Conceived Without Sin

C
ONCEIVED
W
ITHOUT
S
IN

From the Author of the
Spectacular Nationwide Bestsellers
Pierced by a Sword
and
House of Gold.

"I liked this book very much because it is about real people. I
loved
the humor. It explores the hidden battles in the war that is waged over every soul. It's a great read, and I believe it will change the lives of many, many readers."

–
Michael O'Brien, Father & Author

"This book
grabbed me and held me faster and more powerfully than the author's first book. The characters are fascinating and funny, yet gritty and real. I can't recommend this book more! A great story!"

–
Patricia Noble, Mother & Homemaker

"I really liked Donna. She was genuine. She reminded me of a few girls I know–or would like to get to know. And the ending was a big surprise."

–
Marie Ames, College
Student

"The scene where the Kemps and Mark Johnson deal with their marriage problems was an eye-opener. It changed my outlook on marriage, my wife, and fatherhood. It helped me a lot."

–
Bill McNeil, Businessman & Father

"
These
are characters I can relate to! I simply couldn't put this book down. You'll laugh, too–really laugh. This story will stay with you for a long, long time."

–
Vin David,
Computer Analyst & Father

"Movies! Basketball! Marriage! Friendship–all weaved together like nothing I've ever read before. This book is unique!"

–
Eileen Burns, UPS Driver

Characters who jump off the page.
A story that will grab you and surprise you.
Hilarious dialogue and thoughtful discussion.
A novel about the true meaning of friendship in modern America.
A book about your life.

C
ONCEIVED
W
ITHOUT
S
IN

For Sam Fisk, the quiet, driven owner of a computer company, the day began like any other day–until a big, sleepy-eyed man slams into him on the basketball court...

...Donna Beck found herself drifting after college, watching videos, living at home, wondering if she would ever find any excitement or meaning in her boring suburb of Rocky River, Ohio...

...Mark Johnson was a tough guy, used to getting his way, but now his marriage is on the rocks, his wife has kicked him out of his house, and is threatening to call her lawyer...

...Ellie James is beautiful,
blond, and rich–in total control of her life. She is accustomed to attracting any man she desires. Now she falls in love with a man who might not want her...

From the raging summer waters of the New Jersey shore to the peaceful solitude of cold winter nights on Lake Erie,
C
ONCEIVED
W
ITHOUT
S
IN
plunges you deep into the hearts and lives of people so real you'll swear you know them.

I
F
Y
OU
R
EALLY
L
IKE
T
HIS
B
OOK

Consider Giving it Away.

Saint Jude Media, the nonprofit publisher of this novel, invites you to send for copies to distribute to your family, friends, and associates. We are making it available in quantities for a nominal donation. We will even send a free copy to individuals who write to us directly. There is no catch. It's a new concept in book distribution that
makes it easier for everyone to read great books.

See the back pages of this book for more details, or write to us for more information:

Saint Jude Media
PO Box 26120
Fairview Park, OH 44126-0120

www.catholicity.com

Discover a New World.
Change Your Life Forever.

Published by Saint Jude Media
PO Box 26120, Fairview Park, OH 44126-0120
www.catholicity.com

© 1997 by William N. Macfarlane, Jr. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever without permission.

ISBN: 0-9646316-1-X

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 97-91810

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents
either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Cover Design by Ron Wiggins
Typesetting by Joe Vantaggi
Printing by Offset Paperback Manufacturers, Dallas, PA

Printed in the United States of America

A
LSO BY
B
UD
M
ACFARLANE
J
R.

P
IERCED BY A
S
WORD
H
OUSE OF
G
OLD

C
ONCEIVED
W
ITHOUT
S
IN

B
UD
M
ACFARLANE
J
R.

S
AINT
J
UDE
M
EDIA
C
LEVELAND
, O
HIO

Foreword

"Am I my brother's keeper?"

This snotty comeback to God, somewhere in the Old Testament, runs down the centuries to nullify human relationships from start to finish. The modern equivalent is "Live and let live."

