Wednesday, March 17, 2010
St. Patrick's Day
The televised parade in New York is not very interesting. It's a see & be seen event - politicians, firefighters, cops, Catholic high schools, clubs, pipe bands, Irish dancing schools. Let's face it, culturally it's not half so entertaining to watch as the Puerto Rican Day Parade, which has much better music & generally more attractive participants. Irish-American culture has always been handicapped by Jansenism, a puritanical 17th Century French theological movement that was declared heretical, but not before hundreds of Irish priests had been trained in France & sent home to destroy what was left of the old Celtic Church - the one that created the Book of Kells & had already been suppressed by Rome in a power grab for wealthy, independent Irish monasteries.
Thus Jansenism came to America & the Irish built & controlled - & still largely run - the American branch of the Catholic Church. When I was a kid, it was clear to me that predominantly Italian-Catholic parishes were more fun, even with their darker religious aspects. I didn't understand why.
In America, this Jansenist undercurrent manifests itself in a curmudgeonly conservative personality. There's William Donahue of the Catholic League, & of course, Bill O'Reilly. A local example is Paul Mulshine, longtime Star-Ledger columnist, who futilely attempts to mask his Jansenist Catholicism with an interest in surfing, taste for micro-brew beers, & love for Jimmy Buffett, but has written so many angry, off-the-wall crank columns on topics ranging from Bruce Springsteen to global warming that hardly anyone takes him seriously when he marshals his facts & makes a halfway reasonable argument for some conservative reform at the state or local level. His crank columns are his most entertaining. One reason I like Paul is that I feel genuinely sorry for his inability to express empathy in disposable prose.
Jansenism is fading away in American Catholicism. except in the clerical class, perhaps one reason the upper levels of the Institutional Church are so out-of-touch with laity. It's easier to decry "cafeteria Catholics" than to change.
A few years ago, I nearly fell in love with a woman from a large working class, Irish-American family (she would have been my second from that background). She was an intriging mix of contradictions, comfortably unaware of most of them - which is to say she rarely acknowledged their existence. I was too much trouble for any woman. But it was difficult for me to accept that she was contented in her discontent; the angry white underclass conservatism (similar to the current Tea Partiers), a dour Catholic rigidity applied selectively, hardly ever to herself. She did what she wanted & found a rationale. She was very entertaining, had many personal strengths I appreciated, but almost no intellectual curiosity. You could send her on a trip to Bali & she'd return with no more to say about it than that it had pretty scenery & she enjoyed herself. She would never admit pleasure. I wanted to get her on boardwalk in August. But it sputtered out before July 4th.
Thus Jansenism came to America & the Irish built & controlled - & still largely run - the American branch of the Catholic Church. When I was a kid, it was clear to me that predominantly Italian-Catholic parishes were more fun, even with their darker religious aspects. I didn't understand why.
In America, this Jansenist undercurrent manifests itself in a curmudgeonly conservative personality. There's William Donahue of the Catholic League, & of course, Bill O'Reilly. A local example is Paul Mulshine, longtime Star-Ledger columnist, who futilely attempts to mask his Jansenist Catholicism with an interest in surfing, taste for micro-brew beers, & love for Jimmy Buffett, but has written so many angry, off-the-wall crank columns on topics ranging from Bruce Springsteen to global warming that hardly anyone takes him seriously when he marshals his facts & makes a halfway reasonable argument for some conservative reform at the state or local level. His crank columns are his most entertaining. One reason I like Paul is that I feel genuinely sorry for his inability to express empathy in disposable prose.
Jansenism is fading away in American Catholicism. except in the clerical class, perhaps one reason the upper levels of the Institutional Church are so out-of-touch with laity. It's easier to decry "cafeteria Catholics" than to change.
A few years ago, I nearly fell in love with a woman from a large working class, Irish-American family (she would have been my second from that background). She was an intriging mix of contradictions, comfortably unaware of most of them - which is to say she rarely acknowledged their existence. I was too much trouble for any woman. But it was difficult for me to accept that she was contented in her discontent; the angry white underclass conservatism (similar to the current Tea Partiers), a dour Catholic rigidity applied selectively, hardly ever to herself. She did what she wanted & found a rationale. She was very entertaining, had many personal strengths I appreciated, but almost no intellectual curiosity. You could send her on a trip to Bali & she'd return with no more to say about it than that it had pretty scenery & she enjoyed herself. She would never admit pleasure. I wanted to get her on boardwalk in August. But it sputtered out before July 4th.
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"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be." Thomas Jefferson
Being part Irish, and raised as a Catholic, including early stints at a Catholic boarding school, (so when my mom was too drunk to pick my sister and I up, she'd simply call the school and voila, we were told we were spending the night, no one was coming to pick us up), which at the time was an all girls school, and later at a co-ed Catholic school, I know all to well the dogma. But for me, I was actually deeply religious, and I totally loved the drama of church and the various high holy days. The smell of incense during Lent, when we'd actually walk from the school to the church every day to attend mass, I thought was cool. But, as I grew older (about 10) I stopped wanting to go to mass, and convinced my family that my sister and I would rather attend the 10:00 a.m mass instead of the 8:00 a.m. my grandparents always went to on Sundays. The irony though, was that despite the fact my sister and I spent our ten cents for the collection basket on comic books, and hung out at the local bathroom at the liquor store to read them (so as not to be seen by anyone that could report back to the family we didn't go to mass), I'd actually check on Friday what the priest's sermon would be about, and then I'd read whatever epistle from the Bible he was going to talk about, and when I was questioned at home about the sermon, I could answer relatively truthfully, at least convincingly enough that my family never doubted I went to mass!
