For First Communicants
NEUMANN PRESS
With Nihil Obstat and Imprimatur, 1919
by a Sister of Notre Dame, author of First Communion Days
Page 2
-------John--------
Such a ragged, dirty little boy he was when he first came to school, and so naughty that many a time his teacher was in despair over him.
But it was no wonder John was naughty. He had never been taught to be anything else. His father and mother were tramps who spent all their lives going from one village to another begging; then when they got a few pence they spent them at the nearest public-house. They never spoke without swearing and using bad language, which John thought very clever. From a tiny child he had tried to copy them in every way, until he, too, never spoke without using bad language.
He was always in rags, and had never known what it was to wear shoes and stockings, nor could he ever remember staying longer than a week at any place until he was about eight years of age. At that time they were near Manchester, when John's mother fell ill, so they went to live in a tiny room in one of the worst streets in that city.
Now it happened, that John's mother was a Catholic, though not a good one. She had never been inside a church since she was a little girl at school, but feeling herself so ill she thought about the bad life she had led, and how John had never been Baptized. So one day when his father was out she sent John to look for a priest. John went out into the street, asked someone to tell him where a priest could be found, and soon returned with him to his mother.
The priest stayed a long time with her, for he saw she was dying, and he wanted to help her to be sorry for the bad life she had led. He promised, too, that John should be Baptized and put into a Catholic school. Soon after this his mother died, but not before the priest had done all he could for her and for John, and John's father made up his mind to stay in Manchester now his wife was dead.
John did not like school at all. He had spent the whole of his life roaming about the country, and he could not see why he should be made to sit still and learn all sorts of things he did not want to know. So he behaved as badly as he could, and did his best to make the others naughty too. The only time that John was good in school was during religious instruction. He had never heard the life of Our Lord before, and when he first heard the story of the Passion he cried bitterly. If his teacher had not noticed this, I think she would have had him sent away from the school, but she thought she would get him to be good for the love of Our Lord.
One day she asked him to walk home with her so that she might talk to him alone. She explained to him how he hurt Our Lord by his bad behaviour, and by the bad language he used. John replied that he did not want to be naughty but that he never thought, and that he did not know when he was using bad language. He just spoke the same way as his father. His teacher said she would give him a little picture of the Sacred Heart and told him when in school to keep it on his desk to remind him, and John promised that he would try to do better.
Each morning he took out his picture as his teacher had told him, and many a time, just as he was going to begin some trick to make the boys laugh, his eyes fell upon it and he went on with his lessons instead. He did not get good all at once though: many and many a time he had to be punished. But he went on trying, and that was what his teacher wanted.
The next year he made his First Confession. His great trouble was his habit of swearing. It seemed as if he could not cure himself. You see he had always heard this language from his father when at home. The following year the priest put him in the First Communion class, but told him he really must overcome this habit if he wished to receive Our Lord with the other children.
John often tried to do little acts to please Our Lord, and it made him sad to think he had so little to give Him. One day his teacher asked the children instead of buying sweets to bring their money for some very poor children, and in this way to show their love for Our Lord. Poor John was very sad about this. What could he give? He had nothing at all. The next day, to his joy, his father gave him a halfpenny to buy his dinner. John was delighted. He ran all the way to school, and handing his halfpenny to the teacher, asked her to take one farthing for the poor and the change would do for his dinner. Do you not think Our Lord must have loved him?
A month later, on the Feast of Corpus Christi, the children were to make their First Holy Communion. Although John still used bad words sometimes, he was so much better that the priest said he might make it too. The day before, John went to Confession, and was glad to think there was only the night to pass before Our Lord would come to him. He had no nice clothes to wear, nothing but his rags, but his teacher had told him to wash himself well and she would lend him a coat, as he had not got one. So when it was time to go to bed he got some water and began to wash himself vigorously. His father asked him what he was doing that for, and John told him. He had only once or twice before spoken to his father about religion, for each time it had made him so angry that he had beaten John cruelly, so the boy thought it wiser to say nothing about it. But that night he had answered without thinking.
When his father heard what John was going to do the next day he was so angry that he began using the most dreadful language, and took up a stick to beat him.
"Oh, father, beat me if you will," said John, as he put his hands to his ears, "but do not use such dreadful words. I cannot stay here if you do."
"So your own father's language is not good enough for you! And you can't stay here? You shall not stay here. Go and find a home for yourself." And pushing him out of the door the angry man shut it, and left his little boy in the street. It was dark. John walked slowly down the street until he found a doorstep where he would be nearly hidden if a policeman passed. Then, sitting down, he took out his rosary and quietly said his prayers till he fell asleep.
Early in the morning he awoke stiff and cold.
But he did not think of that He only remembered it was his First Communion day and ran off towards his school.
His teacher was there with the other First Communicants, and lent him the coat she had promised, pinning a white ribbon on to the sleeve. How happy John was as he walked up to the communion rails with the others, and it was only after the breakfast at the school, when John was talking to the priest, that he told him where he had spent the night.
"You see, Father," he said, "I was so afraid if I listened to those dreadful words I should be repeating them to myself without thinking, and so stain my soul."
So, in order to make a pure home for Our Lord in his heart, John had lost his earthly home. But you will be pleased to hear that the priest found a new, good Catholic home for him, where he grew up to become a good and useful man.
The above image is not part of the book, which has black and white illustrations.
www.catholictradition.org/Children/true-stories2.htm