You will not find in this story of a small group of friends any honoring of that trite adage. Here are characters cajoling, interfering, philosophizing, yapping like a bunch of
Russians on a train in a novel by Dostoyevsky. They are strong just when you expect them to be weak, or suddenly freak out when you expect them to be rocks of stability. Sam the computer nerd, Donna the tomboy, Buzz the iron man; each one will fool you in the end. One strange and wonderful thing about Bud Macfarlane Jr.'s storytelling is that his people are so loved by the author that they grab and
hold you and make you say, "No, Sam–don't say that–" or "Come on, get up and–" You turn the page and say, "Yes! Thank God for Ellie's kindness (insight, sensitivity…)" Few authors writing today can command that depth of emotional commitment from the reader.

It is all done with dialogue and a bit of interior monologue, and some dreams, and some action. Macfarlane's first novel,
Pierced by a Sword,
was filled with extraordinary events: apocalypse, supernatural warnings, war and rebellion. It is set in the near future. This novel, on the contrary, is plainly a story of love and marriage and friendship and conversion. Supernatural forces weave in and out, as they must do in real stories of the faith.

But there is no world-consuming, world-redeeming, world-wide stage action. It is all in the
here and the now, all in the relationships young adults begin to have and then build on, and then consummate with one another and with God. Its heroism and its tragedy are on the small side of things. What happens can happen to you and me, without even the first bong of the End of the World Clock. But the story grabs hold and grips you as it plunges you into the characters and personalities, the
changing, deepening, accepting or unaccepting faith of Buzz, Mark, Ellie, Donna, Sam, Maggie, Maxine…

It explores faith in its most personal manifestations, in the grace that comes to people, how it comes, how it moves the pieces on the chessboard. It explores the meaning of the virgin birth in a way that has never been explored before. It describes the depths of falling away doubt and the anguish
of redemptive suffering. It describes the crucifixion of Jesus Christ as if you were there, looking at it, cringing with horror. It shows, in the finale, how God will use the deliberately irreligious despair of a self-hating man to bring glory to the people he tried to love.

All of this, which should take hundreds of pages of stale theology, is done with the emotional talk, the pain, and the crabby
wants of ordinary people. People who won't leave well enough alone.

I am a convert to the faith. It hasn't been easy sailing. Often it has seemed to me that I have to carry the faith around in my head. There is no cultural tapestry to make me feel at home. There are no crucifixes on the barroom walls. No one hails me on the street with a hearty "Praise be Jesus and Mary!" In communist Bosnia,
which I visited some years ago, they did. In a novel by Bud Macfarlane Jr., I am able to live in a Catholic culture for a time. Though that culture is carried by only a few characters, those characters make up the whole of this novel, so the world is suddenly Catholic, for as long as I live in the novel. And for that experience, I wish to thank Mr. Macfarlane. He's even got me wearing the Miraculous
Medal sometimes.

T
HOMAS
W. C
ASE
6 J
UNE
1997
F
EAST OF THE
S
ACRED
H
EART OF
J
ESUS

Acknowledgments

I want to thank all the people who read my first novel, and especially those who were kind enough to pass it along to another reader. This second book would not exist without you. Please pray for me; I pray for you.

I'm grateful for my editors, Michael O'Brien and his son John, Tom Case, Rosanne and Andrew Hawley, Dave Baugh, Bill Merimee, Dave van Hecke, Amy Koopman, Jamie Hickey,
Dan Davidson–each played a role in bringing this book to you. Joe Vantaggi did his usual yoeman's job on typesetting, and Ron Wiggins created another beautiful cover. Thanks.

Preface

There are two kinds of people in this wacky world: those who read prefaces, and those who don't. I'm a preface reader myself. But if you're not, imagine yellow police tape around this section with a police officer waving at you, saying, "Move along, move along, nothing to read here. Move along…"

All others, follow me.

There is a poet and singer named Jim Carroll. I saw him on the old Tom
Snyder show. Snyder asked Carroll why he named his first album "Catholic Boy."

Carroll replied that he was a Catholic.

"A Catholic?" Snyder was shocked, as if being a Catholic was like being a leper or something. You could practically see him making a mental note
to fire the guy who asked Carroll to be on his show.

Carroll went on to explain that Catholicism is the only religion that finds any
value in suffering. Carroll had recently stayed by the bedside of a friend who had suffered tremendously from leukemia for months before passing away.

He explained by saying something like, "All the other religions promise you happiness and contentment. But that's not what life is like. That's not what it was like for me watching my best friend waste away; I felt totally helpless. That's not what
is was like for Mary to watch her Son get nailed to a cross. Catholicism isn't afraid of blood and suffering, or death. It's real."

