Central City Dump, the home edition

I know, since the spring, and the successful dunking of all my children, I have written very little about my return to church. Part of this has been due to our abysmal attendance since the summer started. My belief that our absence had gone without notice was shattered while trying to skulk out the door without shaking Padre's hand a few weeks back. He stopped mid-conversation, excused himself, and came over to say hello since he hadn't seen us in so long. I guess the deafening silence left in the absence of Little Man's babbling monologue called All Things Wheeled ("Truck! Car! Train!") is a dead giveaway. But with the new school year starting, and thus the start of CCD*, I have once again been thrown, headfirst, back into my faith, this time without a life preserver.

Since the move, I came to realize there was no way humanly possible that I would be able to get #1 to CCD on time, having to drive through four towns in the fifteen minutes between school dismissal and the start of class, without killing myself, or someone, in the process. So, no matter how grateful I am to this particular parish for making the whole return process easy and guilt free (a miracle itself when Catholics are involved), we had to change parishes. This might not seem like a big deal except I had this whole scenario worked out for #1, who was a year behind, to be in a first grade CCD class, since I was told she had to be in formal class for two years before receiving communion. I really didn't want to have the whole "I'm a bad Catholic" discussion again with a new priest.

I bite the bullet though, make the necessary calls and during my meeting with the director am told, "If you had been doing the first grade book at home, your daughter could have started with her classmates in the fall." Fuuuuck! I had wasted the whole summer since I had been told specifically this was not the case. Sensing my frustration by the huge vein popping out of my head as I explain this, she offers a solution. "If you really want to work at this, and can finish the book by October, we can put her in the 2nd grade class." Splash! That's the sound of my being thrown into the deep end of Catholicism.

Thus began my career as a Catechist (the official name for CCD teachers), but I think Masochist is a more appropriate title.

I really thought #1 would balk at the challenge I put before her, but God knows no better motivation for a seven year old than getting to dress like a child-bride (a post about the creepiness factor of this to come), and she said yes. If she hadn't, there was no way I forcing this upon her, since the kids have only recently become accustomed to the fact that church is something we do on Sunday mornings when they'd rather be watching a Kai Lan marathon**, and I didn't think forcing her to do homework all summer would improve her opinion of the place. But she was willing and although I was really not able, we began.

Let's all take a second here to appreciate the irony that I, a woman who had so completely given up Catholicism that she would not receive communion, even just for show at weddings and funerals, would now be spending hours a week teaching religion to her kid. I thought God would smite me on the spot. Every day we would sit for half an hour and do a chapter of the twenty-five set before us, and, at first, it wasn't too bad. The first couple of chapters start out with the basics, introducing the heavy hitters - sign of the cross, God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit (Which was a total bitch to explain to a seven year old. All together class, can we say abstract?) - but then things take a turn for the worse and I remember all the reasons I hated CCD.

First of all, the activities in the book are written for a wide range of ability levels. If Johnny can't read well, there are easy activities he can complete like "Trace the letters below to find the name of the first sacrament". And Baptism is so clearly written Mr. Magoo could read it. #1 looks at me and says, "But I can read it." No duh. I totally get why they have to do this, so don't line up to protest outside of my house. It doesn't make it any less boring for the other kids though.

And then, once you think oyu can check your brain at the door, among these same short-bus-riding-kid pages are gems like this one:

"In the footprints below, write or draw how you can live as follower of Jesus."

Seriously? When an adult needs to take a few minutes to figure it out, what the hell is a seven year old going to do with this question? I remember, so clearly, sitting at the desk during my dreaded Wednesday CCD class, pondering whether leaving questions like this blank would get me in trouble. At this point I just start feeding #1 answers since I find this whole exercise to be ridiculous, telling her, "Enjoy it now, because you're going to have to do this yourself in the fall."

Content-wise, we progressed to the really good parts about the bread and wine actually being the body and blood of Jesus. I have never felt more like David Koresh then when reading aloud the words "We receive the Body and Blood of Christ in Holy Communion." How is that not terrifying for a child? And, again, bad, bad Catechist that I am, I had to modify. I stopped and said, "OK, listen. You know we're not really eating a person, right? We just pretend it is..." at which point #1 cuts me off and finishes, "be cause Jesus was so important." Thanks for backing me up, girlfriend. I did have the foresight to tell her not to share this knowledge with her classmates, but just go with the flow in CCD. Watch, I'll have my kid labeled the class heretic.

Maybe I'm wrong in doing this, and it does make me a bad Catholic, but I didn't return to the church for all this stuff. I returned so my kids can learn about God, who I do believe in, despite the number of times I take his son's name in vain a day, and so that we can have an outlet to show gratitude for all the blessings in our lives. It's all this Jesus-died-for-you stuff that makes me cringe. I always said I'd moderate the teachings of the church with some of my own, I just never knew I'd be the teacher whose lessons I was modifying. And if the argument is this is information they need to know in order to receive First Communion, then why can't we do it in sixth grade or something? While I am still happy, overall, with our decision to become church-goers, my resolve is being tested when I have to explain original sin to my perfectly-innocent-from-the-moment-she-was-born daughter.

Hypocrite that I am, I will trudge on, helping her to finish the book by October 1st. And while I am giving myself migraines with all the eye-rolling I have had to refrain from, I will try to see the good in what I am doing. The end of each chapter has a space to write "How I will live my faith" and #1 always writes "Help my mom around the house." For that alone, all of this would be worth it.

*Which does not stand for Central City Dump as we all called it, it is actually the more terrifying sounding Confraternity of Christian Doctrine. Brings to mind images of Kool-Aid and sneakers, no?

**If you do not know this Chinese newcomer to Nickelodeon, turn it on and see how badly you suck at repeating Chinese phrases and how naturally awesome your kids are at it.