Title: The Mirror Apocalypse
Author: John Ayang
Publisher: LifeRich Publishing
ISBN: 978-1489711854
Pages: 326
Genre: Literature & Fiction/Religious Literature & Fiction
Interviewed by: Tony Espinoza
Author Interview with John Ayang, author of The Mirror Apocalypse.
HBR: Tell us a little bit about yourself.
I am from Essien Udim Local Government Area in Akwa Ibom State, of the South-South part of Eastern Nigeria. I am the fourth of five siblings – three brothers and one sister. I studied at Queen of Apostles Seminary high school, Bigard Memorial Seminary, all in Nigeria where I obtained a bachelor of philosophy and a bachelor of divinity.
In 1996, I moved to the United States and joined a religious society in the Catholic Church – Society of Our Lady of the Most Holy Trinity – and was ordained a priest in 1998. I worked in parish Churches in Corpus Christ, Kansas City in Kansas, and Houston, Texas. I studied theology at the Franciscan University of Steubenville, Ohio, and got a Master’s degree. Then I went on to study bioethics at the Neiswanger Institute for Bioethics at Loyola University, Chicago, where I obtained a Master’s degree in bioethics and health policy, and a doctorate in bioethics in 2015.
Right now, I am a fellow at the University of Texas, MD Anderson Cancer Center, in the department of Spiritual Services and Education. I look forward to continuing my pastoral work as hospital chaplain after my fellowship program and, perhaps, researching and publishing another book.
HBR: What was the inspiration behind your book, “The Mirror Apocalypse”?
The inspiration to write The Mirror Apocalypse first came to me when I watched the movie, “My Sister’s Keeper,” based on a novel of the same name by Jodi Picoult (2004). But the major thrust of the inspiration came from my deep reflection on the paradox of life: nothing in life is clear cut. There is always a grey area where we experience a tug of war between what ought to be, and what actually is; between what is morally prescribed and what people actually do. Nowhere else in human life has this type of tension played out better than in the arena of the relationship between science ad religion. New discoveries in science and technology, especially in the area of human reproductive technology, have always seemed strange and antithetical to previously held religious beliefs and creeds. This is more pronounced in the relationship between the Catholic Church and the scientific community. Students of moral theology still wrestle with these special topics in the classrooms. That is how the idea and the plot for The Mirror Apocalypse was born.
HBR: What drew you into this particular genre?
I have a knack for exploring controversial situations; life issues that most people would not want to poke at with a ten-foot pole, I don’t mind turning those issues over with a two-foot cane, so to speak. There are more than a million and a half people in the US that were born through IVF. A good number of these are from Catholic parents. Granted that those parents may not be in the conservative cadre, they are, nonetheless, practicing Catholics. Children of such parents can get into seminaries and study to become priests, if they so have the calling. Admission interviews do not include the question: How, or by what method, were you born? It cannot even include such a question because it is a discriminatory question ab initio. That IVF-born individuals can become priests is a possibility that is not far-fetched, but because of the controversial nature of the issue, very few people would like to explore it. That is why I decided to shine the search light into that area by publishing The Mirror Apocalypse.
HBR: If you could sit down with ay character in your book, what would you ask them and why?
If I could sit down with a character in my book, it would be with the protagonist himself, Fr. McCarthy. The question that I would ask him is: Why on earth did you petition Rome to be laicized? There are three reasons why I would ask him that question. First, as a priest, a well-trained official of the Church, Fr. McCarthy knows that the priestly ordination imprints an indelible character on the ordained. Laicization only means that you live in the lay state with no faculties for public celebration of the sacraments of the Church; you still remain a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek, and forever. Secondly, that you were born by IVF was not your choice. Applying for, and obtaining laicization was an undeserved self-penalization that let the Church off the hook too easily. Thirdly, by applying for and obtaining laicization, Fr. McCarthy threw away a golden opportunity to open the way for the Church to wrestle with this area of human reproductive technology and come out with clear directives for its members.
HBR: What or who would you say was your inspiration for protagonist “Father Cletus McCarthy”? Any character or person in particular that gave you the inspiration to create him?
Fr. Cletus McCarthy is a purely fictional creation based on nobody in particular. However, he is a hypothetical creation based on the fact mentioned before; that, of the million plus individuals in the US born by IVF, there is a probability of one or more of those born Catholic becoming priests. So, the probability of such an occurrence gave me the inspiration to create the character as a type of such persons, not a particular, living individual.
HBR: Are there any particular cases or studies involving IVF and the morality of it in religion that you utilized in research for your book?
There are numerous cases of IVF and the morality of it in religion that gave me the idea for the book, but the major one was the case of the first IVF baby, Louise Joy Brown, born in the US in 1978, engineered by Georgeanna and Howard Jones. The media called her the “test tube baby,” the first instance of using that phrase.
HBR: What advice would you give to aspiring or just starting authors out there?
My advice to aspiring authors is: Don’t be afraid to be controversial. Life itself is full of controverses; write with grit and with passion about a subject you love. Put it out there for the reader to make his/ her judgment.
HBR: Now that you have published your book, what are your future plans? Any other books in the works?
My plan is to continue in pastoral work and to research more into other bioethical issues that can form the subject of another book.