Sinner?

Sins of a Catholic School Girl…

We just came off of Holy Week which in the Catholic religion is a pretty big week. To put it in Hollywood terms it’s like the Oscars of the religious holidays. It too involves a lot of praying, eating, and smiling for the camera. Growing up I went to a Catholic grade school and Holy Week felt like the longest week of the year. We couldn’t wait to get to Sunday when, yes, Jesus rises and saves us, but more importantly to a child, you are rewarded with a basket of chocolates.

Holy Week always started off with us going to confession which as a child seems a bit ridiculous considering we are kids who hopefully haven’t committed any serious crimes yet. Even the Menendez Brothers hadn’t done anything too bad when they were 6. I dreaded confession for a number of reasons. First you have to go into one side of a little box with a screen separating you and the priest. The screen is to give the illusion that the priest doesn’t know who is in there, but we both knew that didn’t work. I mean we saw which priest went into the confessional and he saw the crowd of kids in the pews. Pretty sure he could guess who was who the minute they opened their mouth.

Then you had to come up with a sin to confess. My go to “sin” was that I lied which at that moment wasn’t a lie because I was lying about lying just to say something. There was always the standard “I pulled my sister’s hair” or “I disobeyed my parents”. I mean what else was there to say? Then the priest would tell me to say a few Hail Mary’s and an Our Father and not do that again. That was the easy part. Of course there was always those kids that would hit you right before they went into the confessional so they could do their time in the booth and be forgiven for the day.

Next came the Stations of the Cross on Good Friday. The Stations translates into the longest mass in history (aside from the rosary masses). There are 12 stations with pictures depicting Jesus’ steps to crucifixion and resurrection. While as an adult this is a moving part of Good Friday to a kid this is excruciating. There is a lot of incense, a lot of prayers, and a lot of turning around in place to see every picture as the priest stands in front of it. And you the work out you get from kneeling and standing up is tougher than a football workout. We went down on our knees more times than Heidi Fleiss on a busy week.

There was a slight rest on Saturday (at least for us). That was prep day for the big event. We colored Easter eggs and were told what our attire would be for Sunday. It was usually some scratchy dress with tights that we would pull at all during mass. I couldn’t wait to rip off those tights after church and dig into my Easter basket of treats. Of course none of that could happen until we had our pictures taken to commemorate the end of another Holy Week. Looking back at these photos, the adults are always smiling and the kids are usually frowning. I’m sure we were just yelled out for either our behavior in church or the fact we just ran from them so we could start eating the candy from the bunny.

Just like this red wine has a finish that is long, lingering, and memorable so were all those Holy Weeks as a child. They may have been long, but the memories of the laughter, tears, and time with family still linger.

Until Next Time….Salute