Alice here:  It's clear that we are not on the realistic or heroic level in this paragraph.  Here the world of dream exists either on the romantic or mythic level, depending on whether or not we focus on the dream's individual or archetypal information.

We will need a way to see and talk about what is going on in the boy's mind; we need a set of coordinates, a vocabulary.  But since we haven't even met Fr. Flynn, yet, let's just note this strange, unsettling dream and keep reading.  But we will want to come back to it when the story's over.

No Alice, I want to pursue it now.