My life partner has had a strong spiritual desire to examine current Christian Religions and to find one that is suitable. We've spent the last few months basically stalking the Great Religious congregations of our locale, appearing in their midst on Sundays etc and asking questions about baptism, membership, et al.
First we went to the Catholic Cathedral and sat and kneeled and prayed through a few Masses. These various Sign of the Cross and Genuflection skills were very well known to me as I was brought up in a strong Irish Catholic household. (I myself am happy enough in my life with my own understanding of Existentialism as my core belief in this world...if one can ever be 'happy' with existentialism, per se. It is an angsty way of thinking).
Secondly, we went to the Church of England and heard a sermon basically condemning Buddhism. I agreed with the sermon entirely. There were mostly very old white people there, the old women of whom seemed to look angrily at my wife, who is Asian, younger and somewhat more beautiful than I am...so went went elsewhere.
Thirdly we sat in on 8 Lutheran services at one church over 8 weeks, had tea and coffee etc and gave the pastor information about us and how my partner was very interested in being baptised into that branch of Christianity and for 8 weeks he said he would contact us, which he didn't. Once again we noted the scowls on the jowls of many of the old white women in the congregation.
So, Fourthly, we returned to the Catholic Cathedral, went to Masses and had tea and cakes afterwards and asked about baptism etc.
A priest was kind enough to get in touch with us and we met up and discussed the matter and he gave us a 200 page book regarding preparation for entering the faith. At no point in the discussion was I able to say 'well, my dear partner, who I love, is interested in being a Catholic, but I'm not, but I am here because I love her and support her wishes.
Currently, we've been referred to a Church Counsellor/Chancellor regarding our past marriages...so the Church can work out how they can...um...help us. I guess this is quite commendable and, indeed, in some other universe, even charitable.
I suppose the issue is that we don't necessarily feel guilty as both of us are really convinced that we didn't actually kill Jesus. The Jews did that.
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