“Lord, I’ve been trying to be understood
And Lord, I’ve been trying to do as you would
But each time, it gets a little harder
I feel the pain
But I’ll try again.”
~Big Star, “Try Again.”
Spring doesn’t come easy in my section of the Ohio Valley. Even, maybe especially if, the winter has been mild and there hasn’t been much snow, the ground is a brown mush, and the rain and clouds feel constant in February. One’s mood (at least mine) often reflects the soggy gray and brown environs. There an extra stratum of irritation for me, because due to my neighborhood topography and nearby soil erosion, the rains do a number on my house’s crawl space. I’ll spare you the details.
But March has settled in after a couple of days and, as I write this, we are finally having two straight days of sunshine, along with the usual breeziness. Daffodils – not yet blooming – are finally peeking out of the sludge. Some of the trees are starting to bloom. Birds sing brighter. And laughter, the real stuff – at my cat, and my youngest son’s jokes, at Mystery Science Theatre 3000 – leaps out of me without irony. Spring is here, and in the spring a middle-aged man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of grilling and yard work. Things are looking up.
Ash Wednesday was last week. The weather was colder and – surprise – dreary. Forgive me fellow Catholics for I have sinned, but I must confess I do not enjoy Ash Wednesday. The ashes and hymns are nice, and it’s not so much the fasting, which isn’t easy for a guy who likes to eat – rather, it’s the overarching themes of death and the dust to which we shall return. I can see how many may need this reminder, but as a 46-year-old man with cardiovascular disease in my genetics who has faced some mystery symptoms (benign bumps and what-not), I don’t feel like I need to be reminded of my mortality. Yet I believe in grace, in forgiveness, and God’s all-encompassing love, so I should be ready for oneness with God in paradise. I love much of this earthly life too, but I don’t think I’m so tied to the material world that I’d refuse eternal life.
Maybe the death I fear or really grieve is the death of the person I used to be – the wonder and fascination with everything. Maybe I’m dying a little bit every time I give in to my weaknesses. It didn’t use to seem this hard to be faithful.
From about the age of 10-14, I was the typical altar boy. I lived three blocks from my parish church, so about every other week, it was my turn to serve 6:30 am daily Mass through the week. Afterwards, I would drag myself in a daze to my classroom, long before the other students or even the teacher got there because it didn’t make sense to walk or ride my bike home for only a few minutes, then have to come back. But I loved it. Every day I served, I was filled with this moment of peace, that in retrospect, I understand gave my often confused and slightly turbulent adolescent mind an almost Zen-like bliss. Or maybe that’s just the way I remember it. But do I ever still remember it! Every time I smell the same carpet cleaner that they used in the carpets of the sacristy, every time I smell a candle being lit. Funny, isn’t it, how scent evokes the strongest and most immediate memories, but it also comes flooding back to me every time I hear a cheap organ play a post-Vatican II hymn. Especially the ones by Dan Schutte and John Foley, S.J., which were ubiquitous in Catholic liturgies in those days.
As with many cradle Catholics, even the ones who matriculated at 16 years of Catholic school, as I approached young adulthood, I began to see the world differently, with all its nuances and complexities. This is understandable; regardless of schooling or lack thereof, I think it’s natural for people as they age to have a less literal, more complicated view of their faith, or of religion and the spiritual world in general. I began to study other religions and belief systems and realized they might have kernels of truth or even pearls of wisdom which I may not have considered before. This is natural, and probably good – as an adult, I put away childish things, etc.
What isn’t good is that my faith became drab and compulsory for me. It was something I had to do or was supposed to do. Gone was that peace I felt as a youth and the smells, the hymns, the multi-hued magic of the morning sun shining through a stained glass window. Really, these things were still there, they just “hit different” as my own adolescent self would say. It was just the same old church stuff – I’d rather have been out acting foolish with my friends, watching a Fellini movie, or listening to Digital Underground. It was the same smells and bells, the same songs, the same scripture readings, the same Form II of the Mass the celebrant seemed to pray 75% of the time, which was okay with me because it’s the shortest one. I also committed the same sins over and over. This isn’t a confessional, so I won’t go into details, but I bet most of them would be familiar to you.
Gone, except on rare occasions, was the peace, the fulfillment. I’d love to tell you I had a Paul-on-the-road-to-Damascus moment, where the light pierced my foggy obliviousness, and I sang Alleluia! And I gave away my possessions to the poor and suddenly lived the Gospel, fierce and flawless. But spring just doesn’t come that easily for me. Maybe that’s what is meant by “practicing Catholic.” I have to practice because I’m not that good at it.
So, I trudged along and eventually tried praying a bit more and taking Mass and Lenten sacrifices more seriously, started volunteering for various causes dear to me, and advocating for the poor and the environment. I somehow developed a muscle, one that lent me a more subtle peace. The flabbiness of self-indulgence wasn’t quite as obvious anymore. I finally had a feeling that I was on the right track again, but no matter how I faltered, I’d still be loved – much of this change I also owe to domestic life. Once you clean up vomit for the third time at 4 am, hearing “Gather Us In” for the 24-thousandth time isn’t so daunting. And there are the good things – the joy of seeing my wife’s loving eyes every day, the love and satisfaction I get from seeing my sons grow and discover things for themselves. I hope they keep the wonder, the feeling of Grace in their lives.
Yet even in this era of improved spiritual health, I had some serious setbacks. The clergy abuse scandal hit me hard. I was fortunate not to fall prey to clergy molestation myself, but there were some people near and dear to me who weren’t as lucky. Like most of the faithful, I felt the betrayal and disappointment in the Church started by Christ himself, which is supposed to model holiness and humility, but instead sold out the afflicted way too often to protect its power and reputation. I was also annoyed and disappointed to see so many otherwise good religious people, many of whom are family, get snookered by the worldly cheap grace and prosperity gospel of a certain political viewpoint that often seems to exalt power, mammon, and cruelty over anything Jesus represents. This is not the time and place to get polemical, but let those with ears hear.
Even after these setbacks, I keep reaching, keep struggling for Grace. Spring doesn’t come easy, but I hope to continue to see those flowers pushing through the mud, eventually blooming. If it’s slow and with setbacks that’s okay – there’s beauty in the struggle.
“…My heart of silk
is filled with lights,
with lost bells,
with lilies and bees.
I will go very far,
farther than those hills,
farther than the seas,
close to the stars
to beg Christ the Lord
to give back the soul I had
of old, when I was a child
ripened with legends
with a feathered cap
and a wooden sword.”
~ Federico Garcia Lorca