The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence make the archbishop squirm
I stopped going to Mass the minute I got my drivers license. At first it was kind of a goof — my brother and I told my devout Catholic partents that we wanted to go to a different church in town, where we liiked the priests better, and on Sunday morning, when they set off for their parish, we set off for ours … only we’d stop on the way at a deli where the German owner had never respected the drinking-age laws, and we’d pick up a six of beer. Then we’d go sit in the park and drink for an hour, come home a bit dizzy and answer my mother’s interrogation:
“How was mass?”
“Good.”
“What was the sermon about?”
“Sin.”
What did the priest say about it?”
“He’s against it.”
We all tried not to laugh, and lunch would be served.
Soon we stopped pretending, and didn’t even bother to get out of bed. A Catholic-school education never quite worked; I think I was born with the Atheist Gene, not the God Gene.
But 16 years of exposure teaches you a few things, and when I read about the ridiculous furor over the archbishop of San Francisco apologizing for giving Communion to two members of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, I had to laugh.