It's Christmas Eve, so take a pew in the church of St. Conor of McPherson. Sure, the place is a bit of a mess, the ceiling's falling in, the shrines have seen better days and the place reeks of stale beer, unwashed humanity and clogged toilets, but you're welcome to sit awhile and say your prayers. Get ready for the Christ Child and all that.

Appropriately, City Theatre is now staging Conor McPherson's little worship service, "The Seafarer," at its digs, a former South Side church.

The other congregants are a bit down on their luck as well -- to be kind. Boozers and losers, really, (bleeping) "eejits," to be frank.

That's "idiots" for us Yanks. You see, we're in St. Conor's Ireland, not the spiffed up, shiny new Dublin, but a little place named Baldoyle "which could hardly be called a town these days."

There's Mr. Sharky Harkin, not a bad lad -- when he's sober, which is not often. On the drink, he gets a little free with his fists.

As a result, he's been banned from nearly every public house and hotel bar within miles. His wife and a few employers kicked him out, too.

Now, he mostly tends to his disabled brother Richard, blind after he fell and hit his head one night. Plastered as usual.

Richard confines his daily worship to a ratty chair in the dark hovel they share, stinking of his own filth and all the cheap whiskey he's spilled on himself.

A charming eejit, despite it all, except to Sharky who endures a steady stream of abuse while wiping his brother's you-know-what.

These lads are much like the dregs from an old Guinness bottle, not that you'd find a full one in their place.

Their mates are no better. Ivan's a little thick in the head, but he's "jarred" (drunk) all the time, so we understand. Lost his glasses, too, so he's almost as blind as Richard.

Hint: Keep an eye out for those specs.

Nicky's an all-around screw-up as well, dressing like a cheap pimp with clothes from the cast-off shops. Charming enough to wind up with Sharky's wife and his car, though.

Not much worth in the way of saving, you might say. A quartet of clowns better suited for an Irish sitcom, full of the boozy jokes and insults that keep you chuckling.

That's the way St. Conor works though. He's a canny priest of the Irish stage, drawing us in with his laughs and characters so pathetic you can't help but feel better about yourself, then delivering a heartfelt Christian sermon that catches you when you least expect it.

"The Seafarer" depends on an age-old literary legend -- a sinful human wrestling the Devil for his soul. Playing a game for it, like Bergman's knight in "The Seventh Seal" or even those jokers in "Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey."

Here it's poker, just a friendly hand or two among friends and Mr. Lockhart, a stranger Nicky's brought to the brother's home.

Dapper and polished, he's far too spiffy to be playing with these bums, so why is he here on this holiday evening?

For Sharky's soul. Years ago, he beat a wino to death, but Lockhart sprung him from prison -- at a price. Now, he's come to collect by winning the last hand.

As Christmas morning comes, the cards are dealt and the little truths of these men's little lives slip out. Lockhart calls them "insects."

"What have you got? Ha? You all age and wither before me like dead flowers in a bright window. You're nothing!" he rages at Sharky when the two are alone.

Then comes the twist: the Devil's as miserable as the boozers. Why? Because God loves Sharky for all his sins, not the Devil for all his power.

"No, he loves you. He loves all you insects ... Figure that one out."

At that moment, in what otherwise has been a play about, well, nothing, comes the crystal clear message: We can all be saved, no matter how mean and flawed we are.

Nothing original here in St. Conor's sermon, but fun to listen to in its bright, shiny repackaging. The symbolism is as heavy as a full Irish breakfast on your stomach, right down to the little red light bulb in front of the Sacred Heart of Jesus hanging on the hovel wall.

City Theatre's production, directed by its artistic director, Tracy Brigden, is largely rollicking entertainment. As the Irish say, it's "mighty craic" (pronounced "crack.")

McPherson's dialog snaps and crackles with wit giving Brigden and her experienced cast great material to perform.

Nobel Shropshire as the wily, nasty-tongued Richard hits all the right notes as the play's comedian and wise man. Christopher Donahue's Sharky is a study in abject humiliation and a kind of unforced nobility, while Mark Ulrich slips from backslapping drinking buddy to the sinister Devil easily.

Backing them are Sam Redford as the unconvincingly cool Nicky and Martin Giles, who as Ivan reprises his well-worn role as drunken comedy relief, as seen in other local productions.

Perhaps all Brigden had to do was hand out the scripts and stand back to admire these talented actors inhabit roles that seemed perfect for them.

One inauthentic note: The Irish version of moonshine, called poteen, is pronounced "poach-een," not "poteen" as the cast says. My authority is none other than Ireland-born Pittsburgh resident Anne Mullin Burnham, who added that she's been in most of the pubs mentioned in the play.

First Published: January 31, 2009, 10:00 a.m.