Do you know why Catholics put money in the collection plate at Sunday mass?

Because they want to contribute to the upkeep of their parish church. They want to help pay for the heat and lights and the maintenance on the church building. They want to help pay for the room and board of their parish priest. They also want to help pay for whatever charitable projects their parish may be undertaking - shelter for the homeless, clothes for impoverished children, food for impoverished families, outreach to addicts, to those living on the streets, refuge for illegal immigrants.

But mostly, they just want to help support their sense of community with their fellow parishoners. They want to preserve their church as a gathering place, as a place of prayer and communion.

They aren't thinking about the far away institution of Vatican dictates and Vatican politics. They just want to help pay for the heat and electricity needed to keep their church functioning. They want to help pay for repairs to the roof so that it doesn't leak.

The attack on Catholics because they drop a few dollars a week into the collection plate at mass is absurd. They're not doing it because they approve of the heirarchy in Rome, or because they love the Cardinals and the Bishops, they're only doing it because they want to support their own parish community.

I was raised Catholic, I went to Catholic school for the first 8 years of my schooling - and for this I will always be grateful. I was privileged to receive a truly classic education, with a wider range of liberal arts training than any of my public school peers ever received. The Latin training alone led me to a lifelong appreciation of etymology and love of language and history.

While I left the Church behind nearly 50 years ago, I do not at all regret my early years within the Catholic tradition. It's complicated, and I'm glad for the complication - it has challenged me and stretched me, and has made me always appreciative of complexity and subtilty.

I have no patience with the RCC heirarchy - those narrow hypocritical males in their robes and and their thoroughly fucked up morality. But I have plenty of compassion for the ordinary Catholics who attend mass on Sunday and drop a few dollars into the collection plate so that the heat stays on in their church building during the winter.

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