Holy Week is almost here and brings back memories of my life as a student at a parochial school in Wash. DC. The area where I lived was called “Little Rome” because of all the seminarians and nuns staying in study houses and convents in the area while they attended Catholic University, and of course there was the National Shrine, dozens of Chapels, St. Anthony’s Church and the Franciscan Monastery. Lent for the most part was daily mass with my friends and the Stations of the Cross on Friday night and confession on Saturday and no candy or ice cream except on Sunday. Then Holy Week, mostly quiet except on Holy Thursday when we visited as many Churches and Chapels as we could, which was really a treat since each of them was overflowing with flowers and while wandering from place to place we were bombarded with Springs gift of azaleas, dogwood, forsythia, lilacs, lily of the valley, crocus, tulips, daffodils, and blossoming fruit trees. Spring in Washington could seem like Camelot. Easter Sunday, celebration of the Resurrection the essence of Christianity, meant a new hat, dress and shoes, the end of abstinence and fasting noted in a big Sunday Brunch followed by egg rolling on the White House Lawn, where everyone was welcome.
However, from this distance and in my later years, I view those days not such much with nostalgia but rather as a voyeur would view an alien culture on another planet. There was such joy and innocence in the celebration of our faith, no suspicion of priests, a little contention from time to time with our nuns, but otherwise a general respect for their choice of vocation. We followed the Latin Mass and knew all the proper response, in Latin. We even admitted our sins, acknowledging our own gluttony, sloth, licentiousness, lust, anger, pride, selfishness, envy and any hurt we might have caused others. We practiced abstinence, but for those that had lapses with consequences the Church provided protective homes for unwed mothers, adoption services and orphanages for neglected children. No one denied their responsibility to honor God and our parents. We championed virtue but loved the sinner if not the sin. The cop on the beat was our Buddy many of them graduated from the same schools we attended. We were not children of privilege, but we always felt privileged. Some of our parents were divorced, working mothers was the norm, mostly teachers, nurses, waitresses, and secretaries. There were even alcoholic fathers who often struggled to hold a job, but still provided for their families as best they could. Life wasn’t idyllic but it seemed good and well worth celebrating.
I am sure there are pockets where traditional Catholic culture flourishes but it seems the country is mostly secular in their practices and have more faith in Big Government than they do in God. Maybe I am wrong, but I don’t see many signs that I am. Perhaps Pope Francis can bring about a revival of respect for the joyous service of God and Man through the Church, we can only hope and pray. May you have a Happy Easter.
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