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by: Sheri.Block
Date: 10/28/2009 4:38:00 PM ET

Isolation. Loneliness. Addiction.

“The Bishop’s Man” is not just a story of transgressions in the Catholic Church, but of the hidden demons that can haunt the priests.

• Click here to read an excerpt from "The Bishop's Man"

Father Duncan MacAskill is the focal character in Linden MacIntyre’s Giller-nominated novel. He’s the one man the bishop calls upon to discipline errant priests and sweep any wrongdoings under the rug. But when a potentially big scandal is about to break in the media, Father MacAskill is sent to a small parish in Creignish, N.S., close to where he grew up, and realizes he has battles of his own to face.

“I was interested in exploring some of the pressures that people in that line of work have to put up with, especially in view of the fact that there’s really no logical reason why they should have to deal with it,” says MacIntyre, a veteran journalist with CBC and co-host of internationally acclaimed program “The Fifth Estate.”

“You can go deep into the study of scripture and theology and everything else in history and you realize that this question of isolation, which is mostly related to the imposition of a celibacy requirement and the refusal to allow a priest to have a family of his own, it can be a sort of catalyst for a lot of other problems.”

Set in the early 1990s – a time when sexual abuse cases against priests were just starting to come to light in Canada and the U.S. – “The Bishop’s Man” centers around one particular boy in the community who Father MacAskill suspects was abused by a former priest. And while the suspense-laden story hints at sexual abuse, the misdemeanors are not graphically explored and instead take place “offstage,” according to MacIntyre.

“I tried to keep it on the level of the inner struggle that it causes in a guy who suddenly realizes that a, this stuff is widespread and b, the institution I’m a part of is kind of corrupt and I am being betrayed in my attempt to protect the image of the church.”

This whole failure of leadership within the church also fascinated MacIntyre. Rather than dealing with the pedophilia and the serious problems some of these priests were facing, the church instead took the position it must be somehow concealed, he says.

“The worst outcome of anything, from their point of view, is scandal and if you have scandal it undermines the faith of people … and so this justifies evasions of all kind, cover-ups, and it justifies a lot of bad leadership.”

MacIntyre, who has previously written two non-fiction novels, consulted with several ex-priests for research, including a good friend of his from university who was a priest for 25 years before leaving the faith.

“I turned to him to get some sense of from the priest’s point of view, how serious the problem was, even before it became known to the public and also, he was important in helping me develop an authentic voice for the book.”

He learned that so-called ‘Bishop’s Men’ do actually exist and spoke to one priest in particular who took on such a role during the 1950s and 60s in Nova Scotia.

MacIntyre also had his own upbringing to draw on – he was raised in a small Catholic community in Nova Scotia. Although he no longer identifies with the religion, he says his family certainly does and had mixed reactions to his book.

“It’s troubling to them but I haven’t made any secret of it. The first copy of the book I got my hands on I gave it to my 92-year-old mother who’s extremely Catholic and extremely intolerant of any kind of details of bad stuff and bad language and I said, ‘You’ve got to read this so you know. I don’t want people telling you about this book.’”

The book’s release is a timely one with the high-profile case of Raymond Lahey – a former bishop from the diocese of Antigonish, N.S. – currently under investigation for possessing and importing child pornography.

MacIntyre is not sure how the book will be received from the rest of the Catholic community, but it has already garnered a positive review from national weekly newspaper “The Catholic Register.”   

“That was quite revealing to me because the guy who wrote that review, he was a former Jesuit Novitiate, which is about as close as you get to being a priest,” says MacIntyre.

The book accurately illustrates how a parish can hold a community together, especially when other institutions that once brought them together, like schools, are closed.

“For the generation that goes to church, the priest is sort of the unofficial civil servant of that community, as well as the religious servant and so the prospect of losing the church and losing a priest is traumatic even though you don’t need that much from a priest anymore. It’s a symbolic statement that you are a community and that’s still important to people.”

While this is one element of the story that will no doubt be viewed positively by the church, MacIntyre believes most priests will also be able to see a fundamental truthfulness about the book.  

“I think that’s what I was striving to achieve, an essential truthfulness that they have to recognize,” says MacIntyre, who knows others may reject it just on principle.

But MacIntyre says he has seen indications from some priests and theologians that not only his book, but recent scandals such as the Lahey one, are a place to start looking for a reform movement to address things like celibacy and the participation of women in the church. 

“Now unfortunately this is all happening at a time when the church is under extreme right-wing management from the top and so the possibility of serious response to this that might fundamentally change the institution and make it more people-friendly is unlikely.”