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“NOT ALL EPISCOPALIANS GENUFLECT,” Owen announced.

“I don’t,” I said.

“I DO,” said Owen Meany.

“Sometimes I do and sometimes I don’t,” Dan said. “When I’m in church, I watch the other people—I do what they do.”

Thus did our eclectic foursome arrive at Christ Church.

Despite the cold, the Rev. Dudley Wiggin was standing outdoors on the church steps to greet the early arrivals; he was not wearing a hat, and his scalp glowed a howling red under his thin, gray hair—his ears looked frozen bloodless enough to break off. Barb Wiggin stood in a silver-fur coat beside him, wearing a matching fur hat.

“SHE LOOKS LIKE A STEWARDESS ON THE TRANS-SIBERIAN RAILROAD,” Owen observed.

I got quite a shock to see the Rev. Lewis Merrill and his California wife standing next to the Wiggins; Owen was surprised, too.

“HAVE YOU CHANGED CHURCHES?” Owen asked them.

The long-suffering Merrills appeared not to possess the imaginative capacity to know what Owen meant; it was a question that raised havoc with Mr. Merrill’s usually slight stutter.

“W-w-w-w-e have Ves-p-p-p-pers today!” Mr. Merrill told Owen, who didn’t understand.

“The Congregationalists have a Vesper service today,” I told Owen. “Instead of the regular morning service,” I added. “Vespers are in the late afternoon.”

“I KNOW WHAT TIME VESPERS ARE!” Owen answered irritably.

The Rev. Mr. Wiggin put his arm around his fellow clergyman’s shoulder, giving the Rev. Mr. Merrill such a squeeze that the smaller, paler man looked alarmed. I believe that Episcopalians are generally heartier than Congregationalists.

“Barb and I go to the Vespers, for the caroling—every year,” Rector Wiggin announced. “And the Merrills come to our pageant!”

“Every year,” Mrs. Merrill added neutrally; she looked miserably envious of Owen’s face-concealing scarf.

The Rev. Mr. Merrill composed himself. I’d not seen him so tongue-tied since Sagamore’s spontaneous funeral, and it occurred to me that it might be Owen who so effectively crippled his speech.

“We really go in for the caroling, we celebrate the songs of Christmas—we’ve always put great emphasis on our choir,” Pastor Merrill said. He appeared to single me out for a heartfelt look when he said “choir,” as if the mere mention of these trained angels was certain to remind me of my mother’s lost voice.

“We go in more for the miracle itself!” said Mr. Wiggin joyfully. “And this year,” the rector added, suddenly taking a grip of Owen’s shoulder with his steady pilot’s hand, “this year we’ve got a little Lord Jesus who’s gonna take your breath away!” The Rev. Dudley Wiggin mauled Owen’s head in his big paw, managing to push down the visor of Owen’s red-and-black-checkered hunter’s cap; at the same time, he effectively blinded Owen by scrunching up my mother’s LUCKY scarf.

“Yes, sir!” said Rector Wiggin, who now lifted the hunter’s cap off Owen’s head, so quickly that static electricity caused Owen’s silky-thin, babylike hair to stand up and wave in all directions. “This year,” Captain Wiggin warned, “there’s not gonna be a dry eye in the house!”

Owen, who appeared to be strangling in his scarf, sneezed.

“Owen, you come with me!” Barb Wiggin said sharply. “I’ve got to wrap this poor child in his swaddling clothes—before he catches cold!” she explained to the Merrills; but Mr. Merrill and his shivering wife looked in need of being wrapped in swaddling clothes themselves. They seemed aghast at the notion that Owen Meany was cast as the Prince of Peace. The Congregationalists are a lot less miracle-oriented than the Episcopalians, I believe.

In the chilly vestibule of the parish house, Barb Wiggin proceeded to imprison Owen Meany in the swaddling clothes; but however tightly or loosely she bound him in the broad, cotton swathes, Owen complained.

“IT’S TOO TIGHT, I CAN’T BREATHE!” he would say, coughing. Or else he would cry out, “I FEEL A DRAFT!”

Barb Wiggin worked over him with such a grim, humorless sense of purpose that you would have thought she was embalming him; perhaps that’s what she thought of as she swaddled him—to calm herself.

The combination of being so roughly handled by Barb Wiggin and discovering that my grandmother had been free to attend the pageant—but had chosen not to attend—was deleterious to Owen’s mood; he grew cranky and petulant. He insisted that he be unswaddled, and then reswaddled, in my mother’s LUCKY scarf; when this was accomplished, the white cotton swathes could be wrapped over the scarf to conceal it. The point being, he wanted the scarf next to his skin.

“FOR WARMTH AND FOR LUCK,” he said.

“The Baby Jesus doesn’t need ‘luck,’ Owen,” Barb Wiggin told him.

“ARE YOU TELLING ME CHRIST WAS LUCKY?” Owen asked her. “I WOULD SAY HE COULD HAVE USED A LITTLE MORE LUCK THAN HE HAD. I WOULD SAY HE RAN OUT OF LUCK, AT THE END.”

“But Owen,” Rector Wiggin said. “He was crucified, yet he rose from the dead—he was resurrected. Isn’t the point that he was saved?”