The priest who presides over my parish is retiring next week because he got cancer. Sad story, I know, but my curiosity leads me to ask: What happens to retired priests, what do they do? How is this affecting his faith?
My current hypothesis is that retired priests go somewhere warm and sit around all day watching masses being performed by their brethren living in the limelight. They drink a lot and they eat a lot and try their best to die as quickly as possible of natural causes, because they've been working hard their whole lives and now they want their reward. Give me Heaven, or give me McDonald's and a beer! They all shout together. Or perhaps they live on peacefully and enjoy simple human hobbies for the rest of their lives. Or they finally break under the pressure of moral expectations and embark on long journeys of debauchery.
Regardless of the particular poison my priest picks, I wonder how his illness is affecting his faith. For someone who spent their whole life ignoring God or doubting him or even hating him, their proximity to death might lead them to find new faith and use their illness as a way to turn a new leaf and have a positive impact on the world. For someone who spends their whole life serving the Lord and praising his works, for someone who put all their trust in this all-knowing all-powerful being that brought all of creation together from absolutely nothing (a true American, pulled himself up by his bootstraps, so to speak) there is nothing more to turn to. You've already given everything to God and suddenly you've reached the ultimate test of your faith. It must feel like punishment. So now what?
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