The Long Line To Confession

It's "When I was your age" time. I used to go to confession on Saturday afternoon. Once I went two weeks straight and the priest said that wasn't necessary.

There might have been one or two people in line. I had business near my old church and decided to quietly reflect. There is a five o'clock mass. It was closer to four when I arrived so it was too early to stay for mass.

Each priest had a line of at least four parishioners waiting to confess. Are more people sinning? It is nice that many are partaking in the sacrament. I cannot say what sins they committed.

When I left school and in turn organized religion it was liberating that I never thought about what was A SIN!. Eminent Catholic influencer George Carlin described how many sins were committed before actually touching the girl in the back seat of the car.

There are as many interpretations as there are interpreters. One teacher took a vow of celibacy. That's his right and his private life. He said "Touching and feeling are sins."

Somehow, shaking hands was not "A sin". By his estimation, grabbing the other person's arm was sinful. Is patting someone on the back sinful? I was touched so rarely until a certain baby came into my life.

Was it a sin to pick her up? My father put me through Hell because I had the audacity to be nice to a family member who needed nurturing. Out of the other side of his mouth, my father wanted me to do everything with female classmates; selecting girls he was interested in whom I was not.

Adults spend way too much time on the Sixth Commandment. Meanwhile, married politicians say oral copulation is not cheating on your spouse. People do whatever they want. Men can justify anything to themselves.

You have heard "Respect your elders". Somehow, that only applies to men. Ginger Rogers outlived Fred Astaire. Wouldn't you want to know how she danced backwards in high heels? They both did well and those "Old movies" remain enjoyable to watch.

My last confession was more of a conversation with a teacher whom I had the utmost respect for. He was not going to say "Shame on you." He was priest who drank beer occasionally and smoked cigars. As a Cuban American- it did not diminish his message.

The scene I most recall from Doubt is how the priests had a boisterous dinner with wine and good conversation while the nuns ate in silence. I heard Father Luis was a great dinner guest.

As for my last confession- we were beyond the "Shame on you" tone many adults gave children who admitted wrongdoing. That was my true graduation. School was perfunctory at that point. I had no desire to attend college and was growing a different way than my class was.

I was not allowed to attend graduation. A rude man who also smoked cigars to stink up the campus said I was not allowed because I missed a rehearsal. There was no feeling of accomplishment.

The prospect of sitting through a two hour mass was nothing I missed. It was not a rite of passage. It felt like "Lane Ends in 800 Feet- Merge Right". Little did I know that years later I would reconnect with many classmates on social media and come to LinkedIn which has become Permanent High School.

And it all started at confession. I never truly left the church. Skipping school as much as I did- that was rebellion and a reaction to untreated PTSD from taunting by certain students and a divorce which therapists thought was a normal rite of passage.

They could not have been more wrong. Atheism seems like the ultimate rebellion. Religion is one of the basic tenets of American life so to say it is not there is the ultimate rebellion.

Good comes from somewhere. I don't believe in Hell. After that divorce cycle- you couldn't threaten me with fire and pitchforks. I moved underground, quietly reflecting in magnificent buildings.

Usually at off hours. Forty minutes before a mass was too crowded for me. I did not feel like I belonged. As I visited The Cathedral of St. Paul in the capital of Minnesota a wedding was going on.

I did not feel right sitting in the back or enjoying their take on The Stations of the Cross. Religion is a personal thing. It is a story that never ends. Considering the strange way it began it is surprising I made it this far.

The End of The Long Line To Confession

Thomas Jackson Will Return in Crashing the Confessional