Introibo ad Altare Dei: A Catholic Perspective pre-V II

The Angelus - November 1982



"I believe some people were meant to be Catholics, that God calls them to Catholicism," our priest said recently. His remark invokes the premise that our steps are not entirely random, our actions not entirely self-determined, and that God's guidance is not only always there, but extends to pathways we may not even know we are going to travel. This seems especially appropriate to my experience, for Catholicism's insistent, not-to-be denied beckoning held me on a course which I now see was as direct and true a trajectory as any that ever landed man on the moon. From earliest memory, Catholicism radiated magic and mystery, beauty and soul-stirring inexplicable emotion, appealing to me to learn more about it, promising something I had no words for but which I wanted as part of my life. I respected Catholicism as a religious entity, admired its forms of worship, and totally agreed with its logic. All my instincts were Catholic.

Odd thoughts... coming from a Protestant!

For Protestant I was, firmly ensconced in a Protestant cocoon, beginning in the deep east Texas town where I was born. Later, my Protestant affiliation was provided the first Sunday morning after we moved to the small community where I was raised. My father led me by my eight-year-old hand to the nearest church (Methodist), introduced me, and left me there. A residential block held the community's churches, one on each corner: Methodist, Presbyterian, Baptist and Catholic. The Protestants were assertive, the Catholics (though a sizable number) were not. Evangelizing by the Protestants flourished, while proselytizing was not an obvious parish activity. Although variations in scripture interpretation, circumstances of origin—even degrees of social propriety—were matters of irreconcilable differences between the Protestants, on one subject they were unanimous: they saw themselves and all of the other myriad Protestant denominations as products of religious enlightenment. Catholicism, on the other hand, was dismissed as a melange of symbolism, graven images, ornate—and totally meaningless—regalia, and incomprehensible ritual, served up to its adherents in a language no one understood except possibly the priest. The Protestants enjoyed high visibility, while the distinction accorded to St. Theresa's was quite often only "that church on the other corner."

How then did such an incongruous element as Catholicism find a place of identity and influence in my world? By all criteria it should have had neither, but it did. It could be explained that my awareness came from encountering it in literature (I was always reading), but how to account for its emotional pull? It was a siren song which gave everything that went on at St. Theresa's an irresistible attraction. From early adolescence, I watched the activities there as compulsively as if I did surveillance work for a living. The times I directed my evening walk past the church coincided remarkably with their services. Secluded behind a crepe myrtle across the street, I would watch with a yearning too undefined to be articulated the stunning ritual of Benediction, marvelling at the melodic rise and fall of murmured prayers which, despite my ignorance of their content, still were recognizable as going straight to God. The lure of the stars for an astronomer was no more compelling than the enthrallment I felt, but where did it all leave me? None of my family were Catholic, none of my neighbors, few of my friends; those who were, met my curiosity with a certain wariness, as though fearing some sort of Protestant entrapment. And in Protestant company, I quickly learned to keep my interest to myself, for any suggestion, however deferential, that Catholicism might have some merit was met with reactions varying from gentle reproof to near outrage. This puzzled me. Granted that the emotional tug I felt might not be shared, how could anyone deny that Catholicism was the unbroken continuation of Christianity's origin? How could any ignore Catholicism's contributions? It was everywhere—music, art, literature—a multitude of man's finest achievements were companioned by the Church. How could anyone not respond to its impact? Those in my world could, and easily, including my mother—and this was the most frustrating facet of all. Although not a Catholic, she had received most of her education as a day pupil in a convent school, but she had responded not at all to the religion which was the very fabric of her school environment. To my curiosity and questions about Catholicism, she invariably said, "It's too hard to understand," and her reply had a two-fold application: what she had dismissed from her life had no place in mine either!

Nevertheless, I gradually developed a knowledge of Catholicism, accepting all I learned, finding nowhere any justification for the dire warnings I had heard all my life about Catholicism's evils. For me, opinion without logic was whimsy, and the more informed I became, the more the incompatibilities between my views and those held by Protestantism emerged. I was an exasperation to my Sunday School teachers with my inquiries. Why didn't we have crucifixes? And saints? And altars? Why didn't we kneel to pray? If we believed in the forgiveness of sins, why not in the confession of them? If the Catholic Church had no significance, why was it named as a Protestant article of belief in the Apostles' Creed?

The one-dimensional answers I received tended to raise more questions than they resolved. But even though by now I was approaching adulthood, acquiescing to authority figures was part of my upbringing so I usually subsided—for the moment. One little debate was more explosive than the others: why, I asked, did we not revere Mary? Because I was told, she deserved no special reverence, being "just another woman." (Decades later I can still feel my absolute rejection of that attitude!) Just another woman? The Mother of God, chosen by Him before all time to bear His Son? Since God had so honored her, how could we elect to do otherwise? At this point in my protest, my teacher observed that if I felt that way, perhaps I would be more at home in the church next door. For once, my obsequiousness deserted me and I replied, "You may be right." After that my attendance deteriorated perceptively.

