Losing My Religion

Alex is a news hound. He's the kid who reads the newspaper every day, and tries to get a few of the headlining stories in before leaving for school. He subscribes to Newsweek and Time, often picks up another news magazine while standing in line at the store, and he surfs around online for updates to the day's news.

Before school this morning he checked the headlines online, and by the time Char was telling him to get his stuff together and come out for breakfast, he'd read this in several incarnations. That he was angry is an understatement, but more than that, sadly, he wasn't surprised.

He brought his laptop out to the table and showed me a few of the articles he'd read, and when I was done reading, before I could even say anything to him, he looked right at me and said, I'm done with it, Dad.

I know he expected an argument, and Rachel and Kevin braced for it (and hoped for it, I think), but it seemed like the wrong thing to do. His belief in organized religion as a whole has eroded over the last few years, and lately he's been increasingly vocal about his specific issues with the Catholic church. Where a few months ago he was agreeable with the idea that he would still function as a church member, partake in school activities and attend church with us every week until he was sixteen, the look on his face this morning was absolute: he is honestly done.

We could force the issue; we are within our parental rights to drag his ass out of bed every Sunday morning and require him to go through the motions, but to what end? The last thing I want to do is foster a systemic disbelief in him, and I don't want to be the catalyst that pushes him to feel as if he needs to prove the absence of theism. If we give him this now, give him the freedom to explore how what he believes fits in with the world he sees, I'm hoping he'll cultivate faith on a level that works for him.

It would have been nice if he had been able to take a few more years to slowly pull away instead of feeling like he was shoved out, but I completely understand where he's coming from, and to be honest, I'm reaching the end of my own religious rope here. The only thing that has me holding onto it is my kids; Char wasn't raised Catholic and doesn't have a particular belief in Catholic dogma. This is something she's done for me, because it was important to me.

Alex has a dozen reasons for wanting to head in his own direction, and I have a gut feeling Kevin will run from it in a few years. Rachel is only there because her friends are; she finds much of it absurd and has almost as many questions as Alex does, but because her entire social life is tied into that school, she'll likely hold on longer.

But when she lets go, I'm not sure there will be anything left of it for me to want to hold onto.

Until Alex started questioning so openly, I honestly did not realize how many of my own doubts that I had. But this morning, just the idea that the man who is supposed to be infallible in matters of the church may have not only covered up a mass molestation by a single priest, but used bribery to achieve that cover up?

This isn't the church I grew up in, not anymore.

Alex and I had lunch together today after spending the morning working on forms. Watching him eat these days is a true WTF? kind of thing and I'm not sure how he fits all that food into his stomach at one time, but it's also a bit fascinating at the same time. And I'm not sure how we got from What kind of pizza do you want? to religion, but we got there in short order.

How mad would you get if I decided I wasn't Catholic?

I wouldn't. (He's at the same age I was when I started picking apart the faith in which I'd been raised. I never voiced those doubts to my parents because they weren't just Catholic, they were Catholic. Any doubts I had would have been, I was sure, their personal failures.)

What if I didn't want to go to church anymore?

I'm not sure. You would have to have incredibly compelling reasons beyond wanting to sleep in later on Sundays.

I don't think the pope is infallible.

Neither do I.

I think women should be allowed to be priests.

So do I.

And priests should be allowed to get married.

So do-- (he got me there; he knows I'm conflicted on that particular issue, and he knows why.) That one is open for debate.

I don't think birth control is a sin.

I had a vasectomy. What does that tell you?

Why are you still Catholic then, Dad?

Unlike myself at his age, Alex has a firm grasp on what he believes; he worries that it contradicts the things he's been taught as he's grown up and that his mother and I will be crushed if he takes a different path.Our goal was never to raise kids who towed the line because we told them to; we've always wanted them to come to faith on their own. I don't care if he chooses to believe in something else, as long as he believes.

I'm not sure if I can articulate to him why I'm still Catholic, and why it was important to me to raise my kids in the same church I was raised in. But I can tell him that even Mother Theresa had her doubts, and they're prefectly normal. I can tell him, too, that I don't think there's anything wrong with setting aside the things you simply cannot agree with and embracing the things with which you do agree.

Someday he may find something else that meshes a bit better with what he believes, and we won't give him a hard time over it. Or someday he may find himself in the same place I've found myself, unable to pray without genuflecting, turning to the familiar when the shit hits the fan because that's what's deeply ingrained, reciting the Rosary because the numbness won't let anything else come out.

Until then, however, he's dragging his ass out of bed every Sunday with the rest of us.