The Role of Nostalgia in Faith

This is technically part of my "visit to St. Gabe's" series, but it's so much more serious and philosophical that I felt the need to give it a more serious and philosophical title.

Ever since I left TAC, I have missed the feeling of sacredness and closeness to God at church. St. Michael's, while a great parish, feels a bit cold and distant to me. It isn't beautiful, it isn't warm and welcoming. It's white and green.

It also isn't super traditional. I mean it's traditional, but it isn't Latin, hymns, and incense (the last of which my asthmatic lungs appreciate). I haven't found the way to make it my happy place yet. The quiet and smallness of the earliest Sunday Mass are as close as it gets.

I believe God is there. I believe that He is just as present in the Eucharist at St. Michael's as anywhere else. I pray... but it requires a lot of focus and effort.

Kneeling during the Consecration today at St. Gabriel's, I realized that it is an easy place to believe and to pray. I am 100% comfortable, relaxed, and trusting. It was my parish from age 8 to age 19. I grew up there, not only from a child to a young adult, but I grew in my faith. I grew up as a Catholic there.

And it didn't used to be beautiful. It used to be a bingo hall. The chairs were covered in orangeish-brown pleather and were hooked together in long rows. We had computerized bells for the Consecration. It wasn't pretty. It wasn't super traditional. Heck, on some days, it wasn't even traditional. 

See? Not so traditional...

But it was home. It still is, somehow, even after all this time, my Church-y home. This realization led me to wonder: what is the role of nostalgia in faith?

It seems to hold some weight. Otherwise, why would I love St. Gabriel's so much? It wasn't beautiful when I was there, even though it is now. It has none of the things that I would normally consider "necessary" in a Church (Latin, hymns, etc.) Nevertheless, it is just as holy a place to me as Our Lady of the Most Holy Trinity Chapel on campus.

Why? Is it simply nostalgia? Is it simply a feeling or is it something more?

I don't have a definitive answer to this question. I am inclined to say that it is something more. Human beings are physical creatures. The Mass appeals to our senses. The architecture of a Church is intended to physically draw our eyes - and thereby, our hearts - up to God.

God, in His infinite wisdom, sent us His Son to show us the way to salvation. To physically die for us. To physically rise on the third day. 

Jesus instituted the Eucharist. He instituted the transubstantiation of bread and wine - physical things - into His Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity.

He didn't do that because He is a physical being, because He isn't. He took on our nature and became flesh so that we could see Him. Hear Him. Touch Him. He did that for us because we are physical creatures.

It has been established in studies that physical things evoke memories in us. Places, smells, etc., have the power to remind us of times past. It's more than emotional feeling. It is a way in which we can connect and reconnect with things that are important - maybe things that that we have lost or missed.

That reconnection reminds us - at the very least, it reminds me - of the ever-present, ever-loving God that we have. He doesn't leave us and he doesn't change. When we go back to Him, we find him just as we left Him. Loving, forgiving, merciful, good... Everything to everyone.

When I go back to St. Gabriel's, I physically go back to where I learned to love Him. It helps me - inspires me - to love Him more.

A Visit to St. Gabe's, Part 2 (the lovey-dovey emotional part)

We switched parishes a few years ago. While I respected the family conclave decision, I have missed these people. These people hold a big place in my heart.

I was excited for the opportunity to visit them today at Mass. I was also nervous. I have this incredibly unusual anxiety that goes along with reuniting with old friends. You see, I LOVE people. I do. I love them soooooo much. It makes me nervous to see them again because... well... I'm afraid they won't love me anymore. Maybe this is silly. I'm terrified that someone I still love enormously will extend a hand and say "Good to see you again." I want them to want to hug me as much as I want to hug them. A handshake would be so sad.

So I was nervous. That's probably part of why I fell down the stairs (see Part 1). I was so nervous and wound-up that I stopped paying attention to where my feet were going.

But St. Gabe's was as welcoming and loving as ever. The "old gang" has come back with the return of the old choir director. I felt so loved. It was incredible and wonderful. It made me so happy. The surprise, followed by the huge smile, and the running toward me with arms wide open.

