The Catholicism Thread

ROBES!

i like a lot of things about catholocism. the community, and how devotion is something that is expressed together and joy is shared (choral music, congregations), I like the pomp and ceremony, the way incense smells, stained glass windows. I like the connection w/ larger narratives, the history that stretches back. I like transubstantiation, the word was made flesh, the dialectical coherence. The eucharist is a way of understanding the possibility of meaning, the synthesis of object and meaning, the resonance and beauty of everything around us. The emphases is on the margins edges and borders between zones, between what is concrete and material and what is immaterial and eternal. The bread becomes the flesh, the word becomes flesh. That border, the liminal point is the body, the material thing that contains the soul. The truest physical thing, fragile and impermanent. The holy body desecrated, christ on the cross, “Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe.”

did u just write that?

it's beautiful

man if those aspects of it had been emphasized i may have actually looked forward to going to CCD every week

thanks e ;)

It is! I Googled it and everything just to see whether it was a quote from somewhere.

was not expecting ILX to make me rethink the role of catholicism when i woke up this morning, gotta say

catholicism in my life*

seriously

Though I kind of doubt the legitimacy of this, to this day my mother insists that while I spent my first three months of life in an ICU incubator there were people in the Vatican praying for me by name. That our diocese had a guy who knew a guy and what have you. She still attributes my survival to this, and I was baptized at Nuestra Senora de los Dolores--Our Lady of Sorrows--in November of 1986.

I went to OLS for the first two years of school, then was moved to public school for second grade. When I was eight my parents got divorced, and within the year my Dad started attending a Pentecostal church where they danced in the aisles and guest pastors from Spain brought in snakes. The band ruled, and snakes were cool, so I liked it better than Catholicism. I got a little older and went to Jesus Camp-style militant summer programs where I decided I had to be a warrior for Christ in America and was going to preach the Word in China.

My mom moved us far enough away from my Dad & that Church that I got distance from that kind of fundamentalism, and she insisted I start going to the local diocese again. I went, but I didn't buy in--at the "Ask a Priest" nights in youth group I would ask petulant gotcha questions like "at what point in the Eucharist does the bread & wine actually transubstantiate into the body & blood of Christ?"

Inevitably my 17 year old mind was impressed by the subtlety and depth of the answers I got, and through nights like that and long conversations afterward with the clergy I found out that Catholic doctrine was a lot more interesting than I'd understood at the time.

I've since spent a great deal of time trying to figure out exactly which of my neuroses are Catholic and which are Pentecostal--how much of my guilt complex comes from believing in Original Sin vs. how much comes from tearful altar calls where I relearn how fallen and sinful I am on a regular basis.

btw catholocism is still awesome if you extract all the stuff that persecutes women/gays/non-white people/poor people and the part where you have to believe in god

Agreed on women and gays (though in fact, the church is unofficially quite tolerant of gays in its own ranks, and never as vocal in persecution as fundies), but, while the church has been guilty of persecuting the poor, when afforded political power, as in Ireland, it can also be, and often is, a very effective advocate for the poor and powerless: when catholicism gets radical, its as serious and organised about it as old fashioned communism. And the 'catholicism' of catholicism means it's inherently internationalist and cosmopolitan, and less tolerant of, and complicit with, racism than many protestant denominations.

It's probably appropriate that as I wrote that I was listening to Patterson Hood's "Murdering Oscar," in which he repeatedly mutters "I don't need forgiveness for my sins/I don't need redemption for my sins."

I was into Pedro the Lion, "controversial" Christian indie rock band, in my fundie days, and David Bazan's very public loss of faith and new record where he writes about that process with his usual sensitivity continues to be a source of fascination for me. There are some people who leave the faith behind and are happy about it and the abandonment of those beliefs never causes them any trouble. I'm not one of them. xp to myself, sorry for making thread 'hoos's thoughts on faith 4 u'

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crusades

xp

plax that thing u wrote was really nice

also w/r/t this

Though I kind of doubt the legitimacy of this, to this day my mother insists that while I spent my first three months of life in an ICU incubator there were people in the Vatican praying for me by name. That our diocese had a guy who knew a guy and what have you. She still attributes my survival to this, and I was baptized at Nuestra Senora de los Dolores--Our Lady of Sorrows--in November of 1986.

