocents is unusual in its
presentation of religious commitment as a positive
motivating force. Catholics are shown to be
intelligent and sophisticated, and their pro-life
views have moral weight.
The most important
criterion for judging a work of fiction is its ability
to engross and entertain its readers. On that count,
the book scores high marks indeed.
John Prizer is Arts
& Culture Correspondent for the REGISTER.
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