Excuse the extreme, uncharacteristic sap of this post. I was just so happy to see these people again. I felt like I had come home.

I'm going to go out with the choir director (who also was my voice teacher in high school) and his right hand man to catch up. We're going out for drinks. Last time I saw these people, I was 18. Weird that we can hang out at a bar together now. But so wonderful that the friendship is still there.

As Michael Smith and Amy Grant sing,

"And friends are friends forever
If the Lord's the Lord of them
And a friend will not say never
'Cause the welcome will not end
Though it's hard to let you go
In the Father's hands we know
That a lifetime's not too long to live as friends."

Cheesy. But wonderful and love-full.

A Visit to St. Gabe's, Part 1 (The funny part)

Today I went back to St. Gabe's for Mass. Just a visit to see the beautiful new church and some dear, dear, dear old friends. (more on that in Part 2)

I arrived in classic style. With a bang. Literally.

Yes, that's how the visit started. As I walked down the stairs, chatting with a woman I haven't seen in five years, I forgot to keep walking down the stairs. There were more stairs. I didn't walk like there were. Me, my three inch heels, and flippy skirt tumbled down in a pseudo-graceful heap. I say pseudo graceful because even though I was falling with incredible force, I managed to not flash anyone. Or swear. I let out a high scream, though. See? Graceful. But I was falling. So not so graceful.

My next adventure began when I genuflected to enter a pew. I went down... but couldn't get up. My heel had stuck in my aforementioned flippy skirt and I was stuck. I didn't want to rip my skirt, nor did I want to snag it and have the knit material bounce too high when the pressure finally released. If you can't picture that... well, then you probably aren't a girl. If you are a girl and you can't picture that, you obviously have never tried to genuflect.

Still can't picture it? Geez. Maybe it's just me. Shoot.

I repeatedly tried to unhook the skirt from the heel of my shoe. Every time I managed to unhook it and then adjusted to stand up, it would get re-attached. After about five minutes - ok, maybe 30 seconds which felt like five minutes - I ended up scooting into the pew on my knees until I could heave myself up with my arms on the back of the pew in front of me.

Subtlety is not my specialty. Neither is delicacy in behavior. I specialize in drama, don't ya know. :)

My Battle with Food

Hey! Long time, no write! I apologize... I've been busy with visiting family, lounging in the pool during these 110 degree days, and, OH YEAH, getting a job! I start in two weeks at an office that I have wanted to work at since I was 10. So yeah, I'm pretty excited!

But that's not what this blog post is about. It's about my life-long battle with food. Not with eating disorders, not with allergies, but with food. It confuses me.

I am a texture eater. I always have been, I always will be. I am also moderately picky... mostly about texture. What really gets me... and by "gets me", I mean "confuses the *$^# out of me" (I don't know what four-letter word those symbols represent. I just felt like putting them there...) is food with different textures combined.

Example 1: soup. With the exception of something like split pea, which is all one consistency (don't you DARE put ham or carrots in it... because then it will be relegated to the confusing food category), I choke on soup. I kid you not. Here's why, in a step-by-step breakdown.

I scoop the soup into my mouth. Immediately, I start thinking: there is liquid in my mouth. There are also solid foods in my mouth. What do I do?

Do I swallow the liquid and then chew the solid stuff? OR, do I hold it all in my mouth, chewing the solid stuff until it becomes squashed, and then swallow it all together? If I try to swallow the liquid, I inevitably end up swallowing solid food whole as well. If I try to chew it all, the liquid goes down the wrong pipe. In the confusion and chaos, things start sliding down my throat, hitting the back of it, and causing me to sputter everywhere. It's messy.

Consequently, I have had to adapt my soup eating process. I carefully pick out every piece of solid food, careful to drain out all of the liquid from my spoon before inserting the spoon into my mouth. Only after all of the solids have been removed and consumed from the bowl, I proceed to drink the broth like it's a warm, salty tea.

