Tag: catholic

Catholic Born, Part Deux

Posted on by tom.wogan@comcast.net

When I posted a recent article called “Catholic Born,” I got a few responses from readers. Some indicated they felt much the same way as I did, and I suspect those who remained silent disagreed either a little or maybe a lot with what I wrote, but that’s OK.   It was one comment made by my daughter Julie that kind of hit home. She told me “Thanks for not being a priest, dad. Even with all its flaws, and there are many, I find comfort in the rituals.”

While there was little danger of me ever becoming a priest, it made me realize that as I laid out my thoughts on the many teachings of the Catholic Church that I have discarded, as well as the dissatisfaction I feel over current church rules, I missed something important. Being raised Catholic is as much the culture you live in as it is any set of personal beliefs. Leaving that culture behind you is as rare and as difficult as a lifelong White Sox fan waking up one morning and buying season’s tickets for Wrigley Field.

A bit about that culture……………….

The stories:

I was twelve years old and standing in line in front of my dad at the door to the confessional in Resurrection Church on the west side. It was Holy Saturday and all four confessionals were doing a land office business, confession back then being a weekly requirement before taking communion the next day. Lines were long to the left and right of each set of boxes and the little lights above the doorways to forgiveness flashed from red to green as sinners concluded their litany, got their penance, and rose from the kneelers inside their compartments. It reminded me of old war movies where the paratroopers had their eyes glued on the light near the door of the C-47, waiting to jump into combat when the light turned green.

Each confessional consisted of three doors, the center door being reserved for the priest, and the two outboard doors for the sinners. The name of the priest inside was on a nameplate over his door, and people had their favorites, much like shopping for a more lenient judge in court. You wanted absolution, but you wanted it with the least amount of guilt and pain.

The priest sat in a chair and pulled open a screen on his side which allowed you, the sinner, to hear his voice and sort of see his shadow. Before he opened your screen, he could be heard mumbling back and forth with the sinner on the other side of the box. You always tried to listen in and catch the other guy’s treacherous failings, or maybe pick up a new, harmless sin you could use next week, but you could never quite make it out. Once your screen opened, it was Showtime and you went into your lines: “Bless me father, for I have sinned. It has been (your answer here) since my last confession.”

I was next up in that line and my father, not the most patient of men, began to fidget; whoever the person was in that box ahead of me was in there for a long time. Each time another light flashed and a door opened in one of the other confessionals, he sighed, looked at his watch, shook his head, looked around. I could sense it building. It was clear that the priest and the sinner were having a long talk, because the poor guy in the box on the opposite side was stuck in there, awaiting his turn. The sinners behind us, eager to get forgiveness and then hit the grocery store, began deserting for shorter lines or faster moving lines. But we were next and so we were stuck.

Finally, his fuse finished burning and he blew. In a voice everyone in the church could hear, he said “Well I guess they got the guy who shot Lincoln!” Those working off their penances, kneeling in the pews, were startled. Some of the older ladies threw him looks of disapproval. Some of the men could be seen shaking with laughter but trying not to show it. Kids had their mouths open in surprise. And me? I wanted to die, but that’s because I was twelve. And the endless conference inside that confessional ended a few seconds later, so perhaps the priest or the sinner took the loud hint from outside.

——————-

Mass always began with the priest standing between two kneeling altar boys, all with our backs to the faithful. The priest spoke first: “Introibo ad altare Dei” (I will go up onto the altar of my God).

We as the altar boys responded in unison: “Ad deum qui laetificat juventutem meam” (The God who gives joy to my youth).

It was Latin, but it might as well have been Swahili or Kurdish. We didn’t understand a single word of it. To become an altar boy, you had to memorize all of the Latin words of the mass on a small four page card and know when to say the words. No English translation was supplied and none was considered necessary.

I’m not sure how much joy to my youth was brought about by serving 6 a.m. mass on a February morning, but I had more than my share of those mornings. Mass came in several flavors for altar boys: early weekday masses (attended by about the same fifteen people every day), Sunday mass, both high mass (longer and with more singing) and low mass (mercifully shorter), funerals (four altar boys required) and weddings (only two required).

