Midnight Mass - Book III: Proverbs Quiz

Answer: Dementia

Upon arriving, Father Hill headed to his own confessional to beg God for forgiveness since he planned on lying to the people of Crockett's Island about Monsignor Pruitt. Mr. Pruitt was much sicker than thought when he was sent to Jerusalem on pilgrimage and on his very first day there he was lost frequently. Visiting the Wailing Wall, he was already in the grips of dementia. Father Hill suggested that he may continue to say that Monsignor Pruitt would remain in a hospital on the mainland, a sign that perhaps someday things will return to normal. It would be to prepare them for the miracles to come.

At St. Patrick's Church during Sunday Mass, the people of Crockett's Island bear witness to the first apparent miracle. Leeza Scarborough, bound to a wheelchair, raises to her feet to accept communion. Only Bev sees Father Hill leave out the back door, stumbling to his cabin, and she pursues him. She doesn't see him throwing up blood in the restroom; she's instead distracted by something else.

Answer: False

The townspeople see it as a true miracle as Dr. Gunning performs a medical check-up. Leeza, claiming that it was much like the phantom limb pain they discussed, has no idea when she felt able. Nonetheless, as Dr. Gunning claims, some spinal injuries do heal over time. She urges the Scarboroughs to head to mainland for testing, but they refuse, claiming that the experimental treatments they placed Leeza into cost them too much to be able to leave. They are grateful and it would be wrong to refute a gift from God. As they depart, Dr. Canning realizes that her mother, normally unable to reach the upstairs of the house, has wandered to her old bedroom on her own.

The other islanders, on the other hand, head to Father Hill's to seek miracles. Bev makes it clear that no one should overreact and she leads the people in prayer while Father Hill watches from inside. That evening, Riley asks the priest about it during their AA meeting; he can ignore all the possible reasons for her being able to walk except the fact that Father Hill knew she could. He simply says that he just knew.

Answer: Back

Leeza, given a cane by Dr. Gunning, finds herself able to walk to school with the other kids, and due to the nature of her miracle it's unsurprising that many of them walk with her specifically. Erin greets the kids as they head to school though she, too, can't explain what happened.

In the evening, Ed Flynn, despite his bad back, dances with his wife in their living room. It's because of this that they don't hear Warren sneaking out at night, joining Lisa and running out into town. Riley stays awake, writing a list of names he plans to make amends to while staring at the spectre of the girl he killed. Instead, he decides to leave the house, joining Erin on her balcony for the evening. Leeza and Warren take the boat out into the water and kiss under the moonlight.

By the next Mass, the majority of Crockett's Island shows up for the service. And the town experiences somewhat of a rebirth. At least for a short time.

Answer: Mysteries

Mass at St. Patrick's Church becomes so crowded that the altar boys start realizing they're running out of communion wine. As Warren and Ooker prepare to join the congregation, Warren sees Father Hill filling the wine decanter with his own flask.

For his sermon, Father Hill muses on the exaggerations held in life which differ from the exaggerations seen as truth by God-- things like the bread and wine of communion, the body and blood of Christ, which is not a metaphor. God's gifts, he says, are not abstract; they're as tangible as the ground beneath their feet even if people can not visualize them as such. God rarely gives miracles, but he frequently gives mysteries. Partway through his sermon, Father Hill experiences a short dizzy spell. Nonetheless, he remarks on the resurrection of Crockett's Island. It's a rebirth and a second chance, he says before he collapses.

Answer: A sandstorm

It was on the road to Damascus, Father Hill confessed, that Monsignor Pruitt, bewildered and confused, wandered from his tour group for the last time. They likely didn't realize he wandered off into the desert, and when the sandstorm rolled through the area it would have been surprising if her were ever seen again at all. As the Monsignor wandered through the storm, he saw a darkness in the dunes, a mouth of a cave perhaps or a door to an ancient ruin. And he descended into it.

Father Hill meets with Dr. Gunning in his house and, overseen by her and Bev, he's informed that he'll likely be just fine. He's perhaps facing a small virus. With water and rest, he'll recover.

Elsewhere, Sheriff Hassan spies a new book in his son's backpack-- a Holy Bible.

