|
 |
| We lived in New York when my oldest child Michael was 6 years old. One day he came home from school with a permission slip for us to sign if we wanted him to have religious education. Apparently there was a convent of nuns close by that would pick the children up and return them to school. As my husband and I were not of the same denomination I waited until he came home to get his opinion. He thought it was O.K. so we signed the papers.
After a couple of weeks it began to bother me, I told my husband, "You know there is no point in teaching our children about God unless we show them that God is important to us. We need to start going back to church." Because of our differences it was decided that we would alternate each week between the Catholic Church and the Baptist. This was in keeping with my husbands theory that a person should choose for themselves. We began attending the local Catholic Church, we never made the Baptist one as the service started pretty early and by the time I got my son, daughter and myself ready for Church it was too late for the Baptist Church. Each week my husband would ask me about certain things the priest did during the Mass and why he did them, fortunately I had gone to Catholic school and was an A student in my religious instruction class. God was a mystery to me, and I love mysteries. A short time later the Air Force sent him to a school in Mississippi. While he was gone I became dissatisfied with our arrangement for teaching our children about God. What if one of them came to me with a question and then went to their father with the same question? Children will do that. I knew it would only confuse them rather than teach them because of the way our Church's viewed certain things. So I went to the Lord. I didn't think it was fair for me to ask God to change my husband, after all he wasn't there to argue I should be the one to change, so my prayer went something like this. Dear Heavenly Father unite us and make us one, we should be the same denomination for our children otherwise they will grow up more confused than they would be if they knew nothing of you. Lord, you know I am Catholic, I was born Catholic, raised Catholic and think Catholic, however, if you want me to become a Baptist change my heart and the way I think. You are God and have the power to do this, no mother-in-law or Pastor is going to tell me I should be a Baptist, if you want me to be a Baptist change me. Within a week I got a letter from my husband saying he wanted to become Catholic. It came out of the blue (heaven) we had never discussed changing denominations. After he came home he went for religious instructions and became Catholic, shortly after that his boss at work invited him to a Cursillo weekend at church. I had never heard of it but, he said it was Catholic. I thought it would be good for him being a brand new Catholic, he needed to learn more about the Church, he was still asking me questions about it. About this time I hit a faith crisis, my husband and I were model Catholics, we went to Church every Sunday, I even was teaching Sunday school to second graders. I will say this I did teach them what the Church had taught me, not necessary what I believed because of the faith crisis I was going through. I remember praying, "Dear God, are you really there? Was Jesus really your Son, and is the Bible true or did some men just make it up to stop man from being so inhumane to man. I am not going to spend the rest of my life getting up early every Sunday to go to Church and being so good, it is hard to be good, only to die and find out you don't exist, and if you prove this to me I accept the Holy Spirit as the bible talks about Him, if the Bible is true then the Holy Spirit exists.
While my husband was gone a woman knocked on my door, I recognized her as a member of the choir and invited her in, and she invited me to make a Cursillo weekend. I asked her what it was as I had never heard of it. She stood up threw an application on the kitchen table and said "Come and find out." With that she was gone. I am not writing this to say that God prefers Catholics over Baptists or any other denomination. God knows we are individuals and He treats us as such. This was right for us. Our denomination is just what we use to bring us closer to God, whichever one we are most comfortable with, and brings us that closeness is where we belong.
God loves us and answers our prayers when we allow God to be God instead of insisting that God do it our way. I think if I had asked God to change my husband and was not willing to change if that is what He wanted, I would still be asking God to change him to this very day. God Bless you and keep you always in the palm of His hand. Mary E. Cole ------------------ |
Back To Angelwings |
Back To Main Index |
|
|