My best day as an altar boy was a big Italian wedding, where the best man handed each of us an envelope with $15 inside. The priest asked if we had been paid anything so that it could go to the “Altar Boy Fund” and I and my partner Bill lied through our teeth. Fifteen dollars in 1962 felt like winning the lotto. No one could have more money than that all at one time, and I was, at least for a time, quite wealthy. Anyway, I’d cover the lie vaguely at confession the following week and certainly not to the same priest.

Second best were all of those days when you were called upon for funeral duty. Catholic funerals were always on weekdays, so you got out of class for the hour of the service, and another 45 minutes of goof-off time, which you could easily alibi to the nuns as a service that ran long.

—————-

The Gospels

You remember Martha and Mary, those two sisters of Lazarus who entertained Jesus during a stopover in Bethany? Martha was all about working the event, but Mary just sat at His feet listening to him. When Martha went to file a beef with Jesus about her lazy sister, she got a rebuke from the Man himself. She was too concerned with earthly things, He said. I wonder if He might have been a bit less critical after not getting fed and watered, had Martha not been running the show and looking after her guests.

Every woman in every family knows who the Marthas are and who the Marys are. Marthas plan the parties, clean the house, shop for the goodies, get the meal out, look after their guests and clean up after. Marys sit, drink wine, and chat. Every family is a mix of the two and each side knows it, seems to accept that you’re one or the other by nature and not likely to change. Marthas at a party bond together in their righteousness and volunteer to help each other out. They can be found in the kitchen. Marys won’t leave their chairs unless the wine runs out. They can be found on the patio or in the living room.

You know which one you are, ladies.

————-

You know the story of the prodigal son. Kid asks for an early inheritance, leaves town, blows it all on hookers and booze, then comes home broke and penitent. Good old dad rejoices in his return. Older brother, Steady Eddie, is a bit pissed.

For years, I identified with the older brother, thought that dad telling him “but you are with me always” sounded a lot like “and you’re chopped liver.” Your brother is a jerk, but gets forgiven by dad and even celebrated like he did something right for once in his life. Which he didn’t. Meanwhile, you toed the line, worked the farm, and did everything you were supposed to and nobody is putting fine robes on your back or slaughtering any fatted calves in your honor. Raw deal all around.

This was my take on this gospel story for years, until someone shared their interpretation with me. This person, an experienced dad like myself, said he shared my take for years. But looking back on it all, he now concludes that the true meaning of the story was that raising kids was a pain in the butt. Who am I to argue?

———–

The Homilies

I don’t know how many homilies I’ve heard, but just doing the math it has to be more than three thousand. And only three still stay with me.

The two frogs….

The first was given by Father Flannery, a priest at Resurrection who was also a decorated Marine Corp chaplain and who was wounded at Iwo Jima. I was in first grade and I remember his homily about the two frogs who jumped into a pail full of milk. Both were struggling to keep from drowning. One gave up and did indeed drown, but the other frog had some sort of amphibious faith and kept swimming and kicking and, lo and behold, churned the milk into butter. The butter gave him a solid surface from which to jump free of the pail. Keep kicking was the message I guess.

My brother and the apostles…

Father Joe Mulcrone, a Resurrection guy, said the funeral homily when my brother Bill was killed in a car accident in 1979. We were shattered at the time, numb from disbelief, and in need of some comforting words. Fr. Joe’s homily compared Bill with the apostles. He pointed out that the apostles, like Bill, were no saints when Jesus found them. He concluded that Bill would have been comfortable in their company. His words began the long healing process for all of us and I am grateful to him to this day.

The guys travelling to the next town….

Father Bill Gubbins was a gifted homilist in Queen of Martyrs parish. He told the tale of the traveler who upon arriving at a town gate, asked an old man sitting nearby about the people in the town. “What kind of people live here?” he asked. The old man replied, “How were the people in the last town you were in?” replied the old man. “Awful, terrible people,” the traveler answered. “Well,” said the old man, “I’m afraid you’ll find these people much the same.”

