I come from a long line of working-class Catholics (mother's side) and Protestants (father's side). My paternal grandmother was first a Baptist, but joined a Pentecostal church later. She could talk in tongues and taught bible study for children. Cool, but kinda scary.
My Tennessee Grandma was the best person I ever knew. She told me that she once chased the devil out of her house because he was trying to turn her against Jesus. Yeah, I know, sounds a little fanciful. I'll tell you what, though, if anyone could pull off a caper like that it was her.
She was a die hard Democrat until JFK ran for president - my Grandpa made them both switch to Republican because he hated Catholics. She was raised to submit to her husband as the head of the household. Plus, I'm sure her pastor was raising (un)holy hell over a Catholic trying to get elected president.
It's the nature of our reality that evil has always existed in this world, and always will. We have to choose to walk away from it in our own lives, but it still exists out there. Sometimes people are fooled if they don't exercise their mind and search for the truth. Grandma might have voted for Donald Trump the first time, because he pretended to be anti-abortion and folks were preaching conservative politics from the pulpit. However, I'm confident she would not have supported him a second time. Why? Because he's a liar and a cheat. He's filled with hate and tries to spread it around. Grandma knew the difference between good and evil.
 |
| Sometimes good people come together, regardless of propoganda, dogma, or belief systems |
This is quite an eye opener, always and again, how religion shapes outlooks (prejudice) and the directions in people's lives. I never experienced much of it growing up, religion played no role, church was a curiousity various members of my family occasionally attended, more like a social club.
ReplyDeleteWhen I married into a catholic Irish family religion hit me face on, the confusion and initial despair I caused my inlaws, no church wedding and so on but there was also the devastation, hungerstrikes, imprisonments, loss of lives and so much hatred as a result of The Troubles, an actual civil war caused by two Christian religions, just a short drive from Dublin to Northern Ireland.
Thank you for sharing this, Sabine.
DeleteGrandma was a smart cookie it sounds like.
ReplyDeleteShe was great.
DeleteMy maternal grandparents were never precious about religion...they taught me to think critically. My paternal grandmother was fire and brimstone and one can draw a direct line between her stance and my father's atheism. I grew up knowing nothing about religion and that's somewhat problematic too since, imo, we need multiple perspectives on how to recognize dishonesty, selfishness, and evil (Trump, etc) and find ways to counteract it.
ReplyDeleteBeing taught as a child to think critically, that's great. I do think one needs to have a basic understanding of comparative religions in order to understand quite a bit of history. And when I was an employee union organizer, they always sent me to talk to the heavy duty Christians because I could talk that talk The world is so complex.
DeleteBeautiful blog
ReplyDeletePlease read my post
ReplyDeleteRajani, I have read your posts a number of times. I enjoy your writing and your spirituality; however I don't necessarily agree with you. I'm a child of the West. I embrace reality. When I die, I will embrace the No-thing. I will continue to read your blog, and I wish you the best. Cheers!
DeleteI was raised Catholic and went to Catholic schools all the way through college. I am not religious at all anymore and when I think of all of the silly rules I followed, it makes me angry. I feel that if we remember to treat others they way we would want to be treated, we wouldn't have all of this hatred and division.
ReplyDeleteI agree, and I went to Catholic school only through the 4th grade, then we moved to a place where there weren't any Catholic schools. I went to Catechism classes after that until high school. Then I stopped.
DeleteMy parents (mother, my father was unaffiliated I think) were episcopalian and we went to church every Sunday until I was 13/14 when my mother was named as being the other woman in an affair with the husband of their best friends (which she denied) and she couldn't/wouldn't show her face in church so it was up to my dad to take us. That lasted one Sunday, the second Sunday us kids talked him into taking us out to a diner for breakfast and that was the end of church. I was already seriously questioning the dogma by then. Don't have much use for religion at all, any kind, but especially the Abrahamic ones with the all powerful vengeful god that sends you to eternal suffering for not praising him enough and who lets bad things happen to people.
ReplyDeleteMy Dad was raised Southern Baptist, but converted to Catholic when he married my Mom. He sat in "his chair" and watched TV while the rest of us bundled off to church. I'm sorry your mother suffered such an injustice.
DeleteI'm pretty sure it wasn't an injustice. She claimed to know who the other woman was but refused to tell. My mother was not that selfless to endure the ostracization from their social group and the enmity of her husband to save the reputation of another woman. They didn't divorce but their relationship and our lives at home were irrevocably changed.
DeleteThat's so sad.
DeleteI get so frustrated when I hear a woman say she voted a certain way so her husband won't be mad. Don't they know that our ballots are SECRET? Each voter should inform herself and vote for the candidate best for her.
ReplyDeleteI hear you. I guess their "Christian" indoctrination would have said "God knows." Makes my skin crawl, how religions of so many kinds treat women.
DeleteRegardless of the stripe, no more religion for me.
ReplyDeleteOnce you start thinking for yourself, it is hard to imagine returning to the Church.
DeleteWell, I live in a rampantly sectarian country where Catholics and Protestants are sniping at each other all the time. As an atheist, I'm baffled by this constant religious in-fighting, which gets in the way of running an efficient government.
ReplyDeleteI can imagine that you are baffled. It's hate, pure and simple, which I'm sure neither religion would think they teach. But they do.
DeleteComing from an immigrant family of Italian Catholics I had enough of that garbage. The more as a kid I asked questions the more I heard things I didn't believe. The more I questioned the more I had to deal with a very very angry father. I had to be quiet until I left home. No more church of any kind! All cults to me.
ReplyDeleteI hear you!
Delete