Dona Nobis Pacem

Growing up Protestant, there was a lot of misinformation fed me about Catholics. We were told that they weren't really Christians; that they were really a cult and proven to be so by their weird Mass practices. I remember wondering what a mass was. There was never an explanation that came with the word, at least, never an accurate explanation. The few Catholics that I was familiar with were high school kids who would go to Mass and confession on Saturday afternoon, and then proceed with the typical entertainment of an adolescent with a group of friends on a Saturday night. I was taught that this wasn't real faith.

The little information that I had gathered about the faith was from movies, some fiction, and the Saturday Night Live episodes that I would lay in my bedroom doorway and listen to while my parents watched. If the particular scene seemed especially funny, I would risk wrath for a slow trip to the bathroom just to get a look at Father Guido Sarducci.

My first real introduction to the Catholic faith came from R's family. His grandfather, a first generation American whose parents were German, had reared his family of five girls and one boy in the Catholic faith. They attended Catholic schools their entire life. Not all of them remained in the faith, some opted for Protestantism and some for a more eclectic version of Catholicism that better fitted whom they had become. R's grandfather wasn't an educated man, but he loved his family, loved his God, and loved his church. When he retired from his blue-collar employment proud that he had risen through the ranks to foreman, he attended mass daily at the parish at the end of his block.

What I saw was nothing like the propaganda I had been fed in the basements of buildings where emotion was employed to garner the commitments of the sweaty youths that sat on the floor. I saw a man who believed exactly what I did, albeit a different method, a more organized and systematic style of worshiping the exact same God, through exactly the same Jesus Christ.

Once, when his wife was out for the evening, R and I took a meal over to eat with him and to pass his time. I had taken careful note of the way she had served certain things to him, things that the eccentricities of his age required for his comfort and the organization of his mind. He talked about that for years afterwards. Where he came from, what you did mattered far more than what you said.

His death seven years into our marriage, brought on by the terrible, emotionally depleting and physically exhausting disease of Alzheimer's, brought the typical dichotomy of feelings this disease extracts from the relatives of its victims: relief and grief. The funeral was, however, magical. I had never attended a Catholic funeral or wedding, though I had heard that they were a lot more fun than the fundamentalist ceremonies that I had previously attended.

At the burial sight, after the prayers were said, and the crowd of friends began to break away from the family, R's aunt, knowing us to be unfamiliar with the practices of Catholicism, asked if we would like to sprinkle holy water over the coffin. I awkwardly acquiesced more out of politeness than belief of the power of water blessed by a priest. Afterward, I stood holding one of our three daughters and watched as each family member participated in one of the last rituals of his faith for their father. Through this mix of personal notes and observation, I discarded the unfounded notion that these people weren't "real" Christians; that mine was correct and theirs lacking or purposefully misleading.

Years later, while visiting my mother in her newly purchased condo, I saw a small statue of the Virgin Mary, complete with a place for a candle and some rosary beads placed over the top next to her bed. Completely surprised at my heathen mother's choice of decoration, which I presumed it to be, I asked her about it. She told me that she placed it there on purpose. I asked her why. She told me that if she ever again chose "organized religion" she would become Catholic. In response to my question of her preference, she replied, "Because I love ritual and find peace in it." It was a strange thing to hear coming out of that woman I thought I knew. I am sure my surprise and bewilderment was evident on my face. My confusion was mistaken for judgment as I saw her move the small icon away from her bedside and onto an out-of-the-way bookshelf against the wall, protected from my misperceived doubt.

The older I get, the more I understand her desire for comfort the ceremonial brings, though I have grown-up outside the traditional Protestant faiths that utilize liturgy, and once secretly wagged my tongue at it. The past three years, I have used The Westminster Shorter Catechism in teaching my girls the theology of our faith. I have seen so many adults who have belief but have no way to bring words, or accurately define, nor astutely and logically defend or present their beliefs. I must say that while it doesn't ensure a continuing faith (and I don't think there is a system of teaching that does so), that the rigor of the religious Catholic catechism does secure a very specific knowledge of the faith. I have found that in times of questioning the existence of God, His power, or the actuality of my own faith, it is the erudition to which I cling.

I feel that Patrick, more than anyone, has been able to accurately explain Catholic theology to me. Because of his compelling thoughts, I began to examine things from a different perspective. While discussing with a Catholic aquaintance the history curricula I use, I realized that it is distinctly from a Protestant perspective. I had never thought of the reign of Queen Mary Tudor from a Catholic perspective, and really only recalled it being taught to me from a Protestant one in my world history studies in high school. Perhaps this is part of growing up; being cognizant of the fact that maybe the history you believe is only one vista and maybe the other side should at least be examined.

Patrick has posted some interesting and unique thoughts, as well as a distinctive photo (shown below), of Karol Józef Wojtyla, universally known as Pope John Paul II since the beginning of his papacy in October of 1978. I appreciate more than any other Patrick's thoughts because I believe them to be lacking the trite, though well-intentioned, expression of other writers.