Of course, I became a Baha'i when I turned 16, although I had been studying it since I was 12 -- not to mention I was kicked out of Catholic school half way through my sixth grade year. The priests and nuns got tired of me questioning the religion and the teachings, and so asked my mother to remove me. My sister stayed at Catholic school until she had to drop out when she was 16 because she was preggers. I eventually, as a Baha'i, went back to Catholic (all girls) school as a senior. I had the most fun then, in part because I really shouldn't have needed to take the 12th grade, as I only had a few subjects required to graduate, and spent a lot of time in "study hall."
It's funny, though, I never saw or noticed or heard through rumor about the molesting priests (probably because I spent most of my time in all girls schools), and even then, I never saw any overt lesbianism either. As a senior, most of the girls in my 100 or so graduating class, had boyfriends, and given that I graduated in 1970, being out as a lesbian would have been noticed, which I didn't see or observe.
My grandfather was a Nights of Columbus member, and I learned he was a Republican when he voted not based on his religion for Kennedy, but on his political beliefs for Nixon. I, of course, by that time, was already a bleeding heart liberal!!!
Of course, I became a Baha'i when I turned 16, although I had been studying it since I was 12 -- not to mention I was kicked out of Catholic school half way through my sixth grade year. The priests and nuns got tired of me questioning the religion and the teachings, and so asked my mother to remove me. My sister stayed at Catholic school until she had to drop out when she was 16 because she was preggers. I eventually, as a Baha'i, went back to Catholic (all girls) school as a senior. I had the most fun then, in part because I really shouldn't have needed to take the 12th grade, as I only had a few subjects required to graduate, and spent a lot of time in "study hall."
It's funny, though, I never saw or noticed or heard through rumor about the molesting priests (probably because I spent most of my time in all girls schools), and even then, I never saw any overt lesbianism either. As a senior, most of the girls in my 100 or so graduating class, had boyfriends, and given that I graduated in 1970, being out as a lesbian would have been noticed, which I didn't see or observe.
My grandfather was a Nights of Columbus member, and I learned he was a Republican when he voted not based on his religion for Kennedy, but on his political beliefs for Nixon. I, of course, by that time, was already a bleeding heart liberal!!!
I never heard anything about pedophilia priests, or any kind of molestation, although I encountered a Sunday school teacher who inappropriately touched boys. He wanted to wrestle. But I could tell the man was weird, & kept my distance. Wrestling was a big high school sport in my town, you joined the program in 7th grade, you didn't wrestle adults.
There were no later sexual scandals attached to any of the Catholic Churches or schools my friends attended, so I guess they got lucky. Tales of sadistic nuns were not unusual, but difficult to verify. Some of those kids were wildcats.
There were no later sexual scandals attached to any of the Catholic Churches or schools my friends attended, so I guess they got lucky. Tales of sadistic nuns were not unusual, but difficult to verify. Some of those kids were wildcats.
I haven't read Paul Mulshine or the Star-Ledger in years, though I can still remember Mulshine's prim contempt for liberals, moderate Republicans, and neoconservatives. He used to delight in imagining himself to be a resident of the Tiny Island of True Conservatives, along with William Buckley, Ron Paul, and Steve Lonegan. I can only imagine his dismay at having been joined on his Tiny Island by hordes of Tea Partying Medicare enrollees holding "Gov't Keep Out of My Healthcare" signs and wearing Sarah Palin for Pres buttons. Whenever Mulshine sensed flagging reader interest in his column, he'd always whip out one of his anti-Springsteen screeds.
# posted by 
: 12:19 PM
: 12:19 PM
Paul really overestimates his influence. But just googling his name shows where all those years toiling at the Ledger have gotten him. He thinks we're impressed that Phyllis Schlafly takes his phone calls. One of his musician pals earns a living in a popular Springsteen cover band; Paul finds no irony in that.
The description of your girlfriend, every bit of it, is my husband too! Thank you. I experienced quite a shock of recognition. You do have a way with words!
# posted by : 8:18 PM
: 8:18 PM
I worked in the St. Agnes rectory in Clark during my teenage years. I always joke that I was abused by the Pastor...not sexually, though. He was just an arrogant SOB who treated us poor phone slobs as, well, poor phone slobs.
My freshman algebra teacher (a lay teacher) at St. Joseph HS in Metuchen used to call students up to his desk and then "accidentially" brush up against them. We all knew his tricks and thought that it was pretty funny to watch him make an ass of his perverted little self.
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My freshman algebra teacher (a lay teacher) at St. Joseph HS in Metuchen used to call students up to his desk and then "accidentially" brush up against them. We all knew his tricks and thought that it was pretty funny to watch him make an ass of his perverted little self.
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