I guess I owe this post to my friend
Katie. I have been right where she is at. Questioning why God does the things he does. My questioning began several years ago even before my miscarriage. James and I had decided that we were comfortable with having a baby before we actually got committed...I mean married. Well, a lot of time passed and we did NOT get pregnant. I am talking SIX YEARS of unprotected sex people. I kept asking God why we could not get pregnant. I had resigned myself to the fact that we were infertile. We even discussed the idea of asking my ex for a "donation" so that at least Eric would have a brother or sister (now that is really strange to admit). We decided to go ahead and get married. James was worried that I would regret marrying him since we could not seem to get pregnant and he knew I wanted another child. I guess he saw that I was around for good after six years of being together. So in April of 2001 we got engaged. Well in late July I was late. I have been late before and nothing ever happened so James had to beg me to test. I finally gave in after I was like 9 days late. Well to my shock I was PREGNANT! I was in a daze for most of the pregnancy. Once Jacob was born I was still not sure if he was going to be mine to keep and worried about SIDS for several months. I slowly began to forgive God for not blessing us sooner. Then we were blessed again with being pregnant. I guess whatever was our issue with getting pregnant must have corrected itself. Only this pregnancy was like no other I had had. I spotted early on. The doctor said not to worry and that each pregnancy is different, blah, blah, blah. Well, I knew something was not right. The spotting came and went and came again so we had an ultrasound. We saw the heart beating and were reassured for a time. Two weeks later the bleeding picked up pace and we were in the er. That is when we had another u/s and realized that our baby had died shortly after the previous u/s at 7 weeks 3 days. I had a d & c and once again questioned God. Over the course of the next year I tried to come to terms with the miscarriage with the help of the "sistas". I am now at a place that I can honestly say that I do not blame God for my miscarriage. I truly believe that my body recognized that something was not right with the baby and aborted it...not God. I have three completely normal pregnancies to prove that I do not have an issue with having healthy children.
Now for my own dilemma. I really want to raise my children within a faith but I am not sure which one. I was not raised within a religion myself. I was baptized Catholic ( James says that I am Catholic since I was baptized in the faith) but never spent any time going to church. When my ex and I got married I opted to join the Methodist church without giving it much thought since he was Methodist. Now I am faced with another decision regarding which church to go to. My husband is Catholic but I don't want to become a Catholic without giving it some serious thought. I know it is very important to him being a Catholic so my heart says to give him this. But my head says to research it so I can fully commit to the Catholic faith. So we are stuck. I guess I need a kick in the butt to make this decision. Does anyone have any input? I believe some things with Catholicism but not others. Does anyone have a religion that they believe everything within their religion or am I going to become a cafeteria Catholic? I would appreciate any and all input you might have.
4 comments:
Good question Patty. I was baptized and raised Catholic, but no longer attend any services and do not consder myself a Catholic (although I technically still am by default). My situation is different, in that I don't plan to raise my children with religion, so I have no dilemma there. (Yes, I'm going to hell and my poor children will be damned)
But, if your husband is Catholic, he may have a very strong desire to have your children be Catholic also, and it would be nice to have the whole family be the same religion. With that said, though, I don't believe in just blindly doing what someone else does just for the heck of it. I totally see your dilemma.
My only assvice is this... don't worry so much about the "rules" of any religion. Figure out if you can be comfortable enough with the services and overall teachings to reach (what I believe is) the real goal of any religion -- a better understanding and connection of/with God. As long as the Catholic church near you feels comfortable (i.e. they don't still live in the "old" beliefs that the woman HAS to stay home, obey her husband, yada yada yada) then maybe you should give it a try.
On the other hand, depending on how you resolved your first marriage, you may never have your current marriage recognized in the Catholic church. Unless you had an annulment, the traditional Catholic churches will not recognize one as being married when they are in a second. So, if you did decide to be Catholic, you would be "living in sin" even though you are married.
Yes, I know I didn't help anything. But, I got a chance to write a bunch of gibberish and get you more confused and that's got to count for something.
I think the bottom line is to have personal relationship with God (whatever that might mean for you and your family) the church comes second, and, thus, you don't have to worry so much about "rules"
If you begin going to the Catholic church and then it becomes uncomfortable in some way for you, you may want to reassess where you worship (or may decide not to worship anywhere at all).
In the end I don't think it will matter if you went to a church or a field of flowers or your own home to have a relationship with God, only that you did.
And, uhm, Zeeks we would never tell you that you're going to hell and your children will be damned...! =)
I would have to agree with Kether. I go along with the Catholic faith more so because I don't know anything else and I was raised Catholic- 12 years of Catholic school! I also go with it because it is important to my husband and he is Catholic. That isn't to say that I don't believe everything because that isn't the case. There are a few things I have issues with and I try to deal with them the best I can. I think there are people out there (like my MIL) who truly believe everything in their religion teachings. I guess it is possible. Sorry, I know this wasn't any help!
I want to thank everyone who responded. It was a tremendous help. I was having trouble grappling (sp?) with whether to consider Catholicism and feel better about considering it even though I don't believe everything that the Catholic church teaches. I am going to discuss with my husband about the enulement issue and see how he feels. You girls are the best....thanks!
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