Later on, another traveler came to the same town, and again asked the same old man near the gate the same question. “What kind of people live here?” he asked. The old man again replied, “How were the people in the last town you were in?”  “Kind, wonderful people,” the traveler answered. “Well,” said the old man, “I think you’ll find these people much the same.”

Yes, quite a culture.

 

Sisters

Posted on by tom.wogan@comcast.net

“A soldier of the legion lay dying in Algiers,

There was lack of woman’s nursing, there was a dearth of woman’s tears”

-from the poem “BINGEN ON THE RHINE” By Caroline E. Norton (1808 – 1877)

 

We stood at attention in our platoon formations, four or five abreast, ten ranks deep, all in uniform, on a crisp September morning. Our platoon leader stood in front of our formation, back to us. Other platoons were all around us, same uniforms, with their platoon leaders in front of them. We all faced toward the center of the large asphalt covered yard, toward the empty flagpole. In spite of the great numbers assembled, more than a thousand, it was utterly quiet. You could hear birdsong from the nearby park. Shortly, two drummers and two buglers and a lone uniformed young man came into view. The small detachment marched to the military tattoo being rhythmically played out by the drummers. When they reached the flagpole they stopped marching and drumming. The young man took an American flag from under his arm, unfolded it enough to fix the grommets on the flag onto the catches on the rope.

The buglers began to play and the drummers started a slow roll of backdrop as the flag slowly began to rise to its position at the top. The music stopped. We raised our right hands over our hearts and, all as one, recited the Pledge of Allegiance. When we finished, the platoon leaders led us, formation by formation, into the nearby buildings. Once inside, we could hear John Phillip Sousa’s Washington Post March blaring over the loudspeakers as we marched to our assigned positions.

No, I was not in the Army, at least not yet. I was seven years old and beginning my first day of first grade at Resurrection School on Chicago’s west side.

It seemed a bizarre, scary place to this scared first grader. I came from a big family, but they were all in other grades. I was on my own. It didn’t seem at all like kindergarten I attended the year before at nearby Robert Emmett Public School; that school was only a few hours a day, and offered naps and treats and games and playtime. Not at all like today’s kindergarten programs, which feature foreign languages and in which you may be required to defend your dissertation. This was loud, and crowded and scary, with kids of all ages.

My platoon leader/ classroom teacher was Sister Mary Owen, RSM. She was young and pretty; at least I thought she must have been if you could see past the habit she wore. It showed only her face and hands, that pretty face encased in a framed white starched cardboard headpiece. Her dress was black and she wore a starched white breastplate and wore a large black rosary as both a belt and a sort of accessory running down one side. She wore a black veil over her head. This was the official outfit of a Religious Sister of Mercy. There were other flavors of nuns, I would learn, and they had their distinctive outfits, also. Sisters of Providence, Franciscans, Little Sisters of the Poor, and the Sinsinawa Dominicans, who I always thought sounded like a ball club.

We were about fifty kids to a room (we had a class photo every year, and the proof of those numbers is there), the products of the post war baby boom, when millions of G.I.’s, sailors, and airmen came back with pretty much one idea in mind. And millions of lonely women thought it was a pretty good idea, too. Procreation was practically the national pastime in the late 1940’s and early to mid-50’s and it filled classrooms quickly.

Our uniforms were tan shirts and maroon ties for boys, tan blouses and maroon plaid jumpers for the girls. The girls’ jumpers also carried a patch with the Resurrection logo on it. If you were number one or two in the family birth order, you probably wore new shirts, or blouses and jumpers. Come later to the party and you were probably wearing hand-me-downs from an older sibling or a neighbor. Kids mostly carried their books in book bags or by hand, backpacks being reserved at that time for mountain men, soldiers, and Sherpa guides. When the Chicago weather arrived, you hung your coat in the “cloak room” which ran alongside the classroom and, as I recall, where discipline was sometimes distributed to children whose behavior was unacceptable.

———————-

It seemed to this boy that I had entered into a world run by women, which I believe could be said of most elementary schools. The principal and almost all of the teachers were nuns. The few lay teachers were women. And in such a world those things that are important to most women come to define the rules of the day. Things like order. Things like having a plan and then processing in an orderly fashion. Things like discipline. Things like kindness.

