In Midnight Mass, episode 5, Father Paul keeps trying to get Riley to recite the Serenity Prayer with him, especially “to accept the things I cannot change” part. It’s an intimate episode. Riley and Father Paul, mostly in conversation with each other, an echo of their previous AA meetings. And in those previous meetings, the Serenity Prayer had also made an appearance. They repeated it together:
“God, grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change
the courage to change the things I can
and the wisdom to know the difference.”
But in this particular episode, Father Paul becomes increasingly frustrated with Riley, who appears not to be accepting his new state, his new life, reborn as a vampire. For Father Paul, it’s a gift. For Riley, it’s something else, something scarier, something more sinister. Riley, ultimately, chooses to show courage and wisdom and meet the sunrise. It breaks my heart open every time I watch the scene.
And I have watched it twice now. Once when Midnight Mass came out in 2021 and once a couple of weeks ago for on a rewatch. We were doing an episode of Pod Only Knows about re-encountering Midnight Mass five years later. I knew what was coming with episode 5. It still broke my heart, even if Riley’s death was a little less of a surprise on the rewatch.
What really did not surprises me was how much Midnight Mass still means to me years after I first watched it. Arguably, it’s Mike Flanagan’s best show: an atmospheric and supernatural horror centered on a tight-knit island community. It’s horror. It’s religion. It’s a vampire misunderstood as an angel of the Lord. It’s a priest trying to bring miracles and salvation and instead brings destruction. It’s ordinary people becoming monsters. It’s ordinary people choosing not to become monsters. It’s about making choices to save people you’ll never meet. It’s about long soliloquies about what happens to you after you die. It’s horrifying and beautiful. Terrible and profoundly moving all at once.
But if I am honest, it’s not entirely because it’s Flanagan’s best show that I find it meaningful to me. I’ve watched a lot of Flanagan and still have some to watch. I love his shows, but that’s not it.
The real reason is that Midnight Mass was the first show I watched after my stepdad died five years ago. He had faced a long struggle with Stage 4 brain and lung cancer. He died the same month that Midnight Mass premiered. After being by his side as he passed, I found myself helping with funeral arrangements, working on an obituary, picking out a casket and liner, and talking to and comforting people who knew him as they passed in and out of my parents’ home. I attempted to sleep on one of my parents’ couches, which tried to swallow me whole, for what felt like countless nights until I finally returned back to my home, hurting and exhausted. I needed something to take my mind off of everything. A horror TV show seemed to fit the bill. So, I sat next to my husband on our gray couch as he started up Netflix and hoped for a diversion.
But, that’s not what happened.
From the earliest moments of Midnight Mass, everything felt significant. From Riley’s journey home to the island after prison and his guilt to Father Paul and the Catholic rituals to the put-upon Muslim sheriff trying to do what’s right for the community, I was invested, even as I knew that something had to go horribly wrong. And things, of course, go wrong when your angel turns out to be a vampire. But, I could almost understand Father Paul’s desire for a miracle. If I had been offered a miracle, would I have taken it? I want to say I would have been savvy and cautious, smarter than the folks on Crockett Island. My grieving heart still knows that’s a lie.
It’s episode 5 that got me then. It’s episode 5 that still gets me now. When Father Paul yells at Riley to accept the things he cannot change, I empathize with Riley as he fights against the inevitable. As I watched the scene the first time, I was not soothed by the Serenity Prayer. I was angry. I wanted to do anything but accept the things I could not change. One of my parents was dead. I was having a hard time accepting it, even though I had had years to prepare for my stepdad’s passing. As Paul yelled at Riley, I felt like he was yelling at me, Accept it! At first, I wanted to yell back, No, no, no! But as the episode progresses, Riley comes to terms with his fate and what he must do. And watching him, I somehow felt my anger draining away. I wasn’t at peace. I wasn’t resigned. I was accepting.
By the time I had reached the end of the episode, I was sobbing, not just for Riley but also for me. And now, five years later, I can still feel those emotional echoes. I am still moved by Riley’s journey, but it doesn’t burn so intensely for me. I still cry, but mostly for him, not for me. Now, I appreciate what Midnight Mass did for me then and how it was one small step in helping me mourn and heal.