I grew up in the Catholic church. And to be honest I never had a good experience with organized religion. Many of my earliest memories are around my experiences in a Catholic school. And unfortunately I didn't have the best experience. So many of my memories are downright frightening. I think a lot of it had to do with being a very shy kid. And to be honest I think the religious personnel affiliated with our church just plain scared the daylights out of me. I was taught from a young age about consequences that will result from inappropriate behavior. Basically I was taught that "x" behaviors would ensure me a place in heaven while "y" behaviors would ensure me a place in hell. And there was very little wiggle room in between. This message never came from my parents. Of course my parents taught us kids about consequences but never in terms of our relationship with God or our ability to get to heaven. My parents instead taught us about the power of forgiveness and the importance of unconditional love. The other messages instead came from the teachers at the local Catholic school and it came from the priests at the church with which we were affiliated. Needless to say I became an extremely conflicted teenager and young adult. A lot of my struggles with my sexuality came as a result of my religious beliefs. I did everything I could to confirm to society norms. I truly believed that in the long run it would be better to be "unhappy" and in a straight relationship than it would be to be "happy" and in a same sex relationship. My reason for doing so was because I was terrified of disappointing God (and my parents but that is a whole other story). I actually distanced myself from the Catholic church once I entered college. I wanted nothing to do with it. In fact, I distanced myself from a lot of other things while I was in college. This included my family and my friends. I instead focused on my education. But in the long run I was so unhappy during college. I actually started to suffer from extreme anxiety. I couldn't be around anyone without being terrified. I would hide in the corner of the library for the entire day. I would avoid eye contact. I would be sick with worry anytime I had to present to a classroom. I couldn't even pick up the phone and dial a phone number. I even got anxiety when I was walking on campus and I had to say "Thank You" to the person holding open the door for me. I felt like everyone could see straight through me. I was a mess. And things continued to get worse until I graduated college and started my first "job" post graduation. I decided to delay entering the "real world" and I instead volunteered for two years in an Americorps program. And guess what happened ... I fell in love. And instead of running away from it I decided it was high time to start living my life and embracing my whole self. I believe we are all children of God. I am a child of God. This is the way I was born. I made the decision that as long as I lived my life in such a way that should I come face to face with God I would be able to comfortably account for all my actions then I was living life as God intended me to do so. And I have never looked back to being fearful of the afterlife. But at the same time I have never returned to the church. I still connect strongly to many of the beliefs of the Catholic church. I get a lot from the tradition and ceremony that surrounds the Catholic faith. However, I cannot be a member of a church nor can I raise my children in a church that does not accept the way in which we live our life as a family. I want the boys to have a relationship with God. I do not know where I would be had I never built a relationship with God. I find myself in conversation with God during many points of any given day. I believe I have a very strong relationship with God. But I am struggling with how to introduce God to the boys. I would love for the boys to be able to build a church family. I would love for the boys to grow up understanding the importance of unconditional love and the importance in the ability to forgive. But I'm not sure I can do this without introducing the boys to organized religion. So where does this leave us? I think Kara and I need to find a church while the boys are still young. We are blessed to live in a fairly liberal community and as such I think we have found a church to try out that would be welcoming to our family. But to be honest I am terrified of restarting my journey with organized religion. I am terrified of reverting back to the feelings I had as a young adult. My hope is that if we try out a church while the boys are young then should we have a bad experience the boys would be to young to remember it. But should we have a wonderful experience then the boys will only remember always being part of the church. So we shall see. Now Kara and I just have to be brave enough to move forward on this journey.
Mary
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