Reply #93: Ditto

[Submariner]

I harbor the same feelings and observations about the church that you so eloquently outline.

Parochial school was a rotten experience for me and my classmates. I moved on to the Navy with the Vietnam draft closing in on me. Years later I was surprised to hear that some of the class "pets", the ones whose we thought would go on to become priests and nuns, and the ones whose parents would shuttle the nuns and priests around town (because they didn't drive), had moved on to heroin overdoses, and a couple of suicides.

My younger sister is still dealing with the physical beatings from the nuns at Matignon High School that drew blood.

Let's face it, the priesthood is nothing but an exclusionary men's club composed of the class introverts, the boys that did not run with the rest of the kids on the block, the class sissies with little outside exposure to the real world. They basically have, or had in my day, absolutely no life experiences that qualify them to lead or teach children anything about reality. They operate in a world of make believe sky-people and assorted myths and legends.

My ex-wife had the unfortunate experience of attending and all-girls catholic high school in greater Boston. I believe her ultra-religious mother felt keeping her away from boys was the right thing to do. I detest what they did to her, making her feel very shy and shameful about having sex, which weakened our marriage until it fell apart. Because I had similar training, I had no ability, like my wife, to discuss sex with her so we could try and work through our problems. I love her and miss her terribly still 28 years later, but we got lockjaw when it came to discussing our love life.

My only satisfaction now is watching each parish close, one-by-one-by-one, as the catholic church pursues it's trek to eventual obscurity. Instead of using the collection plate money for good deeds, we have come to find out that much of it has been spent on motels where little boys and girls were taken to be raped, or in multi-million dollar out of court settlements to continue the cover-up their evil atrocities. The class introvert, the sissie, turns out to be a child raping priest.