religion

I have long referred to myself as Catholic, or as a "lapsed Catholic"; I have never been to confession, nor was I "confirmed" (is that kind of a Catholic bar mitzvah?).

But you know, when I attend a Catholic mass, I really feel like I've been to church, do you know what I mean? During my last days living in Rochester proper - let's call it 1998 - I made one visit to a Catholic church on Mt. Hope Avenue, near the Mt. Hope Cemetery (which I visited often; not only family members' graves, but most of the famous people buried there - Susan B. Anthony, Frederick Douglass, Messrs. Bausch and Lomb, and many more).

Anyway, that church felt ... sacred, I guess. Didn't understand much of the Latin and didn't know the proper responses, but I felt clean when I left. I'd been churchified.

Around the corner on Elmwood Avenue is the Rochester Psychiatric Center. I was never a patient, but on Sunday mornings they would let outsiders in to attend their mass. They have a proper church for their residents.

It was great fun, as church goes. The vast majority of attendees were patients. The priest was a kindly and cheerful older man who spoke no Latin to us but did give a weather report after the sermon. And the service was good and short; no more than 45 minutes including Communion. Did I take Communion? You bet your bippy I did.

Through the years since, I have attended a variety of churches. The only one I really liked was independent, essentially a splinter of the Southern Hard-Shell Baptists but with more modern sensibilities. It had been founded by an ex-con (drug dealing and tax evasion) who found the Lord and got clean while behind bars. You would never guess his past by looking at him or even getting to know him - until he told you his story. He was a wonderful, down-to-earth, friendly man. And he understood what alcoholics and drug addicts are going through when they decide to clean up.

A couple of things did bother me about that church, though. One was their chosen form of communion, or "the Lord's Supper" as they call it. This "Lord's Supper" was held on an irregular basis (intentionally - so it seems special rather than routine) and they don't use wafers (too Catholic), or bits of homemade bread (too Methodist, I guess). No, their "Lord's Supper" consists of a single Oyster cracker with a shot of grape juice back. A commercially manufactured cracker for that authentic Spiritual kick.

The other incident - more of a month-long theme, really - was a denunciation by the minister of Dan Brown's bestseller, "The DaVinci Code". Despite the clear disclaimer on the cover, "A NOVEL", the preacher railed repeatedly against the book as if it had been presented as a historical text rather than A NOVEL.

Before the service, there was a (very small) Bible study group attended mostly by children. At the same time there was a large group of adults who studied Rick Warren's "A Purpose Driven Life" ("Are you a worldly Christian, or a world-class Christian?") as if it were as holy a relic as the Christian Bible, written by the Lord Himself using Rick Warren's word processing program. The only thing I enjoyed about that study group was the plentiful coffee and donuts.

Overall, though, that church was a nice place to go on a Sunday morning and it left me feeling spiritual.

And then there were the real, hypocritical, hard-shell churches.

The same halfway house that introduced me to the previously mentioned church also forced us to go to another church two nights in a row to see the Devil incarnate in the guise of a traveling evangelist. I skipped the second night. Sadly, I again encountered that evil man at another church. Talk about your bad luck.

Another place woke us up at 4:30 AM for the 5 AM in-house service, held in a downstairs chapel with real pews and a large podium built to look like the bow of a small fishing boat (get it?). Between 4:30 and 5:00, we would eat a hurried breakfast because we had to be off the property by 5:30 AM. In the late afternoon we could return, at which time we'd endure another uninspiring sermon, eat and go to bed. The lights were only off for 5 1/2 hours (10 PM to 4:30 AM). A couple evenings each week, they made us put on long pants (this is Tallahassee in the summer - no time for long pants), packed us like sardines into vans that had no A/C, and drove us north of town to a large church where we were required to sit in the last two rows of pews like a bunch of prisoners. Another hard-shell situation. This is where I encountered Mephistopheles for the second time.

Nowadays I consider myself very spiritual. If asked my religion, I state "Catholic", because I was baptized as such while still an infant. My real spiritual life, though, exists not in attending church or reading the Bible. I do read the Bible on occasion; there is a copy on the end-table next to my couch. But I see the possibility (not proof) of spiritual realities. Not just a (presumably male) God, but a Goddess as well. I believe that every living thing has its own dignity. When I trim trees and bushes, I speak to them. When I cut up a log I make invocations thanking the tree. Upon encountering rotting sticks or branches in the woods, I say something like, "from the Earth you arose, and now you return that others may thrive".

I believe that all self-aware higher creatures have souls.

Do dogs have souls? Live with them for a lifetime. Look deep into their eyes. Try to deny it. Spirituality: the recognition that everything has or relates to a spirit or spark.

At this point it I must conclude that I can hardly classify myself as Catholic anymore. On Facebook, I describe my religion as "Catho-Pagan", but that may change. There are so many facets of Church doctrine that I disagree with. Contraception. A woman's right to choose. A celibate (and entirely male) clergy - the celibacy introduced as Church canon only 1,000 years ago; celibacy was completely optional for the first 1,000 years of Christendom.

Why can't women officiate at Catholic mass? They are just as spiritual as men, often more so.

Why should it be mandatory for priests to remain celibate? Celibacy is, for most humans, an unnatural state. There were married Apostles, for Christ's sake!

And the myth of Papal infallibility is much more recent than the celibacy rule, not taking hold until the 19th century. Just consider, among others, the Medici and Borgia popes! Treachery and sex fill the history of popes.

So we come to some conclusions: I am very spiritual, though I have never had encounters with spirits from beyond the grave nor have I seen angels. Some of my loved ones have. On most days I remember to thank God for the new day and, later, for the day that is ending. I'm not sure that He (She?) is there, but just in case, you know.

And every day I say hello to the dog we have buried in the back yard.