storytime!
my father - there is a long backstory to our (mostly lack of and/or contentious) relationship. so this will be out of context.
he is 80, and rapidly declining both physically and psychologically. in addition, my 68 yr. old stepmother is currently in serious long-term treatment for cancer (while her health has also been declining in recent years aside from cancer).
life is hard for them right now. i want and am trying to do "the right thing(s)", as always. so, one thing that has seemed to help a little is for my father's 3 daughters to spend more time with him, especially getting him out of the house (which also gives my stepmum some quiet time alone at home), and especially doing things that have some importance to him.
although he insists he still can, he really can't drive anymore (i was in a wreck with him last year that shook me up pretty badly). this means he hasn't been able to go to church by himself for a long time now, and my stepmum is too sick to take him.
so i borrowed my friend's car and took him to mass this past weekend.
he's sort of a "born-again" catholic. i think he started getting that scared thing some religiously-lapsed people get when they start getting old. he got "confirmed" in his 60's (usually it's a puberty thing), and remarried my stepmum in church after 30-something years of legal marriage when *my* mother died.
(if catholics divorce, they can't remarry in church. my stepmum - catholic in theory - always resented this. but my dad wouldn't have his marriage to my mother annulled. for some reason though, when the ex dies, the marriage *becomes* null and void, thereby allowing for a subsequent church marriage. sheesh!)
anyway, again skipping over the backstory of *my* own history with religion, i hadn't been at a mass in ... 20ish years? and then only on a christmas eve midnight mass also for my father's sake - the principle of "family should be together here on this night no matter what!" the practice of which happened just that once :)
so here i was, in church, with my semi-demential dad, who had a hard time hearing, paying attention, reading, not talking loudly during the service, etc.
sometimes i imitated gestures or words, sometimes not. sometimes it seemed okay to do so, sometimes weird. it was kinda random. and funny (to me). i sang because i like to sing. and alternating the standing, sitting, kneeling was good for my achy-breaky muscles and bones.
then ..... my dad asked: "you had your holy communion, right? and you were confirmed, right?"
uhm, yep. "then you can receive holy communion with me tonight." really? but i haven't been to confession since grade school. "as long as you haven't committed any mortal sins."
(uhm, what were those again?! :-s )
oh girl. this was going to be good. not only was i wearing underwear with a cartoon devil on the back (you know, for the energetics of a yin/yang balance), but i didn't remember how this went. and i was curious about the wafer and didn't really want to eat it but sneak it out with me to look at it. and i didn't want to drink *any*thing (even if it *was* wine) out of the chalice that had other people's spit in it.
*whistling nonchalantly* i followed dad up to the ... ? what's it called? ... uhm, front of the church - figuring i'd watch how he did it. doh. i'm 5' tall. i couldn't see a thing past anyone. so i get to this lady (a lady?! where was the priest? could regular ladies do this now? huh.) and she says something about the body and blood of christ and i quickly realized i was supposed to put my hands out for it. they used to put it right into our mouths. good thing i didn't stick my tongue out for it eh?
oh, but then i realized i was also supposed to say something to her. i said "thank you".
i think it was supposed to be "amen".
so i pretend to put it in my mouth but stuck it in my purse.
this is it: wheat-based, cardboard pasty, about a half-dollar size. this is the body of a man-god named jesus from 2000 years ago. eating his body every week is supposed to ..... uhm, guessing here again because i forget the technical significance ..... supposed to ..... make me good? holy? forgiven? righteous? saved? go to heaven?
listen, i don't like to mock people. but i do love to see the humor in being human. i love to observe and make *play* with the constructs we indulge in, abide by, struggle to give our lives meaning with, cling to in abject terror, and so on.
i don't "believe" in religion.
(but please, let's not get started on religion vs. science here, okay? not in this case on this photo in my stream. i'm asking nicely. i will delete any comments one way or the other okay? no politics, arguments, antipathies, venoms, spewings, etc. please.)
i wish people could experience or abide by spirit - if that is what so moves them - without creating religions.
but aren't they curious?! aren't they strange and weird and scary and wonderful and terrible and curious?! i could do without them, but here they are. so i'll sometimes observe them with a glance and a shrug and a shiver.
p.s. there's SO much more i could relate about this happening that night, and musings about what we as humans do. but this is enough for now. thanks for indulging my haphazard piecing togethers.