I was scared that first day. So many strange faces, and when Sister Owen called the role, asking each student in turn to raise their hand and speak their name, I could only raise my hand, too scared to speak. She let me off the hook and we set about the business of learning our ABCs, mostly reciting after her.

At some point, my nervousness got the better of me and I had an accident, and not the kind any kid wants to have. Sister Owen was quick to spot it. She swooped me up and carried me to the restroom, then known as the lavatory,  dismissing two older boys with a glare, who knew better than to mess with “Sister“. Like a mother caring for her own child, this young woman cleaned me off, asked me if I was OK, soaked my soiled undies and wrapped them in cellophane (who the hell carries cellophane?) and brought me by hand back to the classroom. I was somewhere between mortified and grateful. I’m not sure the other kids even noticed.

At the end of that first day, she handed me a note for my mother, explaining my little accident and telling me to have a better day tomorrow. I joined the orderly procession out the door, feeling utterly miserable and alone. And that is when I saw my oldest sister Maureen at the top of the stairway. She had on her plaid jumper, her black hair in curls and was talking to the girl next to her. My sister was a “good eighth grade girl” as the nuns would say. “Good eighth grade girls” could be depended upon to perform any task from cleaning the blackboards to tutoring slower students, to probably running the whole school, if asked.

She turned her head and saw me at the bottom of the steps and broke into a wide, welcoming smile. It was the kind of Big Sister smile that says, “I see you. It’s going to be OK. I’ve got you.” And I knew then that I wasn’t alone and that there were people there who cared about me. I was going to be OK. She carries that same smile even today and she has always shared it freely with all who need it.

God bless all sisters, those who took vows to earn that title and those who were members of your family. We’re lucky to have had them.

Tattoos

Posted on by tom.wogan@comcast.net

We are one inked up nation, over these last few generations. What was once the exclusive province of bikers, over-served sailors on shore leave, and carnival “carnies” has now become the norm for almost everyone in their late teens or early twenties. Years ago, tattoo parlors were only located in the same part of town as the “bucket of blood” bar, the local whorehouse and the pawn shop. Now they can be found in almost every neighborhood.

Our skin has become our canvas and what a canvas it is! You can express your love for another person, your lingering memory of the departed, your favorite team, a unit in the military in which you served, what a badass you wish you were, or what an incredible and unusual lover you must be. Location of the tattoo can be public, private, or extremely private; in the case of the ubiquitous “tramp stamp”, it can serve as an “open for business” sign over the doorway.

It’s painful and unsanitary, and mostly permanent, and for sure I don’t get it, but hey, it’s not my generation’s problem.  At least I won’t have to sit around some rest home someday watching barbed wired biceps when the wire goes slack or when the heart with your old boyfriend’s name starts to wrinkle.  There are other drawbacks, too, especially when you exit the world of youth and take your inked-up self into the workplace.

I see bridesmaids trying to camouflage that heart with Johnny’s name inside it just above the right breast. She can see his name every morning in the shower, but Johnny is a distant memory and her husband is Eddie and how does he feel about it?  Or professional women in their 30’s, trying hard to come off as cold steel and all business, but betrayed a bit by the winding vine on their lower left leg, reaching up for, well, somewhere. Young businessmen suffer from having older people question their maturity and judgment when they spy the tip of a lightning bolt or a Celtic cross peeking up from that necktied collar. Ah, youth.

I have an unproven theory that the smaller the town you come from, the more inked up you are likely to be by age twenty. Body piercings follow roughly the same curve. I base this theory on too many years of observation in towns like Blaire, NE (Pop. 8,000), Fremont, NE (Pop. 25,000) and North Sioux City, SD (pop. 2,500). All nice towns, but your younger employees will make your office look like a circus train overturned nearby.

——————————————

My wife and I were 22, newly married and teaching school for a living. I taught in a Catholic girl’s high school in the northwest suburbs of Chicago. Maureen taught in a Catholic elementary school in the heart of a Mexican and Polish neighborhood in the near downtown area (North and California) known as Humboldt Park. For whatever reasons, those two groups seem to coexist easily in Chicago. Maybe it’s their shared Catholic faith and their propensity for hard work, but there are several Mexican-Polish neighborhoods around town.

