Forgive Me, Father

Jackie sat in the confessional booth and took a deep breath. She was a thirty-year-old woman, and had never been to confessional.

Jackie fidgeted, unsure where to start. This confession was long in the making.

"I have a confession to make," she choked out the words.

The priest coaxed her to continue.

"Forgive me, father. I did something terrible, years ago."

The priest asked her how long ago.

"Five years, almost six. Do you remember when there was a break in at the zoo, and all of the wild cats disappeared?"

The priest said that he did remember.

"My friends and I were responsible for it, and I was the ringleader. We wanted to free them, to bring the cats back to their homes. We set everything up for their transportation to rehabilitation facilities in other countries," Jackie almost sounded wistful.

The priest said her heart was in the right place.

"Everything went exactly according to plan. The cats are free now! They adapted back to life in the wild."

The priest said that he understood.

"Father, that's not the part that was bad."

The priest gently urged her to continue.

"I had an affair with the zookeeper to gain access to security information."

The priest asked how the affair ended.

"Well, see, he was married and also my college professor. I aced his class, freed the cats, and left him."

The priest told Jackie that her heart was in the right place, except for the affair. Wanting God's creatures to be free was a noble cause, she just had to think about how she freed them.

Jackie thanked the priest, saying that she would see him on Sunday. In the meantime, however, she had heard about an animal testing facility with a couple of gorillas.