Kitchen Catechism: Words of Wisdom

A chain is only as strong as its' weakest link.

"Teens Get a Second Chance at Literacy" - was a headline on the front page of the "Los Angeles Times" Sunday, July 21, 2002 . Under the headline it reads: "Education: L.A. Unified begins a back-to-basics reading program for secondary students. The effort is being watched by districts nationwide."

It goes on to tell that 35,000 students will embark on a remedial reading program to learn skills thy should have learned by second or third grade. They will forgo electives such as music and art to attend mandatory classes that stress the phonics usually taught to 6-year-olds. It will cost 16 million dollars this year and, of course, is quite controversial with some students balking at having to attend and some teachers reluctant to shelve 'the classics' for rudimentary storybooks.

When I read the entire article, I could only think of how this 'lack of basics' in LA's schools seems to be exactly what has happened to catechesis within the Catholic Church since Vatican II.

To get a definition of catechesis, I went to the Catholic Encyclopedia and it tells us: CATECHESIS and CATECHISM are synonymous with CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE in the sense of "the act of teaching" and "the knowledge imparted by teaching" and that the word 'katechesis' means instruction by word of mouth.

All of this started me thinking of my own journey and why I am here and why I am writing this.

Before Vatican II the priests and the nuns were the purveyors of all we needed to know about our faith to obtain salvation and be a Catholic in good standing. They spent their lives educating themselves about the faith, which they passed on to us lay people - especially children - and we had complete trust that we were learning all we needed to know since they were totally dedicated, as well as, armed with thousands of years of tradition.

Living in this era, I felt comfortable with my Catholic knowledge and could answer most questions people would ask me about my faith. I did, however, have an 'us against them' mentality as there was a lot of anti-Catholicism and discrimination and most Catholics knew there were places they wouldn't be accepted and people who looked down on them and would not socialize with them because of their religion. That was alright with me because I wasn't interested in people or places that didn't want me and was very happy just staying with my own kind.

Then, Vatican II entered my world like a big blast through the front door that toppled everything inside and then, some people began scrambling for positions which caused an enormous earthquake shaking everything to it's very roots and turning it up-side-down.

For the first few years, I was effected only by the 'big blast'. Priests mingling with no restraints among the laity and telling us how things were changing (i.e., we could eat meat on Fridays) ; nuns abandoning their habits some dressing exactly like lay women. My first experience with controversy came with the Mass being changed from Latin to the vernacular. (Vernacular was a seldom used word and came, as did many other such words - i.e., Liturgy for Mass - to become very familiar.) There were six Sunday Masses at my parish and for a short while one was said in Latin. Then it was declared all Masses had to be in English and this made the folks who wanted Latin very unhappy. I personally liked the Mass in English but I couldn't understand why there couldn't be just the one Mass in Latin.

How sweeping - across the boards - the changes were didn't become a reality for me until my two youngest sons needed to make their First Communions. My three older children attended Catholic grade school but with the changes we lost all the sisters and the school began to crumble. So now I didn't have to drive a mile for the Catholic school but enrolled the two youngest a block away in the public school.

The boys were enrolled in CCD (Confraternity of Christian Doctrine) on Saturday mornings for their religious instruction. When the first grader came with homework, I tried to help him. I don't remember the question but I know the answer had something to do with what I thought should be apostles. After reading the chapter, I was very perplexed. Nowhere was the word apostles mentioned nor the word disciples. So I read further and discovered everyone was referred to only as "the friends of Jesus". Later, I learned that the same was true in the second grade book and the words First Communion and Eucharist were never used - only "the family meal" and "the bread".

On the Saturday mornings, it soon became apparent to me that it wasn't worthwhile to go home for fifteen minutes and then come back to pick the boys up so I just stayed and helped where ever I could. Soon I was teaching a class of older children who hadn't made their First Communion and there was no book for that type of class, so I just designed my own lessons.

A lot of things were happening, with religious education, that was shaking everything up - that's what I now call the 'earthquake'. Two that stand out in my memory are: A mandatory First Communion meeting for parents that was conducted by a fee-paid visiting nun. She said: "Young children should only be told about God the Father. You should take them on walks and show them flowers and trees and tell them all of this is given to you by God because He loves you". This made no sense to me because Christmas was coming up and who loves the story of Jesus birth more than young children? The second incident happened when I was teaching my class on a Saturday morning. The woman who was the chairman of the first three grades came shouting down the hall for all of us to hear; "There are no devils, there are no angels, there is only God the Father." Evidently she was having a dispute with one of the teachers about telling the children there were angels and devils.

The end result of the earthquake was rungs or levels of power were established. At the top rung were the innovators. These were the people who decided what the changes were to be and how they would be implemented. Then there were the enablers who occupied a middle rung of power and put the innovators decisions into effect in the religious education programs. I ended up on the bottom rung with no power in this system. However, I felt no animosity toward the people above me, many of them I dearly liked, but I did feel a sense of bewilderment when the changes went against my commonsense. And ending up on the bottom rung, with no voice in the system, made me feel like an outsider.

In order to teach my Saturday class and plan my own lessons, I had to do a lot of reading and research. In the Old Testament I found there was a group of true believers who were referred to as 'the remnant' because they were not in the mainstream of their time. I related to this 'remnant' and felt for my time I was part of a remnant and pictured the remnant as a piece of cloth with myself on the outer edge - the fringe. So in the 'whole scheme of things', I viewed myself as belonging to the 'Remnant,s Fringe' and wondered if there were other Catholics out there like me.

The children in the class I taught were not the typical Catholic children of the time who made their First Communion in Second grade. Often they were newly arrived illegal immigrants or children who had some type of problem within their family where they weren't allowed to get Catholic religious training at the normal age. The 'system' had little interest in these children because there weren't very many of them, and 'the system' was so preoccupied with putting their changes into place in the regular classes that, in my mind, a good thing happened and my class was left alone. To me these children, in the perspective of that time, were the disenfranchised, the forgotten, the vulnerable and the weak. I learned to love them dearly and they returned my love. There is a mysteriously, strong bond between anyone who is learning about Jesus for the first time and the fortunate person who gets to relay the true message.

All during the period I was a CCD teacher, I thought the children I taught, using the perspective of that time, were unique but today I realize most of the youngsters who received their religious education in the decades following Vatican II were poorly served. It seems the majority fall into the category of the weak, the disenfranchised, the vulnerable and the forgotten as far as knowing their Catholic faith. It made me feel so sad when my niece, whose mother struggled so hard to get her to CCD classes, said: "I don't like the Catholic Church. I don't go anymore." She was rejecting the Catholic faith and it would be fine if she knew what she was rejecting but she didn't have the faintest clue.

Passing on the true faith, which has come to us through thousands of generations of believers struggles, can be likened to a chain. The period of time I have been speaking of left a link that was sorely weakened but a link that can be restored. That's what I am dedicated to doing - everything I can to rebuild and make the link strong.

The window of opportunity to accomplish all I humbly desire has been opened by the Internet. With God and His mother on our side, we can make this generations link strong. That is so important to do because a 'chain is only as strong as its weakest link'. It will take dedication, hard work and above all prayer. Please join the effort. Your reward will be great in heaven.

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"Nothing should
frighten or grieve you.
Let not your heart be troubled. Am I, your Mother,
not here with you?"

"Nothing should
frighten or grieve you.
Let not your heart be troubled. Am I, your Mother,
not here with you?"

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