my mom STILL, for real, calls her v devout catholic friend (who is a fukkin saint imo, srsly the kindest person there is) whenever she's worried about something my sister or i have to face/do. like oh your finals are coming up, well don't worry i called M____ and she's gonna bang out a few rosaries and even tho i don't really believe in that stuff anymore if anyone's got a mainline to the baby jesus it's M____ and may as well right it can't hurt

hile the church has been guilty of persecuting the poor, when afforded political power, as in Ireland, it can also be, and often is, a very effective advocate for the poor and powerless: when catholicism gets radical, its as serious and organised about it as old fashioned communism.

Yep. For all the truth about Pope Pius XII being Hitler's Pope, it's a fact that the Polish, French, and German Catholic Church protected thousands of Jews and other protected minorities at the height of Nazism.

yeah, that's kinda the root of my OK-ness with catholicism even as someone that has identified as 'atheist' since like 4th grade.

idk TBF its like a big part of what jesus said, protect the poor the weak the vulnerable in society. the fact remains that the catholic church has also helped create and maintain those positions as positions of vulnerability and idk how much of a pat in the back you get for sometimes helping the poor and weak while also shafting them quite a lot (via colonialism)

Catholicism brings out an intense mixture of contempt and defensiveness in me. As a kid I really never saw much beauty, fellowship, or hope in Catholicism. The impression I got was of decay: old churches, old statues, old priests, old ladies with strong perfume that made my eyes and nose itch. My parents were ardent churchgoers but they (like a lot of Catholics) never really knew their faith very well, other than the rituals and prayers they had been observing since they were children.

None of it felt particularly real or comforting to me. After moving to South Carolina, the bafflement and confusion in my mind toward Catholicism transformed into embarrassment and anger. At school my Baptist classmates questioned me (as the lone Catholic in class) many times about my religion and would then tell me to my face I was a heathen who "worshipped Mary".

It also didn't help when our parish priest was accused of molesting someone and was quickly shuffled to another parish.

I realize a lot of this reflects my own myopia and selfishness.

this thomas nast cartoon always kinda freaked me out

http://www.phlmetropolis.com/Nast%20Anti-Catholic%20Papist%20Drawing.jpg

woah

Nast was born in the town my dad's from in Germany.

that cartoon is fucked up!

tbh i still get a faint whiff of "nastian" anti-catholicism from a lot of otherwise progressive types, like they still think it's ok to unleash a little hate on white ethnic/catholic types in defense of all things lefty

this is a fascinating thread! i wish i had been a religious studies major. the catholic church is so beautiful and so terrible. i think most of us are still reacting to it, and to the church's power at its zenith.

At school my Baptist classmates questioned me (as the lone Catholic in class) many times about my religion and would then tell me to my face I was a heathen who "worshipped Mary".

"Saint Nick? So you pray to Santa Claus too?"

It also didn't help when our parish priest was accused of molesting someone and was quickly shuffled to another parish.

This could be one of the few threads where I can swap altar boy stories without being asked a thousand times if I was ever raped.

My favorite duty was to ring the bells during the Consecration. Sometimes I'd wait a beat and give it just one more shake for emphasis.

And I don't want to come across as an old man, but when I went last time and saw girls working the altar, man. Is nothing sacred? And why couldn't they have done that when I was a kid?

This could be one of the few threads where I can swap altar boy stories without being asked a thousand times if I was ever raped.

i was also an altar boy (i was until i graduated high school) and i was never molested or even looked at funny by any of the priests i served. i also don't tell anyone that i was an altar boy b/c i don't want to get questions about whether i was molested.

catholic gators vs. jewish octopi:

http://m.clipmarks.com/image_cache/ammcc/512/75B66BB1-17AB-4EB2-B20D-CA4C38BA6853.jpg

well they came for the squids first

tbh i still get a faint whiff of "nastian" anti-catholicism from a lot of otherwise progressive types, like they still think it's ok to unleash a little hate on white ethnic/catholic types in defense of all things lefty

