Silent Night: A Christmas ghost story, by Billy O'Callaghan
A Midnight Mass, a ruined chapel, and a song that never stops — read Billy O’Callaghan’s haunting Christmas ghost story
A few Christmases ago, a couple of dear friends invited me to join them for Midnight Mass at St. Peter and Paul’s. It was thoughtful of them, since they knew I was on my own, and would, I’m certain, have been a most enjoyable night, a festive supper and good, lively, long-overdue chat at their place, followed by a stroll in through town for the service.Â
That particular December, Cork had been decked hard and white with frost; the air clean and crisp, the night sky even in around the city brilliantly starlit, and though I’d fallen out of the routine of regular mass-going, the prospect of a prayerful half an hour in beautiful, contemplative, candlelit dark, with the church’s stillness only deepened by gentle carol-song and all around us the most wistful, bittersweet reminders of years’ and people past, should have seemed an idyllic way of welcoming in the Christmas tide. “Not if you lashed me to a horse and dragged me.”