The next day, I went right out and bought the album. Carroll, who wrote
The Basketball Diaries,
turned out to be a better poet than singer. He did have one song that was almost a hit which is both hilarious and eerily sad,
All the People Who Died.

Parents beware.
I wrote what I see in the world we live in, not some made-up fiction world. This story has a lot do with marriage, and, because sex is a part of marriage, it has to do with sex. Read it first before you give it to your kids.

One last note of interest: in Chapter Eight a story is told about an astronaut and a piece of wood. This is a true story, just so you know. The astronaut has a niece who is
the godmother of one of my sons. I changed the names around, of course, 'cause that's the law. Also, the story Buzz tells in Chapter Five regarding the Saint Anthony statue really happened. In some instances I have refrained from depicting certain details of the events, truth being (as the cliché goes) far, far stranger than fiction. I won't tell you whether or not the big scene at the end really
happened to somebody in real life. Maybe it did. Maybe it didn't.
Maybe it did.

Also, if you like movies, you might want to jot down the ones mentioned in this story as you read. That way you can rent the videos and kind of 'watch along' with the characters. Kinda cool, huh? Interactive! Yikes!

Finally, there is no need to strap on your seat belt this time around. Instead, put on your walking
shoes and pour some coffee in the ol' Thermos. Pack a lunch. Grab your favorite jacket–the old, well-worn one that you keep, yes, over there, on the hook by your back door. Let's go for a walk, together, with some friends I would like you to meet.

B
UD
M
ACFARLANE
J
R.
13 M
AY
1997
F
EAST OF
O
UR
L
ADY OF
F
ATIMA

Prologue

It would come to him. Things always did.

Sam Fisk finished tying his shoe, and looked up from the marble floor of a gallery in the Art Institute of Chicago. He saw the El Greco for the first time, and according to his curious, methodical habit, made a point of looking at the title and artist before giving the painting a close look. This work was part of a traveling exhibit from Spain.

The Savior of the World by Domenikos Theotokpulos, "El Greco," meaning "the Greek,"
Sam mouthed the words as he read them. He already knew about El Greco. His father had taught him. But he had never seen this particular work before.

He stared gently at the painting, a depiction of Christ from the waist up with his left hand on a globe the size of a basketball and his right hand floating, arm raised,
his fingers making a sign of blessing that looked like an anachronistic peace sign. Sam almost turned away from the painting after a cursory twenty seconds, but the eyes in this Christ penetrated him. Held him. His father had taught him never to rush inside a museum, so he quite unconsciously allowed the enjoyment of a great piece of art to hold him.

Sam looked for a minute. Then two minutes.
A matronly lady courteously made a small sound in her throat, waiting, but he did not hear her. She frowned a gray frown and moved on. He kept staring, thoughtless, held by the eyes of Christ.

Who are you?

He often skipped class at the University of Chicago to come here. It gave the sophomore a sense of peace.
A museum is the only authentic cathedral for the man who loves humanity,
his father
had said.

It was as if Edward Fisk lived inside his son's head. His father, a devout atheist, worshipped often and reverently in museums, and tried valiantly to pass on his love for art, literature, and history to his boy in a thousand different ways. Sam could have been a better student of humanity. His father's love for the achievements of mankind seemed sufficient for the two of them. If the
atheist father was devout, then the agnostic son, while still believing as the father did, had lapsed, not into Christian faith, but into the practice of the "lower arts," as his father would have called them.

Edward taught philosophy; his specialty was the Enlightenment. Sam was studying business and computers, to the great disappointment of his father. The son wanted to experience the joys of
triumphing over the world–a world which his father only studied. Sam pondered at the biggest blank space in his father's life.

Why did I choose business over art?

He squinted at Jesus.

Sports,
he told himself, pleased with his choice.

Triumph, defeat, endurance, will. The real world is my world–not the world of thoughts and books and lectures.
He wanted to be a player, not a reporter.

He remembered
his first solid hit on the football field, in fourth grade. Sam's impact had broken the other boy's chin strap, and the other kid had almost passed out. His teammates clapped Sam on the back, his coaches nodded approvingly. Edward, who was still alive and talked with Sam on the phone practically every evening, had lost his son to football, basketball, and baseball on that fall day. Instead of
leisurely reading books on the back porch with his father, Sam was out playing ball games and starting little companies to mow lawns, walk dogs, sell papers, and paint fences.

