Ah, to be a good catholic.....

....which I am not, and have no chance of ever being. Which made it very difficult when I called my church to book my daughter's baptism. First off I asked if they were doing baptisms in August, as the godparents are coming from Scotland that month. No, they said. Why don't you try Annunciation? So I call Annunciation, which is where my oldest chose to have her First Communion (because you only have to take 3 classes, not 5 like at Good Shepherd.) When I was asked if this was Annunciation was my parish, I said no it is actually Good Shepherd but they suggested I try you. What????, she says, they told you to try us? She seemed a bit perterbed about it, but managed to ask me the following important questions:
Q: What is the baby's name?
A: Saoirse Maeve Sullivan
Q: WHAT????? How do you say that? How do you spell it?
I tell her the proper spelling and the pronunciation and she asks my name and the father's, there is a discussion about my other two children)
Q: Are you baptized Catholic?
A: Yes
Q: And the father, he is Catholic?
A: Umm, no, he wasn't baptized but he was raised as a protestant.
Q: (Exclamation really) NO NO he is not a protestant if he wasn't baptized!!!!
A: Ummm OK.
Q: Were you married in the Catholic Church?
A: (as I am quivering on the sofa) we aren't married (yes I do have a wee bit of catholic guilt about this)
Q:(in a very disapproving tone) Is he the father of your other children?
A: No, he isn't.
Q:What is that father's name?
I wonder why she needs to know that information, but being rather frightened at that moment I choose not to question why and tell her his name
Q: Now about the godparents, what are their names?
A: Well, she will have 2 sets. The first godfather is named .....
Q: What???? (She seems slightly dismayed that his the only difference between his first and last names is the word son)
A: I know
Q: Is he Catholic?
A: Yes (this is the last question that will please this lady)
Q: What about the godmother?
A: No, I'm not sure if she was baptized and if she was it is a protestant faith.
Q: sigh. What about the other godparents?
A: I don't actually know what religion they are, but it is definitely not Catholic.
Q: Well we need to know what religion they are, because there some we don't recognize, like the Salvation Army, and if we don't recognize it or they aren't baptized they can't be godparents, only witnesses.
A: Well, I'll ask.
She then proceeded to tell the baptism class was May 25 and I should probably take it as it has been 9 years since I last did so.
Which was pretty decent of her I thought for when I had my son baptized only 8 months after my daughter, at Good Shepherd I had to take the FOUR hour class all over again.

God, this is getting long. But I haven't even gotten to the class yet. Shelley, the other godmother, came to the class with me. Right off the bat she said I don't think I can listen to this woman for 2 hours. And it was fairly traumatic. On the table there were 5 items, oil, water, a bible, a white garment and something else. Can't remember what. So she says "All five of these items are used in a baptism, but you only really need one of them. What is it?" She starts at at one end of the table (not mine thank God) Everyone says water. She gives each one a withering stare. "Are you sure she says?" Gets to Shelley who says "Water" I say "I'm pretty sure it's holy water." Lady next to me says "The Bible???" Her husband (who did at one point argue with our teacher lady about confirmation) says, full of confidence "It's water." And she says "It's water!!!" As if the whole table except for one person hadn't already said that. Needless to say, I learned that if I had been smarter I could have just called the church and said 'hey one day my baby was choking so I took a moment out of trying to save her life and baptized her with water from the kitchen sink' And no questions asked the priest would have annoited her with oil, signed a piece of paper and the baby would have been catholic without me going to the class, 2 hours of my life that I will never get back.

After attending the class I found out that my own church is now doing baptisms on the exact day the other is. Bugger, I thought, do I have to do this class over again? Alas, called the church yesterday and no, the other just has to fax over a letter saying I took the class. I now have to build up the nerve to call that one and tell them I am doing it elsewhere. Frankly, she'll probably be glad not to have me and my not-conceived-in-marriage-with-a-nice-catholic-man child.

That gets me about the Catholic church, they complain about numbers going down and yet they torture you when you want to do something that really should please them. I hate going to church because without fail, the priest will say something about gay people "Sign our petition to stop politicians from voting for the gay marriage bill! " Haha...it passed. "Never ever get divorced. Stay married even if you are miserable" Sorry, but I do not think a celibate man has the right to tell me if I should stay in a miserable marriage or not. I don't think a celibate man has a right to talk about much of anything to do with relationships actually.

A closing note on the godparents : 1 Catholic, 1 Church of Ireland, 1 baptised but not sure as what (I am going to tell the Church he is Presbyterian- his mother was Scottish so I think that is close enough) 1 not baptized at all but desperately does not want to be called a witness (I am going to commit a huge sign and lie and say that she was baptised United.) oh, the tangled webs we weave.

Baby will be baptised August 14, as long as her father doesn't swear at the priest or anything. I am not sure he will agree when we have to answer the question about promising to raise her in the Catholic faith. After all, he did attend Ian Paisley's Sunday School and let's face it, that would mess anyone up for life, even more so than being a bad catholic.