Example 2: gum. I know, I know, not technically a multi-textured food object but it still confuses the begeebers out of me. I put a piece of gum in my mouth and am ok until about 30 seconds later. I have this thing in my mouth and I'm chewing it, but I'm not allowed to swallow it. You cannot imagine the anxiety that accompanies this process. My mouth and throat are trying to make me swallow, but my brain keeps telling me not to swallow it or I'll choke and die. I start feeling all sweaty and hot.

Consequently, I gag. Repeatedly. Violently. Eye wateringly violent. It's awful. There is no solution to this problem. I avoid gum like arsenic.

Example 3: potato salad. Similar to soup, but even more confusing. You have crunchy stuff (celery), chewyish stuff (potatoes), and hardboiled eggs (squishy stuff). It all needs to be chewed, but to greater and lesser degrees. It isn't one texture or even two textures, but THREE. It's absolutely impossible.

(Not only is it different textures, but the different things are all different SIZES. WTH??? Who's sadistic idea was this?)

My brain cannot even deal with the complexity of the chewing process for potato salad. I end up swallowing large chunks of potato whole or inadvertently getting egg up my sinuses. (Don't ask, I don't know).

Thankfully, nature has given me a convenient way out of this embarrassing situation. Most potato salads are made with mayonnaise, which 99.9% of the time has soy in it, to which I am deathly allergic. It provides a convenient excuse that doesn't refer to my strange, apoplectic aversion to varied textures. I can get away with a semblance of normalcy with strangers this way.

You guys know the truth now. The ugly horrible truth of how I over-analyze my food. I have a problem. I have learned to live with it... but it isn't pretty.

The Problems of "God Bless"

Recently I have been mulling over the Catholic/Christian tradition of signing off letters, birthday messages, phone conversations, emails, etc. with "God bless." It seems to me that while it's a good thing in itself, it's something that can lead to some problems.

The first, and least serious, of these problems is that it is yet another thing you have to say or write as you say goodbye, dragging out the process. There's "I miss you," "I love you," "Thanks!," "See you soon," and "God bless." What order do you put these in? Does each get a separate line? Which do you put as sentences in a concluding paragraph and which do you use as a sign-off? Maybe this one falls easily into the category of me over-thinking things, but this is how I see it: more words, more things to interpret, more possibility for confusion.

Another, more serious problem, is that it can easily turn into something about which you are scrupulous. I cannot tell you the number of times that I have written a letter, email, etc., left off the "God bless," and then gone back and added it because I felt like the person would judge me for not putting it there. Or worse, that God would judge me for not putting it there. I was afraid that the person would think I was losing my faith or was a "bad Catholic" for not putting that phrase there. Once it becomes this object of such worrying, I would argue that it has lost quite a bit of its value. It is supposed to be a gesture of goodwill, but it can become a way to give yourself Catholic-points. It became a measure of your "good Catholic-ness."

This leads into the final, and most serious problem: wherein "God bless" becomes an empty phrase. It's like saying "I love you"... if you use it all the time people start to think you don't really mean it. While some people may sincerely love everyone (like me... I really do love everybody), some people use it as a filler. Think about it: every time you write or say "God bless" are you using it as the convenient Christian sign-off or are you really intentionally wishing God's blessings upon them?

I am not writing this as a judgment on any of you who use "God bless" all the time. I have no doubt that some of you are sincere, intentional, and non-scrupulous about it. But just like all good things, it can be abused. And I, for one, need to be careful not to abuse it.

Apple Is Wonderful

Ok, I'm probably going to jinx myself and my software forever by posting this before I install it, but here goes anyway. I'm Catholic. I'm not superstitious. *finds wood to knock on*

I'm back. And for those of you who are wondering, I did just knock on real wood. Where was I? Oh, yeah. Apple.

So I bought a new computer ($$$) for my birthday and bought new MS Office software to go with it (so I can write my book about my life. it'll be hilarious, y'all). When I finally opened and tried to install my software, I discovered that Microsoft is a group of lying, deceiving... er.... I don't know how young my youngest reader is so I'm gonna go with BAD GUYS. My 25 character keycode was misprinted so the first character was cut off. That's right. No 25th character. No software install possible.

I called Apple this morning and told them of my dilemma. The first young man I spoke with told me that I needed to talk to Microsoft directly. (BAD DAVE. I don't like you!)