Please, who are you?
Sam requested of the Christ staring at him from the El Greco.

No answer came.

Or maybe I can't hear you. Probably because you're not there. Just paint and light from the mind of a saint in the cathedral
of humanity.

Still, the tall business student stared. There was no bitterness in his question and answer. Just relief and a certain smugness; a legacy from his father.

"Hey, good looking," a sharp, female voice came from behind him, "you gonna stare at that El Greco forever?"

Sam turned and saw an absolutely striking blond woman, a stranger standing a few feet behind him, with her arms folded.
She was not quite a woman yet–a girl, really–probably no older than seventeen. She had a Mona Lisa smile and seemed to enjoy his awkwardness as he turned. He looked at his watch. He had been standing motionless in front of the El Greco for over ten minutes!

"Um, I was just daydreaming, that's all, I uh–"

He started to blush.

"Don't be embarrassed. It's my father's favorite painting, or was. He's
been dead for a long time–" the girl said.

There was something about her that reminded him of the painting. He was a bit surprised, and he shuffled his feet and looked down. He was always uncomfortable around women.

"I'm sorry–" he began.

"No need to be. I got over it. It's just that my class is over at the Sunday Afternoon in the Park with Harry exhibit, and I'm playing hooky to see Daddy's favorite
painting. You remind me of him–my father, that is." There was a sparkle in the blond beauty's eye, betraying mirth and confidence.

She's just a high school chick,
he thought.

"It's George," he corrected.

"What's George?"

"The painting your class is studying. Sunday Afternoon in the Park with George, or was that the name of the musical?" he asked himself as much as the pretty girl.

She squinted
her eyes and shook her head. She had no idea what he was talking about.

"Whatever," she replied. "Look, I'm sorry I interrupted you. I've got to get back, and I just wanted to see Daddy's painting, but it's no big deal." She sounded sincere, her voice lower, a bit nervous.

It's the eyes,
he thought.
Their eyes are the same. Beautiful, haunting. What am I saying?

"I'm playing hooky, too. I attend
the University of Chicago…" he offered awkwardly.
God, I sound so stupid!

His words hung in the air. The blonde looked down the hall, toward the wing where her class was.

"Look, I've got to go now. Nice meeting you."

She smiled a perfect smile and started to walk away.

"Don't go, I don't even know your name…"

But she was already walking away with a somewhat boyish gait, leaving him.

"It's Becky,"
she called over her shoulder as she turned the corner, smiling, somehow relating to him that she was just fine.

"But I don't know your last name…" he called softly to himself, knowing she couldn't hear him. He looked back quickly to the El Greco. Surrounded by beauty.

What?
he asked, feeling foolish.

He had just seen the most beautiful girl in Chicago and let her walk away. It was time for the
self-castigation.

Good job, Romeo. She's gone forever. You can't even get a date with a high school girl.

Now for the rationalizations.

Who cares? Besides, she had to be kidding, calling me good-looking.

Sam was not handsome. Sure, he was tall and had the lankiness and easy grace of an athlete, but his skin was full of pockmarks, and tight against the stern bones of his face. The residue of a
horrendous war, now peacefully settled, that his face had lost to acne in high school. His teeth seemed too big for his mouth, marring his smile.

No, Sam Fisk was not handsome. And girls had never found him attractive. Until Becky Macadam this very day. But he could never be certain if she had truly found him attractive, because he would never meet her again. She was meant for another man in the
great plan of life.

But her beauty had inspired him, and something his father had made him memorize swam up from the pools of his memory about a faint heart. His memory grasped it.

Yeah. 'The faint heart never captured the fair maiden.' Was Dad preparing me for something? Usually, it's more like 'The good-looking guy gets the hot babe.' Hey, Dad, hearts pump blood. They don't faint or wake up
even. But thanks for the tip.

Next time,
he told himself for the hundredth time,
I'll be more confident. I'll ask her, whoever she may be, to go out. This one was way too young, anyway. If I ever meet a girl as pretty as Becky again…

He looked down, and away from the El Greco.

Yeah, right.