going to church

This morning I had to smear automotive paint on my shoes, because they somehow obtained ugly black scuffs on them that I can’t seem to remove. The shoes in question are shiny silver mary janes, and since my car is silver, too...well, even a dyscalculia-riddled fool like myself can put two and two together.

My sister and her husband have recently rejoined the Catholic church after many years away. He was technically raised Catholic, but it was done in a really half-assed, inconsistent way. Meanwhile Kristen, like me, was put through the whole rigmarole: mass every week and on holy days, CCD every Sunday, Confirmation classes every Wednesday, no meat on Fridays during Lent, etc. But when we turned 18 we were allowed to drop church, if that’s what we wished to do. And drop it we did—like the proverbial hot potato. This means that aside from attending the occasional Catholic wedding, Kristen hasn’t been to mass since 1989...yet now she’s going every week, and she even went to confession. How surreal it must seem! I haven’t been to confession since 1991, several months before I was allowed to stop attending church in 1992, so if I went now, I’d have to say to the priest, “Uh, it’s been 16 years since my last confession, and that includes my college years, sooooo...um…yeah, needless to say, we’re gonna be here for a while.”

Now my niece has to get baptized, but, oddly enough, their church does baptisms during regular mass, instead of during a special ceremony. So in late April I’ll be sitting through a full mass for the first time since Christmas Eve 1994, when I was studying abroad and attended midnight candlelight mass in Germany with my friend Laura and a few of her friends. I think the majority of us did it just for kicks—solely to do something Christmassy while spending our first Christmas away from home. I’ve been to a few Christmas Eve services since then with my grandfather, but they were all at his Protestant church. I haven’t actually done the Catholic thing for over 12 years (aside from being a bridesmaid in a Catholic wedding in 2003). It should be interesting indeed...especially if the priest takes one look at me and screams, “GET OUT, HEATHEN!!!!!!!” Or maybe “Jezebel” or “heretic whore of Babylon” or “sinful stench in the nostrils of the righteous” (™Miss Peel) will get bandied about? One can only hope.



song heard most recently before posting:
Kreuzberg—Bloc Party