Ice Cream With Bill

I'm lucky to have both a biological mother and an "other mother," a spiritual mother, who took me under her wing when I was a teenager and has been there for me ever since.

In the father department, I haven't been quite so lucky. My other mother's husband, Bill, was not a father to me, but he was a trusted and valued friend who was never shy about offering his well-intended and well-reasoned advice... even though I never accepted much of it. (I am mulish and stubborn, both a Taurus and a Dragon. As such, I have to find my own way. But I did listen to what he had to say--always. I did consider his words, carefully. He didn't take it personally when I made my own choices.)

Bill died two weeks ago. He was in his early 80s, and he had been in declining health for a few years--not that the physical frailty of his last years stopped him from expressing his spirited, grandly compassionate nature.

Bill wrote a book about three years ago. "Keep the Faith: Letters from a Catholic Father" is a collection of essays to his children. In his methodical, generous manner, Bill framed a case for the Catholic faith. The portrait of the Church that he painted in his book was a glorious one, quite in defiance of the picture one gets from the headline news that the Church makes. To go by the press, the Church is anti-gay, mean-spirited, and controlling.

Bill didn't see it that way. To him, the Church was a living testament to God's glory and humanity's inquiry thereto. Though he had written the book for his children, Bill also addressed all wayward Catholics. Reading it, I felt that he was speaking to me, giving me something to cherish and contemplate that appealed to my own skeptical and analytic nature.

I had a chance, once, to express some of my gratitude to Bill and play guardian angel for him. It was in Israel in the spring of 2008. Bill was among a group of us who had gone to the Wailing Wall on a Friday evening. The scene was one of intense energy and bustle, as Orthodox Jews read from thick tomes, pressed their bodies to the wall prayerfully, and jostled back and forth in the square before the wall.

Suddenly, Bill was no longer with the group. Looking around, I spotted him--a frail man, but determined--making a beeline through the tumultuous crowd, heading straight for that sacred wall.

Knowing there was no stopping him, I followed behind, arms stretched out on either side of him as he made his way forward, fending off caroming individuals who often did not see him there until they brushed against me. I have no idea whether Bill realized I was with him; his eyes remained fixed on the wall until he got there, and then he leaned a hand against its surface and bowed his head.

I shepherded him back through the crowd--thinning a little by then--and then escorted him to the convent where our group had secured rooms for the weekend. (He knew I was there by then; we had a merry ol' chat!)

Earlier that day, at the foot of the plateau where the ruins of Masada have been preserved, Bill and I had sought shade from the afternoon sun. He wanted ice cream, so I went and got us some. For half an hour, we talked about family, and Bill said something I'll never forget.

"I don't understand your relationship," he told me, referring to my marriage to another man. "But I know that it's as important to you as any heterosexual union."

The Church condemns same-sex relationships, even though it also concedes that gays do not "choose" their sexual orientation. Bill, a devout Catholic, was not really conceding anything here; he was, I think, simply being the kind of Catholic he always was. Open-minded and inquisitive, rather than hard-shelled and dogmatic; open-hearted, rather than derogatory toward those whose paths were different than his own.

I am not a Christian, but Bill was one of two people who made me wish that some day I might be one. The other, my closest friend, has the same effect on me. I yearn for a fellowship of service and gratitude to which to belong. I think Bill created that for himself. He remains my role model as I continue my quest for atonement--for harmony with God.

In loving memory of William McNamer.