― buzza, Wednesday, March 16, 2011 11:09 PM (47 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

this is super otm and something i've run into several times in my life

for sure. at least in my circles there's a certain "well the church is why AIDS is so rampant in africa" attitude going on.

they're basically right, though, is the thing

eh ime it's taken its form more in terribly insensitive priest/abuse jokes from non-catholics

you live in boston

and?

in my circles almost everyone hates religious people and thinks they're stupid and evil.

the epicenter of catholic church molestation activity iirc?

yeah i mean this is something that gets me defensive--as someone who's interacted with my fair share of priests i don't need to hear hurtful blanket statements from outsiders who have no knowledge of how wise, caring, and kind priests can be.

i mean not only is it offensive to victims, but it also rejects a vocation that is extremely strange yet still calls some remarkable people.

though in fact, the church is unofficially quite tolerant of gays in its own ranks, and never as vocal in persecution as fundies

One Sunday, when I was 14, the auxiliary bishop of our diocese made a guest appearance at our church and caustically denounced homosexuality in his homily. I was just beginning to identify as bisexual and was visibly shaken by these remarks; though I must've known the church's official position, I'd never heard a priest or anyone else be so explicit about it.

Though I'd already expressed to my parents my doubts about Catholicism, I think the clearly emotional complaints I made on the way home from Mass that day -- and my liberal parents' inability to defend the homily -- probably hastened their decision to have us stop going to church.

(On a related note, the former bishop of the diocese was my great-uncle, and my mom has made occasional insinuations to the effect that his profession may have been well-chosen, sublimation-wise.)

I remember leading the procession into mass a few of times as an alter boy, swinging the incense. I liked to set a real slow, solemn pace. The priest would urge me to hurry it up but i pretended not to notice.

<3

they're basically right, though, is the thing

yeah, criticism of the rc hierarchy is obv legit on many issues, it's more seeing the catholic churchgoers in some lumpen "they are just drones who obey the pope/bishop/parish priest on all issues including the ballot box" that irks, like if you actually knew a lot of catholics you'd know how conflicted/contradictory "the laity' is on pet left-wing issues

my layman's impression of actual catholics is that the hierarchy and the tradition and the myth and the obscurantism and the intricate endlessly revised self-contradictory rules give them this sense of irony that is often really attractive and mature without abandoning reverence. like whenever i have dinner with my girlfriend's large and reasonably devout catholic family they make a lot of rueful impenetrable jokes about their failure to obey this or that proscription, but in a way that reveals the proscription still matters to them, and it is really warm and human because it seems analogous to the whole christian god-became-a-mortal-for-a-while paradox. whereas if you hang out with devout protestants they seem to think they've worked everything out.

the only times i enjoyed mass was the days when the altar boys would have an attack of uncontrollable lolling and the priest would get really mad with them which would make them worse.

like you know that scene in annie hall where woody allen's jewish family and diane keaton's WASP one are split-screened and begin to talk to each other across the split-screen:

"what will you be doing over the holidays, mr. singer?"
"we fast."
"fast?"
"yeah, no food. to atone for our sins."
"what sins? i don't understand."
"tell you the truth, neither do we."

obv. this is a jewish joke but i'm always reminded of it anyway at dinner with the catholics.

jesus

yeah i mean this is something that gets me defensive--as someone who's interacted with my fair share of priests i don't need to hear hurtful blanket statements from outsiders who have no knowledge of how wise, caring, and kind priests can be.

i mean not only is it offensive to victims, but it also rejects a vocation that is extremely strange yet still calls some remarkable people.

well sure! I wasn't trying to be one of those ppl---just that I imagine that snarky "priests be rapin" comments might be more common in yr area, like

that "jesus" was a Zing artifact btw

The eucharist is a way of understanding the possibility of meaning, the synthesis of object and meaning

yeah this is a thing i always envied catholics growing up.

i envied the trinity; i think the trinity is more than pretty and might actually be accurate. i think "these things are all different, but they are also all the same, and together they form a larger thing, which is also the same" is like a super super useful concept to have hammered into your head.

(http://www.feandft.com/Mandelbrot-set-web.gif)