Coming home, part 2

So, as I was saying just a few years ago...

My wife and I found out that, miracle of miracles, we were going to have a child. It truly was a miracle; we'd been trying for years and had had no luck. I had basically given up hope. And then, Memorial Day weekend, my wife gave me the good news. 

When I say I'd given up hope, I do mean that. I had come to the conclusion that the only way we were going to have a child was by adoption. I was ok with that, but realized that there would be home visits and such before we'd get a kid. So I has started making a mental checklist of all the things around the house that needed to be addressed. This came in handy. 

But as things began to sink in, I realized that I unquestionably wanted my child to be baptized as a Catholic. And that meant that I really shouldn't continue to be lapsed. I told my wife, who was not Catholic, that this was important to me. Her response was to decide to attend RCIA, so as to learn more about the Church. 

To be continued again, maybe in less than five years. 

Coming Home

Part one of however many...

It's been just over a year since I came back to the Church. Memorial Day weekend, 2007, my wife and I found out that we were going to have a baby. That started a whole list of things that I had to do to get ready, and one of the biggest ones was to get back to Church.

It wasn't that I ever stopped being Catholic, really. I just stopped practicing. I was the classic "lapsed Catholic" - I would go every once in a while, maybe even for a few weeks, then something would come up, and I'd stop again. I didn't have any interest in going anywhere else. I just didn't bother to go.

Honestly, going to Mass every Sunday is in many ways a habit. That's not a bad thing, really. Habits aren't intrinsically bad things, even though people tend to think of bad habits. There are good habits too, like exercise, flossing your teeth, or going to Mass every week.

I lost the habit when I went to college. Too many Saturday nights ended too late, and Sunday morning ended up being used to recover. After I dropped out of school, I worked nights, including - more often than not - Saturday night. And after slinging stock for nine or ten hours, all I wanted to do was go to sleep.

...to be continued....