A little more 'this & that' from Oldest Living Blogger...

When I first began blogging on a local community blogging site, now defunct, the 'handle' I used was 'Oldest Living Blogger', because, among bloggers, I'm
still one of the oldest I've ever heard of who isn't himself defunct.

I think my mental faculties are returning to some semblance of normal lately. And that's in large part due to avoiding watching the 'idiot tube' with its barely forty minutes of programming broken excessively by 20+ minutes of stupidity-filled commercials each hour. Whoever produces those damned commercials must be convinced that the average I.Q. is somewhere between our shoe size and Macy's basement. Those are yet more proof of Old Uncle Albert's saying that the commonest element in the universe isn't hydrogen, but rather stupidity.

Everybody's making a big fuss in the media lately over the new Pope and some of his 'common touch' sayings and doings, and I must admit, it's quite a departure from the usual conceited pompous ass exhibited with great fanfare to the unwashed masses during Masses by the Vatican. And if you think the Vatican, - it can't! I'm what they now call a 'lapsed Catholic', and I'd be happy to explain why, but first tell me - how long have you got? This might take a while.....

Seriously, I went into Catholicism with much seriousness and a prolonged training course back in the mid-1950s, not because I needed to for marriage or any of the usual excuses, but just because I wanted to. I had a formerly Protestant pal with whom I worked, and he was more of an intellectual type than I am, and had turned Catholic during his time at university, and I really wanted to understand why. We got into some long discussions about the various differences between Catholicism and Protestantism. These eventually led to each of us consulting his own religion's Bible, him the Catholic version and me the King James version, and trying to work our way through the differences in what each religion subscribed to for their beliefs. And all of that consumed many an evening in the little bunkhouse we shared at the hydro-electric plant where we were shift operators. 

It finally got to a point where my pal Don couldn't answer my questions, and so he suggested that I talk to Father Sullivan, the local parish priest. Father Sullivan said that the best thing I could do would be to start a course of Instruction, and if, at any time, I felt that I didn't want to continue, we could stop, but if I continued to the end, then I would be expected to make my first Communion and join the Church. And one Easter Sunday away back when, that's exactly what happened. I was quite serious about all of that until after my first marriage hit the rocks, and the priest who had married us, now a Monsignor, decided that there wasn't a lot he could do to help. I'm not sure what I'd expected, but I had expected that he might try to do something to save the situation. When that didn't happen, I was really hurt, and I demonstrated that by staying away from Mass - and I'm still staying away from Mass 50 years later.

I hope God understands and forgives me, and I really don't care if the Church does or not. I've discovered during these 50 years that God really doesn't need 'middlemen' to get a message through to us mortals, if we are suitably respectful, and in a receptive frame of mind. That 'still, small voice within' can answer our questions, and reassure us, and guide us in the right directions if we are willing to be quiet and listen to it, and follow where it leads. And you won't hear that from your parish priest as he lectures you while leaning over the Communion Rail at Mass next Sunday - or any other Sunday. And like I said in a previous blog recently, God is a lot older than the Catholic Church, and there's probably a very good reason for that if we think about it, and we should.