Sunday, April 27, 2008
Being Catholic
My mother is an erstwhile blogger over at Running on Empty. But this, this is worth reading (not that the rest isn't, it's just so few and far between. There's nothing wrong with her temporal lobe...). She wrote an essay for NPR's program "Speaking of Faith" which is reproduced at her entry, Being Catholic.
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2 comments:
Thanks for linking to this - I printed it out and plan to share with two friends from work, who I was just talking to yesterday about leaving Catholicism. You know the song, "should I stay or should I go now?" And after just coming back last year for the wedding.
I'm exhausted from agonizing over this. You know that post you put up in response to my question re: what Benedict would say about the difference between spirituality and religion? I've read it and re-read it because I thought it had some wonderful insights and noodling on it helped me formulate my own thoughts on the subject. I've come to the conclusion that I am neither religious nor particularly spiritual, the former I knew from adolescence, and the latter, I have just become aware of. I used to be a very spiritual person.
But I HAVE been TRYING to be more spiritually active, particularly in community, and just can't find a place where I can simply pray. Every time I turn around, there's a new article or comment by a friend or tidbit on the news that makes me just. want. to. get. away. And I find myself forcing myself to stay, because there are positives, because I do feel like it's my own, but it feels rather like staying in a domestic violence relationship.
Nowhere else would I stay that I disagreed with so vehemently. And yet I remember from my childhood, and am still exposed to, wonderful people and acts like the one your mom is referring to. And it is my own; I couldn't remove the cultural background from my Self if I tried.
If I recall correctly, you blogged or said once that Mike had never undergone any doubting periods, that he had just gone straight through and stuck with it. I envy him that.
As I said, I'm exhausted - I feel like I've been flying around in circles for years, trying and trying to find a place to land on this one craggly, scraggly island so that I can just be, and not finding it, or at least not for any length of time. There are other islands, but none of them are mine.
I want children soon, I'd like to have a spiritual structure, something, so that they're not raised in a void, because I think it's really important that they not be.
Anyway, thanks for continually sharing things like your mom's post, your thoughts on the church, etc. They're often grist for my mill as I go through this process. Yet again.
Alex, If it's important that children not be raised in a spiritual void, my next question would be is it important for adults to avoid a spiritual void? If it is, is it then a spiritual good to search for a spiritual home, whatever that might be? From what little I know about you, I know my own searching followed a similar path for a long time, in and out of the Catholic Church and trying to find myself in other mirrors.
If you truly believe you are in a domestic violence kind of relationship with the Church, perhaps it is time to find a new home. I would probably have one suggestion...but it's only based on my own searching, not on anything objective. I've had that conversation before with other friends: "maybe you're done for a while." In my understanding, doubt and searching is never bad. Read. Visit. Talk.
Human institutions are always flawed. One can find problems in any organization. It has to be a balance, in my mind, between what good is there and what bad. I am still part of the Church, even though I find the present situation of Church infuriating on many levels. I have found my niche within and therefore can stay...
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