Answer: Leeza

Leeza takes herself to Joe's and surprises him by walking into the front door of his spacious trailer. She asks if she can see the gun he shot her with, but he alleges he threw it into the bay; he couldn't stand to look at it after what happened. She explains that on that day when she was injured, she didn't feel it, but she knew something was wrong when her father was screaming like a wild animal.

She tells Joe that she hates him, and has for years. She wants him to suffer for what he did and she wants him to beg for forgiveness so she can tell him no.

But she didn't visit him for that. What she really came to do is forgive him. She's still angry with him, but it's different. If God can forgive him, then anyone can.

Answer: The Bible

The parents of Crockett's Island attend a quick meeting in the schoolhouse to ask questions of Bev and Erin. Bev starts by stating that the full curriculum is still being taught and that teachings of Jesus can help better inform the students. Sheriff Hassan, however, is a bit concerned. The problem isn't his possession of a Bible or discussion about Jesus; the problem is that as a Muslim, he and his son believe that the Quran is the final, unalterable message of God. If he were to hand the Quran to the students of Crockett's Island, he would surely be run out of town. Erin intervenes here, agreeing with the Sheriff as a member of their congregation, and it forces Bev to apologize to Hassan...by claiming that the Bible is no less a study text than a science book or a history book that should be in homeroom. If a member of faculty, she claims, read from the Quran in the same way she read from the Bible, she would be fine with it provided that they didn't choose text that wasn't offensive which, as she asserts, it often is.

Bev reiterates that the island is experiencing a full-blown religious revival and bonafide miracles. If they can't read the Bible, then they aren't eager to learn the right things.

Answer: Joe

Erin confides in Riley that Bev's particular brand of self-righteousness made her deeply uncomfortable. He, similarly, is having trouble dealing with people. Since he struggles with making amends to people he's harmed, he takes Father Hill's advice to write letters instead-- lots of them. He claims he's a coward, but Erin tells him not to think that way.

At the Gunning household, Mildred seems to regain clarity of thought and mind, seeing her daughter and understanding that a darkness seemed to be hovering over her. She asks when she was moved into the living room.

Riley, meanwhile, heads to his AA meeting at the rec center and finds that Joe has joined the group on account of Leeza's visit. Father Hill nearly has to force Riley to say the right things just so Joe can hear them. After they leave, they don't notice his awful coughing fit, bringing the priest to his knees in the empty hall.

Answer: God didn't save his wife

Riley and Joe leave their AA meeting together joking about the rec center, a building Joe refers to as 'Bev Keane's Money Laundry'. Joe never thought he'd step inside the building, but then being in there with Riley and Father Hill, he feels like life might be worth... something after all that happened. Riley has to admit that he was glad Joe came.

Sheriff Hassan and Ali, finishing their prayers, have a critical talk. Ali, wanting to visit St. Patrick's to see the church his friends go to, is rebuffed by his father. Ali believes that with all the crazy things happening on the island, there must be something to understand. Hassan reminds his son that if God chose to spare some and not others, like his mother, then that simply wasn't how it worked. It's not magic.

As Hassan turns out his son's light, he briefly sees the image of a pallid face in the window looking in.

Answer: False

Elsewhere in town, Bev plans a community dinner in celebration of Father Hill for all he's already done and he asks Wade and Dolly Scarborough to give the primary address at the rec center. They happily agree, but mere moments later, the priest bursts through the door, stumbling into the furniture and falling to the floor coughing up blood. When he ceases his spasming, Wade checks his pulse to find that the man has died.

In the ruins off the road to Damascus, the Monsignor found darkness. Lighting a match he sought his way through the tunnels there to find something with glowing eyes staring back at him down the path. It attacked him in the dim matchlight, draining the blood from his neck and leaving him to pray. The creatures eyes and skin and hands and wings-- so different from a human but so similar-- reminded him of an angel. The creature, cutting into its own wrist, allowed the Monsignor to feed on its own blood and with that he was able to survive. When morning arrived, the Monsignor found himself a changed man with mental acuity. The storm had passed and somehow he was young again, the decades having been washed away.

The Monsignor would bring the Angel back with him to where it was need most. And he did, but he knew he would need to lie.

As Bev and the Scarboroughs pray for Father Hill, he regains his consciousness with shocking abruptness. None of them notice the newspaper article on the wall depicting a young Monsignor Pruitt...who looks like none other than the island's new priest.