Periodically, the church next door featured a week of evening services called a "mission," conducted by a guest priest. During this time Protestants could visit St. Theresa's (and a few did) without being suspected of harboring secret papist leanings, as going to Mass would have been interpreted. It represented no involvement, a token gesture of religious tolerance, to be gotten out of the way and then back to one's own Protestant fold. My motivation, as might be suspected, was different. I delighted to have this opportunity to immerse myself in an environment not ordinarily accessible to me. There I could be found, to all appearances another visiting Methodist, but marching to a cadence never produced by a Protestant drummer.

I went to work and the widening of my horizon brought more Catholic contact. I inveigled an invitation from a co-worker to attend Mass with her and had my first exposure to this most perfect form of worship. What an experience! How could anyone settle for less?

My hesitant participation received an overwhelming boost with the return to our office from army duty of a man I shall always esteem. Devout and knowledgeable, he provided the bridge from my collection of assorted experiences to an insight into practising Catholicism. We talked and talked: opera and Catholicism, sports and Catholicism, our jobs and Catholicism—especially Catholicism. He probably guessed where it was all going to end before I did. Then one day it was there, as though between one eye blink and the next; the objectivity with which I granted that Catholicism was the true Faith had evolved into a personal conviction. It had become, quite simply, the only Faith which had any meaning for me.

Between this private acknowledgement and making it part of my everyday world, however, there loomed a truly awesome hurdle. Most of my ties were with the Protestant community and although it was some time since I had attended their church, I knew I was still counted a Methodist. My "Visits" to Mass, Rosary, and Benediction were known about (and deplored) but could be regarded as merely a misguided diversion, a lapse from approved values which could be erased by my re-dedication. I quailed from openly admitting my new allegiance, being thoroughly knowledgeable of the many forms that small-town discrimination could take. In my world there were only two acceptable reasons for being a Catholic—regrettable, but acceptable: an accident of birth which had not been corrected by subsequent enlightenment, and converting when marrying a Catholic (what we do for love!). Any other entry into Catholicism was unthinkable.

Until this point, I had generated little controversy or criticism. Along with the virtues of respect and obedience, I had been taught to be agreeable, even conciliatory if the situation called for it. Sometimes, to avoid dissension, I had remained silent even when I knew my silence would imply an attitude I did not hold. But now, with Catholicism's appeal filling my consciousness, I grew impatient with deception. It was distasteful to sidestep confrontations about specifics of faith, harder to remain silent. But I lacked sufficient fortitude to dive in against the current, so I let myself drift into that most pointless of dilemmas—trying to please everybody and really pleasing no one, including myself.

How long this cloud of ambivalence would have lasted is unanswerable, but clouds of another sort gathered all too suddenly. In the space of a few months' time there was my father's serious illness, forced retirement and loss of our home. He and my mother moved to a little farm in north Texas and I really had no option but to rent a room and stay behind (the source of a regular paycheck exerts great influence on decisions of this sort). It was suddenly another world—one of adapting, of interweaving familiar habits with new routines to create some sort of continuity. My mother had often sighed over my adventurous nature, now it had its uses. My brother, much older than I and not on good terms with our parents, had not been around much while I was growing up. Now he came to see me and we managed a promising compatibility. Then, exactly one month to the day after my parents moved away, my brother was killed in an accident.

Hours after his death, with phone calls and arrangements made (this fell to me who had absolutely no experience to call upon, who had never even been to a funeral), I was finally alone. It was then that from all the disordered thoughts which filled my mind, one stood out. It was extraneous to the circumstances, but crystal-clear, without any possible misinterpretation. There was a place I wanted to be. I remember looking around me, as though with new eyes, seeing my world as I would never see it again. No more would I run with the fox and hunt with the hounds. A chapter was ending; another was beginning. I walked to that church on the other corner and told the priest what had always been there, waiting to be said: "I want to be a Catholic."

SO IT BEGAN, my absorption into Catholicism. I started taking instruction, and with this open avowal of my commitment—no more ambivalence, no subterfuge—came the reactions, as I had known they would, ranging from disapproval to ostracism. Friends dropped me from their Sunday outings and movie evenings, co-workers volunteered their analyses (none flattering) of why I was making such an appalling and/or incomprehensible move, the Methodist minister and his wife, who had previously shown no interest in my well-being, spiritual or otherwise, paid a visit to discuss my folly, and my seamstress refused to sew for me anymore. Perhaps the strength needed to meet life's later crises was born then; in any event, from somewhere came the armor of imperturbability which deflected each salvo as it arrived. There were no regrets, no doubts, and not the slightest thought of turning back. I was baptized on Holy Saturday, a Catholic at last.

