Search - Ascent Into Hell

Thomas Donlon made a bargain with God. If his wife survived the night, the son born of this terrible labor would become a priest. So Hugh Donlon's life is directed toward that vocation by his loving parents. When he is tempted in his youth by the beautiful Maria Manfredy, she is removed from his life.... but the priesthood is not the idealistic serivice Hugh had been lead to expect, and when the revolution of the Sixties comes, Hugh leaves it and rushes headlong into marriage and the secular world.... With compassion, insight, and wit, Fr. Greeley gives us a Parable of Grace, the story of a priest's spiritual pilgrimage and of two strong women contending twice for the man they both love.

A father bargains with God...if his wife survives the night the son born of this terrible labor would become a priest. This is the story of how he is pushed into the priesthood and eventually choosing to enter the secular world...

Another one leaves the priesthood.