Catholicism Rubs Me the Wrong Way

A Memoir

It's impossible for an eleven year old to listen to a man with only eight fingers. He could be saying that he's about to give you a lifetime supply of Tootsie Pops or Pop Tarts or some other wondrous prize, but the only thought running through your mind will be, "where the hell are his pinkies?!" Don't try this at home kids; it's just plain impossible.

In this case, the eight-fingered man is a priest at my church and is decidedly not offering a prize. At least not anything I'm interested in at eleven. Eternal life and salvation are the least of my worries. I have the rest of my life to worry about my soul and being swallowed by the pits of hell. Eternity, to me, is sitting in church for an hour every Sunday.

My mom, obviously on to the fact that I'm not listening, as I'm currently slouched down in the pew and counting ceiling fan rotations, instructs me to sit up and listen to the father.

"Do you have any Lifesavers?", I ask.

She shakes her head no and shushes me.

Damn it.

"Does it count as a sin if you think a swear in church?," I whisper, slightly concerned.

I see her eyes roll and swear I detect a slight smirk. Getting my parents to laugh in church is the ultimate win-- even a small, thinly spread wisp of a smile is a chink in the armor; a small but exploitable gap in the unified front of church-going and godliness. Ha, I'm funnier and more interesting than church. Take that, God. It's usually my goal to make them laugh at least once during the sermon, particularly when there's no possibility of Lifesavers or any other suckable candy that guaranteed my parents at least a couple of minutes quiet time, but today I'm much more interested in getting the full story of the eight-fingered father.

Church wouldn't be so bad, if it wasn't preceded by a full hour of Sunday school. Sunday school starts way too early and reminds me of a pre-game show. No one cares about the pre-game show. They're getting nachos ready and beer cold. They're here for the main event. God, in his omnipotence, should be well aware of this.

To make matters worse, my Sunday school teacher is literally the most boring human being alive. At this point, I'm fairly certain he's actually one of the apostles. It's the only possible explanation as to why he's so old and boring. He's not in touch with the way things operate in our advanced, modern society. We have Nintendo now, the most important discovery of the 20th century. There's no way he can compete with that. He's constantly making us leaf through our Sunday school workbooks that contain pictures and seemingly endless stories of miracles and tales of Jesus and his crazy antics. Anyone that wasn't an apostolic time-traveler would know that modern kids would be much more interested in reading if the illustrated biblical characters looked more like the Dream Team or New Kids on the Block. Duh.

When he talks about the crucifixion, which is a lot, I find myself secretly rooting for Jesus. That, just once, Jesus would look (disdainfully, of course) at Pontius Pilate and say, "Yeah dude, I'm totally the King of the Jews. What are you gonna do about it?" This would enliven the crowd of Romans and Jews alike and culminate in a WWF-style cage match between Jesus and Pontius. Which Jesus would obviously win by pile-driving Pontius head first into the mat and then helicoptering him into the toga-ed crowd. That never seems to happen though. And I still have an hour of church after this...

Kneel, sit, stand, bow, shake someone's hand. The father sings something. Hymn. Sit. Another hymn. Stand. I wonder if the lady playing the organ lives full-time up on the organ balcony. I imagine her fixed to the side of organ day in and day out, steadfast in her duty, devoted only to playing the music of the Lord. Nuns would go by twice a day, three times on Sunday, to feed her some eucharist and wine. Occasionally, when the church is empty and she has the ears of the Lord to herself, she plays baseball music to keep her spirits up. She imagines the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit all enjoy a good rendition of "Take Me Out to the Ballgame." She plays on into the night, the sounds of the organ echoing out into the dark, empty pulpit. She plays herself to sleep, only to be gently roused by a nun in the morning with a fresh plate of warm eucharist.

Well, that train of thought lasted about twelve seconds. Now what? I look around. Kneel. Finally, when I'm totally unable to occupy my mind any longer (I've looked at every single stained glass window and for being so colorful, they're all alarmingly boring--couldn't they at least have thrown in some saints getting mauled by lions?), I break down and frantically, in far too loud of a whisper, ask my mom why the father only has eight fingers.

"I'm not sure. I think he was born that way," she responds.

I squirm in my seat, swinging my head back to the altar, incredulous. Being told anything or anyone was "born that way" is the worst possible answer to a question. There aren't any follow up questions. There's no room for imagination or exaggeration. Up to this point, the possibilities were endless. In my mind, the father could've been accosted and captured by a gang of angry Jews in South America while trying to build a school for blind children. They might have been merciful and agreed to let him go with his life, but kept his pinkies as a warning. There could've been a freak baptism of teething twins who, upon being plunged into frigid holy water, had a knee-jerk biting reaction and clamped down onto the nearest objects for survival. But, no. This would not be chalked up to a fluke occupational hazard. There was no derring-do, he was just "born that way". End of story.

I think about it for a while and realize that I can find some solace in this. Because if a person can be born without pinkies, and still want to come to church everyday, a place with boring stained glass and overzealous organ ladies, he must really love God. So, surely, there's still hope for me.