I had expected Catholicism to be spiritually fulfilling—after all, that is what the preference of one religion over another is all about—and it was; more deeply so than I could have imagined. What I had not anticipated was the pure enjoyment of being a Catholic. I delighted in the smallest distinguishing detail—every visible characteristic of Catholicism—I wore my Ash Wednesday smudge with something just short of flaunting. The saints' medals, Rosaries, genuflecting and kneeling, prayers that were not improvised, making the sign of the cross—I loved it all! I even found satisfaction in the regimentation, the restrictions. The meatless days, the fast days, the holy days of obligation, the deprivations of Lent—all were part of the simple concept that self-denial is no small part of piety, and that to reach heaven, one must do more than declare it exists. I learned that there was more dimension to being a Catholic than just joining the Catholic Church.

Parish activities found me a willing participant: keeping books, Altar Society and CYO work, adult study, making rosaries, restoring statues, doing art work, and singing in the choir (a testimonial to the indestructibility of liturgical music in that it could transcend my tree-frog piping).

When I married and moved to Houston, it meant leaving St. Theresa's and relocating in another parish. But here again the constancy and steadfastness of Catholicism shone through, its precepts and ritual unaffected by setting or geographic location. Soon I was again busy in parish activities, my little aura of happiness undisturbed. At the heart and core of it all was the Mass; beautifully repetitive, the unchanging jewel in Catholicism's crown. At St. Pius and later in our new parish, St. Augustine's, the words I have loved since first hearing them, continued to ring true: "Lord, I have loved the beauty of Thy House, and the place where Thy Glory dwelleth."

How unbelievable—unthinkable—that the time would come when I could no longer bear to attend Mass, when I would turn my back on the Church I had wanted so badly to call my own. That is not strictly accurate—the Church turned its back on me and millions of other Catholics—in the terrible action which has come to be known simply as Vatican II.

What happened to me happened to many, differing only in the name of the parish and the specifics of abuse brought about in the name of ecumenism—with the common result—alienation.

What a familiar story! Catholicism as we knew it, loved it, revered it, taken away bit by eroded bit, until there remained something we could not tolerate, something from which we turned away, bereft, mourning the loss and baffled as to how it could have happened. How many variations of the same story, but alike in reaction. The effort to accept a vernacular instead of Latin, dismayed but willing to try; then the steady disappearance of the appurtenances so special to our Church—the statues, the Stations, the paintings, the candles. Sin went out of style and all too many priests were blandly tolerant of infractions, so it became easier to miss Mass and avoid confession altogether. Another blink of the eye and the vestments were gone, the crucifixes not far behind. More alienation. Sundays became days of leisure, uninterrupted by Mass obligation. And when a slumbering Catholic conscience occasionally surfaced and prodded its owner back to church, what surprises were waiting! Altars gone, tabernacles inconspicuous or invisible, and lay people scampering about in roles splintered off that once inviolate entity known as priest.

And towering above it all, the awesome desecration of the Mass.

That is not to say that all Catholics reacted the same. As in Our Lord's parable of the seed fallen on stony ground or crowded out by weeds, there were always those of shallow purpose; Vatican II simply provided a vehicle. In their willingness—and eagerness—to embrace a counterfeit Catholicism with a comfortable regimen and permissiveness of expression and participation, they gladly traded religiosity for frivolity. But I was among those for whom there was no more Catholicism. About the time the Mass was well into becoming unrecognizable and the altars had left, so did I, thereby being spared the continuing procession of tasteless and irreverent innovations. My single venture back into this twilight world some years later was to attend a funeral, where the form of Catholicism I encountered so devastated me that I declared I would never be back.

Total alienation. Years and years of it.

From my spiritual limbo I watched the incredible happen: life-long Catholics investigating other faiths, joining them, apparently considering their actions as little different from staying with that euphemism for Protestantism, the Novus Ordo. The phenomenon brushed my life also. It took the form of the LDS Church, which had had a sort of peripheral role in my life for many years, dating back to time spent in Utah (where I found, surprisingly, that Catholicism's identity was very strong). My Mormon friends courteously accepted my religious commitment, as I did theirs. This mutual deference, however, did not keep us from spending many hours happily challenging each others' beliefs; never becoming abrasive at impasse points, and retiring from our jousts with no noticeable crossover accomplished by either side. When I married and had a home, I was able to return some of the hospitality I had enjoyed, and the pleasurable associations continued. Some of my fellow workers in community theatre were Mormons. They were also involved in drama workshop in their stake (roughly equivalent to a parish), and I worked with them on their productions along with speaking at their directing/play writing seminars. It was a very short step to attending their services.

