Things I'm much less certain about now
It's been 162 weeks, or thereabouts, since my last confession. In that time I've been facing the biggest challenges to my faith, and there's a long list of things I probably shouldn't have done.
Until roughly three years ago, I used to attend Mass every week. There is something sacred and mystical to be found there. For those who believe in the concept of transubstantiation, the Communion provided the closest thing possible to a physical connection with Jesus. Sometimes it felt like a very tangible connection. The Catholic faith speaks to us deeply about the human condition and of the sanctity of life, in a way no other authority does. Its Social Teaching and understanding of human rights - the Church's answer to modernism - are consistent and few predicated on the idea that the lives of every human person is sacred. These are things I still believe in.
So much had happened over the three years since the Church closed its doors. Weeks dragged into months. The world moved on. I lost touch with my old social circles. Old support networks were supplanted by new ones, as 'lockdown fatigue' became more widely felt and we sought out companionship and community where they could be found.
Things are a lot more complicated between myself and the Church, now that I'm a transgender woman in a committed relationship with my boyfriend. In the eyes of most church leaders, I am living in grave sin by transitioning and by being in a relationship with the man I love. It precludes me from being a full member of the Church or returning to any form of ministry.
Why do The Powers That Be hold that position? Really? Ask a Church leader, and the answer will typically have more to do with Aristotle and Aquinas' ideas than anything Jesus or the Apostles themselves actually said, though they'll typically cite verses from Genesis and Paul's letter to the Corinthians. An honest attempt at exegesis of what the Bible says on the subject would require several blog posts.
Knowing what I do now, I suspect the underlying reason is that gay and transgender people are minorities, without representation in the Church, and The Powers That Be want it to remain that way. At least that's what can be inferred from how thibgs currently are.
It's too easy for a priest or a pastor to prescribe thatĀ a person with 'disordered inclinations' should substitute everything a committed relationship provides with whatever simulacrum of companionship might be found in a Church community. Whether this is achievable and the ramifications of attempting it in practice are never discussed. It's very easy for the majority to say that gender identity should be suppressed, that a transgender person must essentially become someone they're not in order to be accepted as an equal in a church community. It's easy for a pastor to pontificate about the 'disorder' of homosexuality and gender identity, instead of speaking uncomfortable truths about how the moral failings common to the majority contribute to the material dysfunction of our society. I was watching Question Time, just the other night, and people on there commented on how the older generations have very much pulled the metaphorical ladder up from young people, to the point whereĀ home ownership or even stable tenancy seem unattainableĀ for them.
The other reason I'm less invested inĀ the Church these days is that my experiences during the pandemic have changed my perspective of everything. Regardless of what's professed, people and institutions are only as moral as the world allows them to be.
I wasn't against the first 'lockdown', as it was initially sold to us. Things needed to close for two or three weeks to help minimise the number of hospitalisations and ensure we still had a healthcare system at the end of it. It seemed the right thing to do, given the information available to us then, to cancel Mass for that short while and to discourage large gatherings in any enclosed space. It's unreasonable to expect Church leaders to take such a needless risk with their lives and the lives of others.
As the months went by, the human, social, psychological and economic costs were becoming evident. Did the 'lockdown' and restrictions eventually cause more damage than the virus itself would have? I think so. I went out and prevented a couple of suicide attempts that were encouraged by the fear campaigns and psychological manipulation, watched loved ones pass away in conditions that were inhumane, saw local businesses eventually go bust and people lose their jobs as wealth was transferred from local businesses to multinationals (especially Amazon). I was far from the only person struggling with severe depression and alcohol dependency, which many are still struggling with today. Something felt very wrong with the fact everything and everyone was thrown under the bus because of our collective fear, and I find it impossible to reconcile that with the moral philosophy we once professed.