Thoughts of a recovering Catholic

I was born and bred Roman Catholic and was taught way back then that ‘once a Catholic, always a Catholic.’  

I must admit that there are days I still feel Catholic, but in my heart of hearts I know I’m not.  That’s not to say my upbringing has been uprooted and I am free from what I was taught as a kid.  That kind of thing runs deep and still informs the fabric of who I am. 

I bring this up today because of a request for a financial gift I got the other day from my Catholic high school alma mater.  Such a request isn’t new.  I get one a few times a year.  And I’ve written checks a few times.  Not much.  Twenty-five bucks here.  Fifty bucks there. 

But now I’m not sure if I can continue sending them money. 

First off, let me say how grateful I am for the education I got at Carroll High School here in Dayton back in the 1960s.  I learned how to write pretty well in the classes of Mr. Hemmert, Sr. Mary Christopher, and Sr. Marie Irene.  I know I learned about social responsibility in those Vietnam years while working at Dakota Street Center on Saturday mornings and tutoring one afternoon a week in a Dayton public school.  I was proud to be a member of the school’s Backyard Peace Corps.  Civil rights for all Americans was pretty new back then and I felt strongly that we celebrated such progress in every class where we talked about such things.  I think the school staff trained me to be a leader and I am very grateful for that. 

It was a time in the Catholic church, too, when centuries-old practices were being rethought and restructured.  The mass went from Latin to English just before I got to high school and we were re-taught that not just Catholics would make it to heaven.  I felt pretty good about the direction of the church back then. 

But now I’m not so sure. 

You see, the Catholic church has a thing about accepting sinners after the sin.  As a divorced and remarried person, I am not welcome to participate in mass at the communion rail.  I changed my mind, got divorced, then remarried. That means I am not welcome to share the body and blood of Jesus because I am living in sin.  I’ve often ‘joked’ with friends that if I were a murderer and confessed that sin, I’d be forgiven and free to act as a full member of the church.  I might be going to mass in prison, but I’d be forgiven and embraced in the body of Christ.  Divorced and remarried?  Not so much.  

And then last week I read that in the Archdiocese of Cincinnati, teacher contracts are being rewritten so that if a single woman becomes pregnant, she can be fired for violating a morality clause.  Guys?  Likewise, not so much.  

And how about priests messing with kids?  To be fair, the church is intolerant of such behavior these days, but for years those men were merely shuffled off to another parish.  When I was in college, I sought out a priest for counseling after a particularly tough break-up with a girlfriend.  After a few hours talking, I was feeling better, but it was pretty late.  The guy invited me to stay over and even offered me a spot in his bed.  He jumped in nude and invited me to do the same.  I declined, thought it a bit unusual, but survived the night with my virginity intact.  When it became known of this priest’s affinity for boys, his order shipped him off to be a chaplain in the US Army.  Talk about a guy being given a key to a candy store.  

I can forgive the church for its mishandling of pedophile priests.  It took bishops too long to act, but I think church people of good intentions are trying to set things right.  At least I hope so.  

Then a week or two ago, to add to my unease, I got an email from a Carroll graduate who has served as alumni president who encouraged me to send letters to Congress encouraging our national leaders to exempt the church from offering employees birth control in their health insurance programs.  It has something to do with religious liberty, I was informed.  But isn’t it some of those same representatives, like Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, a proud Catholic, who want to cut benefits to those in need but can’t find a way to protect us from gun violence by requiring background checks at gun shows?  

Somewhere in the process of absorbing all this, I am having difficulty opening my checkbook to support an organization that from my point of view is way too politically conservative.  When I was a kid, I would say my church and school were more liberal in embracing ‘the other’ in a changing world.  Now I sense Catholic organizations have reinstalled their pre-Vatican II blinders to hold more righteous positions regarding personal freedoms and choice.   

The Catholic church is as male dominated today as it has always been.  Women are not accepted as equals, and even if an organization of nuns presses for equality, American bishops can disband the group or put some man in charge to keep those women in line.  Gays in committed relationships are living in sin, too, you know.  Birth control is unacceptable as is artificial insemination.   Can’t have a child?  You can’t pursue medical assistance at a fertility clinic.  You and your spouse are pretty much stuck, but feel free to pray for God’s divine intervention.  

‘Right to life’ is the official position of the Roman Catholic church.  Unborn life is sacred.  I don’t disagree with that, but what makes human life so special?  Isn’t all life sacred?  Not so much.  Drowning unwanted cats?  No problem.  Women taking a pill to plan for the children they will raise?  Unacceptable and sinful.

I am still a church goer, but now am an Episcopalian.  Some joke that the Episcopal church is ‘Catholic light.’  We do, in fact, use the Nicene creed in liturgy and so say that we believe in ‘the holy catholic church.’  For us that means universal, not exclusive. Gays and lesbians are welcomed in our churches in full membership.  Our church ordains women.  Shoot, our national presiding bishop is the Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori.  Not all Anglicans agree with the American branch of the church today, but they supported slavery back in the day, too.  But they came around.  

Until the Catholic church does, I’m afraid I’m done writing checks to further the influence of a high school that promotes its narrow conservative practices.  My idea of Jesus is as a prophet who embraced all, not excluding those who didn’t have the proper authenticated membership card.  Where I go to church, we have a saying, ‘Don’t check your brain at the door.’  That’s where I need to be.

Today’s elder idea: 

This is my simple religion.

There is no need for temples, 

no need for complicated philosophy.

Our own brain, 

our own heart is our temple.

The philosophy is kindness. 

Tenzin Gyatso

The 14th Dalai Lama