I spent over an hour on the phone with those... bad guys... during which I was put on hold, not once, not twice, but SIX TIMES. When they transferred my call to the refund department, it dropped the call. Thankfully the bad man was kind enough to give me the number before he transferred me to the other department "just in case" something happened to the call. THAT DUDE DISCONNECTED ME ON PURPOSE. I called the other department, waited on hold for 15 minutes, and then was told that I had to mail the defective product plus a letter with detailed contact info so they could send me a check in 6 weeks to refund me. Six weeks MINIMUM.

This was all just ridiculous. My mother thought so, too, so she called Apple and gave them a piece of her mind. We bought the software from the online Apple store, shouldn't we be able to just exchange it there??? And yes, yes, we could. The people at the customer service center didn't think so, but the WONDERFUL people at the actual physical store location were scared of my mama took pity on me and let me bring it in and let me exchange the defective piece of... not-goodness... for a hopefully functioning piece of goodness. THANK YOU, APPLE.

Y'all... wish me luck as I go try to install this thing. Praying for no explosions and hoping for a successful install (so I can finally write a hilarious book about my hilarious life!... y'all would buy that, right?).

Dude, you're cute...

... but not cute enough to make up for your other deficiencies.

You guys hooked? Good. Keep reading to hear the entirety.

The Story of the Cute Guy in Mass Today

As I was praying before Mass, I noticed that behind me to my right was a well-dressed young man. A few surreptitious glances through my conveniently drifting eye and I discerned that he was reasonably cute, although shorter than what is preferable. Said to self, "Ok, Bridget. He's cute. Don't do anything embarrassing during Mass. Maybe you'll run into him after Mass and be able to strike up a conversation with him. Yes, this could be good. Don't ruin it by doing something dumb/embarrassing/potentially life threatening."

If I wasn't already sold on this dude, I became sold when he opened his mouth to join in the opening hymn and the most beautiful sound started coming out. Not a pop star voice, not an overly-vibrato'd voice that is just trying too hard, but a beautiful, incredible, wonderful baritone voice that you could listen to all day. Or, at least, I could listen to all day. It was wonderful. I wanted to marry him.

That was the high point in our relationship. After that, things started to go downhill. First, he laughed at the first reading. I don't know what about it he found funny, but apparently he thought it was funny because he got all giggly.

Second, the Gospel made him emit some noise that sounded like crying. Yes, crying. Weird.

Third, at every song announcement, he would make some under-his-breath-but-not-quiet-enough-for-me-not-to-hear comment about the song choice. "Ooooh, interesting choice."; "I don't like this one."; "I've never heard of this one."; "YES, I like this one!"

Fourth, HE KEPT STARING AT ME. Incessantly. Ok, ok, I know you're wondering how I know that since he was behind me. First, he wasn't directly behind me. As aforementioned, he was behind me to my right, so he was well within "corner of my eye" range. Second, I had to get up for both collections and he watched me walk back and forth. It wasn't even subtle. IT WAS LIKE HE WAS TRYING TO TRAP ME WITH HIS EYEBALLS AND KEEP ME THERE FOREVER. Ok, that's probably an exaggeration, but it was weird. Third, and most importantly, girls know when a guy is staring. It's just in the programming. Sorry, dudes. Even subtle staring is usually detectable.

Fifth, he bequeathed the sign of peace upon people like he was some celebrity doing you a great honor. He was very... smiley. And enthusiastic. Me no likey. If we must have the sign of peace, keep it short and non-obtrusive. Preferably, it doesn't involve touching people. None of this intense eye-contact, longer-than-necessary handshake business.

Sixth, he likes "Canticle of the Sun." No, please&thankyou.

At the end of Mass, as I was kneeling to pray, he tapped me on the shoulder and told me, "Keep singing. You have a very nice voice." (The compliment was sweet. Thanks, dude.) Then he walked away, looking pleased as punch with himself. Or me. Or the world. It's really hard to tell exactly what he found so pleasing since this isn't fiction and I couldn't actually ask him what he was pleased with, but he just kept staring and smiling at me as he walked away.

I don't want to marry him anymore.