graven images
by Rachel written January 18, 2015
invariably, when a roman catholic finds out i’m not roman catholic—usually when i profess ignorance of a tradition amongst the faithful—they ask one question: “are you christian?”
and in my head, i always ask, “well, aren’t you?”
1) growing up, i’ve had it impressed upon me that if you believe jesus christ is the lord and savior, you’re a christian. the rest of it is a matter of (millenia-long) disagreement. apparently, some roman catholics use it as a shorthand for protestant, a.k.a. people pope leo x would have certainly disapproved of.
i’m all for the ever-evolving definitions of words, of flexibilities in meanings and chimeric understanding, but i will never stop being perplexed over the whole christian == protestant conflation. is this a thing taught to baby catholics at confirmation? does the roman catholic bible (now with 100% more maccabees!) contain a definition of christianity that somehow excludes roman catholicism while carefully shepherding every other jesus-centric religion under the umbrella?
2) christian, protestant, born-again— two- to three-syllable words that contain multitudes. what if i were to say, “no, i am a methodist?” or “yes, baptist and proud” or “excuse me, anglicans are the true catholics, thanks”—would that have sparked a pinprick of illumination?
probably not.
3) this long holiday is a meditation into the Other. this fellow—his position, his title, his treatment—is a direct contradistinction of hundreds of years of history and heresy.
i was in a private roman catholic school for six years, faithfully attending first friday mass in an itchy gala dress, standing for the three o’clock prayer, acting as a mute uncomprehending bead in a human rosary. i argued with a christian living education teacher about the ten commandments—a regular martin luther, me.
when not through osmosis, then my knowledge of a religion my nominal spritual predecessors vehemently rejected was acquired as a means of self-defense.
of my own free will i’d read the entire bible—taught to me as god’s final word on things—before i turned sixteen (except for the boring bits in numbers, because honestly.) john’s gospel of love, the aching eroticism of the songs of solomon, mary mother of jesus totally having kids after giving birth to the son of god, paul of sodding tarsus ruining things for everyone especially for roman catholic girls who want to be priests, the terror of the pale horse cometh.
(i’d read parts of the qu’ran—also god’s final word on things, my ill-formed mind barely comprehended; back then i’d not yet been educating myself comprehensively on comparative theology, as fast internet had yet to be invented by jesus in my house—too, but i understand that as i hadn’t read it in the original language in which it had been written, my reading doesn’t count as much.)
i had a bible in elementary school, and i had a bible elsewhere. multiple bibles outside the schoolroom, even. comes with the territory of having a father with multiple degrees on the subject.
looking back, that might have been my spark of illumination. unquenchable literacy exacts a price.
4) if i’m not roman catholic, does that mean i’m not filipino? this is what popular representations of filipino culture seem to be saying, an exposed nerve, a broken bone poorly set, a fingernail scraping down slate, lungs drowning on dry land.
if adoration for the people’s pope is nigh universal among filipinos, and i daresay it, catholic across the archipelago, then am i being un-filipino?
men are still made flesh, and they are great and terrible. it is a ___________ on my part that in the past few days my heart has been strangely unwarmed.
am i not the people?
5) “credo in deum”
this is a declaration of faith—
a pledge of allegiance.
6) with some difficulty, i can recite the names of all the books in the (apocrypha-free) old testament in order. unfortunately, i can’t do the same for the new testament after romans and before revelations; paul was a very prolific letter-writer to too many -ians and also i hate his guts.
six years of roman catholic schooling is no match for a lifetime of parentally-mandated sunday school. even now i associate genteel southern accents with a particular preacher my mother used to watch at six a.m. on television. it all culminated in a legitimate, to borrow a phrase from bertram wooster, scripture knowledge prize when i was in first year high school.
funnily enough, i don’t defer to my father on christian theology because of his ordination. i defer because he’s been studying the bible for half my life, and wields aramaic and greek like nobody’s business. τετέλεσται, he says at easter, and the tomb—and the massive wooden crucifix—is empty.
on matters politic and social, i keep my own counsel.
7) i don’t speak of religion of my own free will much often. maybe this is why.