This was midway through the 1970's and Catholic activities had long since been phased out of my life.

The arguments I had used years ago to support my Catholic logic had been effectively defused by the ruinous actions of Vatican II. How could a Catholic refute the Mormon premise of a new direction when the descendants of Vatican II were obsessively eliminating every trace of continuity of Catholic practice and belief? If a choice must be made between new beginnings, it seemed reasonable that one was probably as good as another. I liked the LDS atmosphere, the high standards and dedication, and I was compatible with the Mormon character. Persuasion was strong and some of it came from surprising sources. It is a measure of my despair that I sometimes thought, "why not?"

The trouble was, I knew why not. I was a Catholic and would be till I died. The Church had left me but I could never leave the Church—the Church that once was. So I remained in limbo, regretting that I could not make use of the means to lessen my emptiness, but accepting the unyielding ties of my Catholic commitment. Perhaps this had been a crossroads for me—we seldom recognize them as such when they occur, realizing only in retrospect at what point our lives make their turnings. Perhaps I had been tested; if so, then perhaps what happened next was my reward for "keeping the Faith." Or perhaps Catholicism's call simply includes a fail-safe feature that is activated when defection threatens! For whatever cause, my season of discontent ended not long afterwards. A friend said: "Do you know there is a traditional Catholic Church in Dickinson?" and with her words, the door thought to be forever closed began to open.

We found what we had not known existed, the Society of St. Pius X and its followers, clergy and laity alike committed to the perpetuation of the only uncompromising expression of the True Faith to survive the maelstrom of Vatican II, traditional Catholicism. Here was the miracle of the lost being restored. And we, who had mourned, as did Martha and Mary for a Lazarus lost, now could experience their joy of a Lazarus returned. We had been given back our Catholicism with its glory intact!

OVER TEN YEARS OF ALIENATION was ended, appropriately enough as of Easter, 1977, at Queen of Angels. We knelt on the hard floor of the parish hall and once more thrilled to the beauty, the soul-satisfying sight and sound of the old ways—the vestments, the incense, the altar and the Tridentine Mass. Once more I could "go in unto the Altar of God, to God who giveth joy to my youth," and was able to say, "I have loved the beauty of Thy House, and the place where Thy Glory dwelleth."

In succeeding weeks we saw the mission-style church building restored to a splendor it had never before had. The golden light, the candles flickering their steadfast testimony that there are those who still believe in prayers offered, prayers answered and saints remembered; statues and paintings of poignant artistry and the gleam of gold never more rightly placed, mute evidence of a belief that in furnishing a temple of God's glory, more is better than less; and dominating it all, the altar with its tabernacle, the glorious proclamation that here there will be no compromise in the Sacrifice of the Mass. We saw the wonderful vestments, stiff of fabric and embroidery. We confessed in the dark cubicle before God and priest, hearing, as in the sermons, that sin still exists and so does retribution...and reparation. And we took Communion, kneeling in His Presence, treasuring an unviolated sacrament.

The benevolence radiating from Queen of Angels continues, filling my awareness when I am there, glowing in my recollection when I am away. Its beauty is the tangible, visible image of Catholicism, a perfect love that never wanes, reaching out as surely today as it did in the beginning, fully delivering the joy that awaits those who go in unto the altar of God.

But there are those who do not know this joy. Among the ones set adrift by the Church that disappeared are those with instincts blunted by habit, who cannot find in the new ways any of the fulfillment offered by the old, but who blindly persevere with all the logic of lemmings. Bewildered by the outrages of Modernism, they recall the way it was but passively accept the way it is. They defend their compromises by saying they "don't want to be disobedient"; they avoid acknowledging a total disenchantment by resolutely telling themselves that "some of the changes aren't important"; and when occasionally finding a parish where the abuses are not quite so blatant, they are soothed by the delusion that "things really are not all that different." They try to coax their Catholic consciences into approval of ecumenism's sorry product, but at best achieve only a dissatisfied detente.

It is hard to believe that any of these Catholics do not know where the truth lies, regardless of the comforting rationale employed. I ache for them, remembering how it was to be on the outside looking in, remembering what it was like to want what I did not have, and later to yearn for what had been taken away.

Perhaps God is again, or still, calling us to Catholicism—to the traditional cause—giving a special grace which helps us follow, without dissembling or hesitancy, a course dedicated to saving the shining diamond that is our Church from crumbling into sand. It is a call we answer with gladness, for, as Archbishop Lefebvre said with such beautiful simplicity, "We are Catholic."