Okay, I don't pretend to be anything other than God fearing, but I was raised Mormon, I was married in a Mormon church, my family is Mormon, and I was baptized Mormon, so.....technically I'm Mormon. On the other hand, I also claim to be a Democrat even though Jay tells me I lean so far towards communism he expects me to start spouting Russian at any given moment, so that helps clear up how muddy my moral/religious/political waters are.
But I digress.
We have a nephew who is about to take his First Communion. We didn't have those growing up in Mormonville. We also didn't have a LOT of things that go on in Catholicism and which I still don't quite grasp.
Oh, did I mention my husband was Catholic? Yes, our wedding was half full of Mormons and half full of Catholics. Apparently something else Catholics do is clap during services. You know that saying about "one hand clapping?" That's what our wedding looked like when we were pronounced screwed together for eternity, and half the church was reverently beaming and the other half was hootin' and hollerin'. Okay, that's an exaggeration. I married a Catholic, not a Redneck, but it was still quite the memory and coincidentally you can't have a half-Mormon wedding in a Mormon chapel anymore.
Apparently something else the C's do that we M's don't is a LOT of on your knees. (By the way, only the atheists are laughing right now; everyone else is running for fear of the lightning striking.) Days after the half in, half out, hokey pokey that was our wedding, my new husband's grandmother died. I got to attend my very first Catholic service. Did I mention my husband comes from BIG Catholics? I'm talking the religious equivalent of the Rockefellers, a family of a BAZILLION kids on all sides in a small Minnesota town that pretty much has their own church (or at the very least their own personal priest). Did I also mention my brand new husband was a pallbearer at this funeral, and I was left alone with my new in-laws and their BIG CATHOLIC FAMILY? Yes, the Queen is usually fearless, but I was absolutely shaking in my new winter boots at the thought of making it through this granddaddy of initiations all by my lonesome.
So I'm trying really hard not to stick out like the sore thumb here and hoping no one can point me out as "THAT'S the one!" I tried to listen and pay attention, but a girl can only take so much Latin and "right back at ya" rituals, so I start zoning out. And that's when I start feeling the earth shake under my feet. So panicked at the thought that God caught me (and of course He would), I look to my beloved father-in-law sitting next to me for guidance. I find HE is the one causing the earth trembling, and it's not an earthquake, it's him (and everyone else in our pew) trying to get the kneeler thingie to go down, which it's not gonna do until I take my lazy feet off of it. Yes, I thought it was a foot rest, and while I was
I'm fairly certain God has forgiven me (at the very least for the good chuckle). My new Catholic family? My fate is still undetermined, but I'm ever hopeful that redemption will someday be mine.
