Road trip imminent pondering religion

Well with preparations to depart for North Carolina and the Family Motor Coach Association RV Rally in Winston Salem then onward to Raleigh area and visits with more friends, I did not get my Sepia posted last weekend and will not be posting any Sepias while we are on the road.  It's  a funny thing because I had the best one to contribute, on my Aunt Jinx and her forklift but I have shared that before on this blog, so I didn't feel too much guilt. 

Guilt, that "g" word is something I have battled out of my mind over the years; long ago I learned to move on, to say and recognize "that is over" and to let myself off the guilt hook by saying "I did the best I could at the time without the foresight of the wisdom of hind sight.  I did nothing intentionally harmful, though it may have been stupid,  and that is all I can say."  My cousin,  Rollie who died a year ago this month, this very week, yesterday and I discussed this a lot.  Maybe  because we were both raised Catholic and along with  that old time religion of the 50's and 60's came a heavy dose of guilt, to be absolved only by the confessional and penances doled out by the priest.     Much has changed today in the Catholic church over the years and I doubt that practicing Catholics make  weekly pilgrimages to toll up and atone for their mistakes, aka sins of the week.  Vatican whatever number it was changed much.  

Lately my soul has been restless stirring around and questioning the business of the Methodist church I have tried attending here in MN.  It just seems to be a big waste of my time as the local congregation has its way with being a community center of those who have been there and in this community forever. They have their weekly  Wednesday dinners and seem  happy with each other though they never grow, some people join and others leave.  Our current minister is someone I do enjoy  but his sermons are shortened to make room for the  activities of the congregations.  This past Sunday he talked about severe declines in the Methodist membership, using the Biblical Ezekiel and the dry bones analogy.  Yes, I think he can see it but for now until retirement he's gainfully employed.  He is also a Chaplain with the Air Force and so has a broader ecumenical view. 

For the other activities, I sit bored, my mind wandering wherever it likes and looking at my watch while wondering why in the world I am wasting my time.  Sometimes I exit early, having all I can stand of the various "church family" discussing their concerns.  The church now  has  people run around with microphones to each person who must speak so that others can hear, this drags the process on longer at times than the sermon and finds me ever amazed that these people seem to relish this activity.  I am not that  concerned to be truthful and find I barely listen so I arise out of the pew and exit the nearest door.

In the late 70"s in California  I drifted around  in and out of churches and settled for a time on Unity, a Christian church with heavy doses of New Age and other thoughts.  It was interesting and I felt each time  I attended worship I learned something.  But then later, for many reasons and not one in particular, I drifted back to the local Methodist church.  How I got to Methodism from Catholicism reaches back to my college days at Allegheny.  I was matched up with another Catholic girl in the dorm as roommate, my friend Janet who is a friend still today though we communicate maybe twice a year.  Allegheny is a small liberal arts and pre-med  school in Meadville, a college town in  northwestern Pennsylvania near  enough to Lake Erie to get the winter effect snows.  Well winters were the pits and I announced to Janet one evening that I would not be accompanying her down the hill to mass the next morning that I would go to the chapel like the others on campus, or maybe I wouldn't do anything.  She was horrified and questioned how I could even think that, but I did and she went on down the hill with the other Catholics at Allegheny.  There were not many of us.  Well the earth did not cave in and nothing awful happened so I learned that it likely didn't matter if I went to mass, church worship or nowhere at all.  When I found myself a divorced  young mom in CA and the Catholic church would not allow me sacraments, I went along my way and recalled, "well the protestants don't have such demands.  That works for me."

In the 60's I had developed  a litany of dislikes about many things in organized religion from the common, "all they want is money" to "it's for those who have nothing else to do, no place else to go and who are just dependent."  I could go on about all my litanies  and some resolutions but that would be a very  lengthy post.  Despite my dissatisfaction with organized protestant religions, I do retain a deep faith, the faith initiated in me by  my grandma Rose (Baba in Polish) before I could run around loose; I remember Baba teaching me my prayers, that I can still recite  today in Polish which was the first course.  My faith has sustained me through trials, triumphs and tragedies.  I am not convinced religion does that.

But nowMinnesota., to where I uprooted from California when we retired, I have just not found a church that suits me; I've drifted from the Methodist to the Evangelical Free and the Lutherans and back to the Methodists.  I will admit the Lutherans have been the most comfortable to me and I have many friends who attend the Lutheran churches in town.  Well most of this area is either Catholic or Lutheran. 

When I am in Pennsylvania the Catholic churches, including my hometown original church leave me with a feeling of peace.  I don't get that here. When Uncle Carl died, his Catholic church could not have been better, kinder, more caring, more helpful.  Just what I'd want locally.   I am wondering if this is  not some mystical stirring from the clouds and my Grandma Rose's partnering with my departed best friend Roberta, who tried her darnedest to get me back into the Catholic Church while she was on this planet.  I have been to  many other Catholic masses around the country and though there are some things Catholic with which I quibble, I can say I feel like I have been to church and worshipped when I attend mass.   Maybe it is time at last for me to  return home.  There is a saying, "once a Catholic always a Catholic."  I think I might just believe that today; I know it has been true in some things for  me like midnight masses on Christmas eve, and Good Friday services, All Souls and Saints Days, just around the corner. 

I was quite an active Methodist in CA for a long time, likely because I had ministers like Clarence the cowboy preacher  who corralled me back and talked with me.  We  will see what happens.  Maybe this is time to move on, maybe this is a stirring of the soul calling me home.  Maybe I'm just going through a strange period.  My friend Bonnie who moved here  from Arizona is also searching for a church, she still blames me for talking her into joining the local Methodists  years back but she no longer attends there either.  Maybe we are just grown enough to know that it is not essential to be amongst them all on a Sunday if there is something else to do.  I recall once giving a talk as a Methodist lay speaker in CA  about how church attendance has become the haven for the aged who have  a sense of obligation about Sundays.  Is church a way to fulfill a social need for those who otherwise would have no such contacts?  Is church for the "needy"  the lonely, the recovering what alls? Is there really any reason to go sit with groups of people who appear to be there to see and be seen?   Is all the activity much ado about nothing?  Does church have to be one's primary social outlet?  Is church for those who have not spent their lifetimes  there, but who lived and now with age attend like flocks?   I have more questions than answers and what's it all about anyway?  The ritual of the mass has been simplified, but the liturgy is there  and the essentials of worship.

I used to think one reason for remaining a Methodist was that was how Jerry was raised, but he has less  than no desire to go to church and makes a few obligatory appearances each year.  So it matters not to him where I go or if I do, although he  might ask "Aren't you going to church today?" when I skip.  Oh, well meantime we are packing up and heading out in a day.  The next other posts to the blog may be just what it was set up for, to record our travels.