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hoodlum, they find out I‘m also a poet!
Father Mahon thinks my work has “spiritual intensity“ and “rich imagery,” and you can’t argue with an expert.
The “spiritual intensity” is a little hard to explain, since I’m an atheist. (By the way, around here atheism is worse than having your hands in your pockets. I got smacked for disrespect. You can imagine what they’d do to me for atheism. Boiling oil or the rack; Spanish Inquisition stuff for sure.) The only guy I can talk to about it is Bernie (that’s what some of us call Father Mahon), but even Bernie gets a little nervous on the subject—maybe because he’s not exactly an orthodox priest, though he’s the most genuinely religious person I’ve ever met.
Anyhow, I’ve given up enough Catholic beliefs to qualify for excommunication. To begin with, I don’t think Jesus Christ was God, though he was a hell of a nice guy, and very spiritual. And I don’t believe that Catholics have a better chance of getting into heaven than Protestants and Jews. I hate the word “Christian“ when it's used like this: “Why don’t you behave in a Christian manner?“ Where does that leave the Jews I want to know? I hate exclusiveness—the idea that we belong to some restricted country club for Christian souls. What’s so great about behaving like a Christian? Hitler was a Christian. The first big issue for me was authority. In elementary school, the nuns shoved “the authority of the Catholic Church“ down our throats. I couldn’t stand it. I just couldn’t see the value of swallowing somebody else’s ideas about how to live before you live yourself. I mean, you get born into the world to discover the world. You try to be good, but not just because of someone else’s laws. You have to discover your own laws. Look at all the morons who’ve done horrible things because some maniac made some laws for them to follow. When Hitler ruled Germany, he said that Jews were impure and made laws to prove it. And the Germans obeyed.
Another thing. If the Church has so much authority, why doesn’t it use it when it should. To save lives, for example. Where was the Pope when they were killing millions of Jews? Hiding in the catacombs probably, silent as a prayer book, with all his authority scared right the hell out of him. What good is authority if you don’t have any courage?
The next big issue for me was sex.
I’ve had girlfriends since the first grade. I never had one of those periods that boys are supposed to have, when they hate the sight of girls. I’ve always loved the sight of girls, and the feel of girls, and the talk of girls.
The nuns were scared to death of sex. One time in the sixth grade, Sister Sarah, who was very weird, gave us a lecture. She said she had seen us