My own baptism was fairly lackluster, no prolonged dunks in a river for me. At least I remember it, vaguely. A Catholic baptism, on Easter, at the tender age of seven. Far more aware of the proceedings than an infant would be undergoing the same, I nevertheless was oblivious to the full meaning of the ritual. It was more of an item on a sort of spiritual checklist, along with First Confession, First Communion, on down to Confirmation (which I never made it to). While Mass was often a bore as a kid, I remembered being excited for the baptism, but probably moreso for the Easter egg hunt that was following the ceremony than the actual ceremony itself. Still, I generally enjoyed the spectacle of ritual and I still do to an extent, sans the innocence of my childhood gullibility.
Despite the fact that neither of my parents were Catholic, I was a de facto Catholic until about age 12 due to their enrolling me in a Catholic elementary/middle school - "St. Mary's Academy" in The Dalles, Oregon. Of course, according to the Church I'm still a Catholic, I think you have to be excommunicated to be taken off the rosters after being baptized. Makes you wonder about the validity of membership numbers issued from the Vatican. Anyways, as a small-town, poor private school, St. Mary's by that time was far different than the stereotypes most people associate with Catholic education. We wore no uniforms, although I remember the issue being continually brought up and debated amongst parents and teachers. Only my fourth grade teacher was a nun, and she had retired from the convent to live with her cats in a trailer park double-wide by that point. Every now and then murmurs of what amounted to corporal punishment circulated, but save for a few exceptions the discipline was only a little more strict than the area public schools. No rapping of knuckles with rulers. The priests of the neighboring church had an active role in the school's operation, but were resigned more to guest lectures, heading the youth group, and teaching religion classes, while a female layperson ran the actual day-to-day administration as principal.
Mrs. Richie, the principal, was often genial, especially when parents were around, but also fully capable of transforming into a frigid, disciplinarian prone to outbursts. I remember one of the "older kids" being violently berated (verbally) and suspended for bringing a small statue of Buddha to school. She equated the action to a full declaration of paganism, flirting dangerously close to - gasp! - Satanism. The woman could have benefited exponentially from even the most cursory reading of Buddha's teachings.
After sixth grade, my family moved from The Dalles to Scottsdale, Arizona. Total culture shock ensued. I went from being in a class of 19, in semi-rural Oregon, to a class of 450, in the metropolitan sprawl of Phoenix and its suburbs. Now in public school, I increasingly became what equates to a lapsed Catholic, identifying simply as a Christian, one who still harbored some Catholic tendencies. By the time we moved to Spokane, Washington, halfway through my sophomore year of high school, I had become a lot more skeptical of organized religion. Regardless, I still cherished my years at St. Mary's, where everyone knew one another and were generally good friends - it greatly contributed to the person I am today. Whereas, in Scottsdale, the onslaught of awkwardness and social hierarchy accompanying puberty was in full swing. The caustic nature inherent in most middle schools was compounded by the generally materialistic and shallow cultural atmosphere of the pseudo-Californian upscale suburb. I remember kids getting brand new BMWs for their first cars and girls getting rhinoplasty or even breast augmentations while still in high school. After moving to Spokane, MTV's vomit-inducing ode to bratty, self-possesed prodigal daughters who represent the extreme in American materialism, My Super Sweet 16, shot an episode on a girl from my high school. Still, my experiences in Scottsdale - no matter how bitterly remembered - were also very formative in my growth as an individual.
To avoid the writing of a novel - Alex Thomas: A Memoir to Bore You - in one blog post, I'll revert to a flowchart. After all, I still have my second baptismal story to get to. To wrap it up, my religious progression, or degression depending on your point of view, goes roughly so:
Catholic -> Self-spiritual Christian -> Skeptical Christian -> Experiments with Eastern theology/philosophy and Unitarian Universalism (another story for another time) -> Naturalistic Pantheism -> Disillusioned Skeptic -> Open-minded Nontheist (still have some pantheist inclinations, but I use nontheist as an umbrella term to avoid using more specific labels, such as agnostic or atheist, that I will only end up abandoning for others)
Despite the continual growth of skepticism in my personal beliefs, my interest in the subjects of religion and theology has also grown. I think this interest in belief systems stems from a broader proclivity towards learning and examining the interconnecting stories of humanity, from animist creation myths to Judeo-Christian parables.
During my senior year of high school, a friend of mine had a spiritual revelation, supposedly on a mountaintop. How biblical. He went from being a militant atheist to being a militant evangelical, enthusiastic in the way new converts often are, eager to prove himself worthy of his newfound religion. I, on the other hand, had recently renounced all ties to my Christian faith and was on a syncretic bender of picking and choosing beliefs from world religions, particularly Buddhism. Luckily, I spared myself later embarrassment by not publicly announcing myself as a Buddhist as so many fake-baked, hip, enlightenment-seeking Westerners do today in what amounts to a "Buddhism Light" of casual, haphazardly appropriated, highly romanticized philosophy.
Attempting to rise above my base urge to tell my friend he was making a huge mistake, I decided to attend his baptism and at least feign support as he was "officially" born again. Biting my opinionated tongue, at the time framing it in the vein of "What would Buddha do?" How am I better than my constantly proselytizing, fire-and-brimstone spouting friend if I too am judgmental? After all, his atheist, alcoholic mother had recently been diagnosed with cancer, which no doubt played a major role in his newfound faith. I felt sorry for him.
Ironically, his baptism took place during Easter, just like mine. The members of his new church were very welcoming, almost too welcoming, as if they could smell I was a non-believer in need of some saving. The Easter sermon centered around the story of Thomas the Doubter. A strange feeling crept over me, as if this had been arranged, as if it was the pinnacle of my friend's constant efforts to convert "Alex Thomas the Doubter". Further troubling was the fact that an odd amount of church members seemed to be turning their heads towards me, kind smiles in full effect, and that the minister announced that he knew there were some Doubting Thomases in the congregation, asking if they would like to now declare Jesus Christ as their savior. His sermon was hardly that convincing, still I ashamedly shrunk down in my pew, trying to shake the feeling that I was being watched. After what seemed an eternity, my friend and his younger brother (whom he had successfully recruited) delivered testaments to the iniquities of their oh-so-long lives living in the dark, now erased by the "glory" of Jesus Christ. Then came the dunk tank.
Afterwards, I kept quiet about my own experience in the church for fear of seeming like some conspiracy theorist. Interestingly enough, though, my friend seemed to give up on converting me soon after. During one of our fairly civil debates, he cited the advice of Jesus to his disciples to "shake off the dust that is on [their] feet as a testimony against" anyone who does not welcome them or their teachings (Mark 6:11). He explained that he had essentially done all he could for me. His metaphoric dusting of sandals did nothing to squelch the lingering suspicion about my experience at his church, that he had attempted one last great evangelical act by telling his fellow parishioners about me, in hopes of making his friend Doubting Thomas take a drink of their kool-aid. Then again, I was a bit paranoid.
Our friendship had already dwindled quite a bit, we had both been hanging out with different crowds for awhile. After heading off to college, we were relegated to being Facebook friends, very rarely talking to each other. Once his mother's cancer went into remission, his fanatic devotion seemed to ease up. Months later, he posted "notes" that seemed to reflect a questioning of his beliefs. Eventually, his profile no longer displayed "Christian" as his religion. Finally, some very anti-Christian remarks seemed to be popping up on his page. He had completed the circle: raging atheist to raging evangelical to raging atheist yet again. A raging ricorso. While I can be overly critical at times, he seems incapable of moderating himself. No matter the doctrine, he must impose his views upon others. I still feel sorry for him.
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