Maureen had made friends with another teacher in her school, St. Fidelis.  Helen was in her forties or early fifties, an attractive middle-aged woman of Polish descent with accent to go with it. Maureen admired her skills in the classroom and I think Helen served as a sort of mentor for her. Helen also served as moral support for her, as Maureen looked way too young to be in charge of a classroom and the principal who hired her was a nun who was very skeptical at first. By the end of the first semester, Maureen had won the principal over and she and Helen had become fast friends.

A few months later, Helen invited us to dinner at her house and the chance to meet her husband Bishof, which translates into “Bill”. In those days of lean paychecks, we didn’t turn down too many free meals.  Bishof was a distinguished looking man, about Helens’ age, and an old country Polish tailor, who made all the clothing for both he and Helen. These were the terrible days of polyester, the photos of which no one really wants to recall or see again, so he was decked out in his blue polyester jacket and slacks. I don’t know what I wore, but I am sure it was equally hideous.

It was a wonderful dinner with ham and a number of Polish delicacies, Zywiec Polish Beer and some wine. We chatted about al lot of things and they showed us around their home, so proud of every room and every detail. After dessert, we drifted into some contemporary topics, one of which was a newly-surfaced theory that the holocaust in World War II was a myth, that nothing like six million people died. It was a ruse being used by the Israelis to get support for their cause.  I’m not sure who floated the idea or why, but it was getting lots of ink in the papers.

Bishof and Helen grew quiet and then, seeming to nod to each other, Bishof took off his jacket and rolled up his sleeve. Helen did the same. There, on their left forearms, were the tattoos, six numbers each, the unmistakable and permanent marks of concentration camp survivors. I could not have been more stunned had they undressed and stood naked before us.

You can read about it, see movies about it, and see the newsreels of corpses piled high, but it’s not the same.  My uncle was with the 82nd Airborne and had overrun a few of these camps at war’s end, and had talked a bit about it, but it sounded like just stories from long ago.  My mother lectured us at lunch about it and felt very passionate about the holocaust.  But here standing before us was living proof of this word holocaust. Here were two normal, likeable people who somehow survived the most lethal killing machine ever seen on earth.  That machine was built under the blatant lies and half -truths of a ruthless political party selling nationalism and racial purity. And a misguided nation bought into it and in so doing brought the world into a global struggle to end the murders and punish the authors of Nazism.

That ended that discussion, and we drifted on to other topics that night, but I never forgot it. Our new friends had honored us with their tattoos, as if to say “It really happened…it happened to us, and we were the lucky ones. Six million others were not.”

—————–

Nationalism is being sold again, both here and abroad. The British people are now dumbfounded to learn that they have been hoodwinked by the loud voices of separatism, the suspicion, hatred and banning of immigrants, and a return to the “glory days” of Britain, which were never that glorious to begin with. The final tally was barely announced before members of the U.K. announced their own plans for referendums to leave Great Britain. The leaders of the “Brexit” movement within days had renounced most of their pre-election claims and had removed themselves for consideration for higher office. They sold their “big lie” and have now left it for others to resolve.

Here at home, we have, of course, Mr.Trump. Plenty of people would rather vote for anyone but him, but there he stands. His supporters demand only that he continue to boast, insult, and demean. His deficiencies, and they are many and deep, matter not at all. He plays to our basest, most unlikeable self, the absolute worst angels of our nature. His base is mostly white, more male than female, not very bright, angry about almost everything, racist, and plyable.  They are buying into the myth of “Make America Great Again’, which is a transparent lie they refuse to see through.  Watching their behavior makes me think that the only difference between them and the “Brownshirts” of 1938, breaking the windows of shops in Berlin’s Jewish quarter, is the uniforms.

I believe we are a better country than this and I believe he will implode and his frantic supporters will cry foul, but then go back to their fear and loathing on a local level, polluting their own towns and cities with their misplaced hatred.

The great British Parliamentarian Edmund Burke once said “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” Do the right thing, Americans. I have seen enough tattoos.