I’ve been wanting to explore this deeply personal subject with you. It is a subject I am quite passionate about, something that has ebbed and flowed throughout my life and has taken many shapes and forms, but has never been out of reach. I’m struggling to find the right words to essentially express my spiritual beliefs. I think my struggle stems from the fact that I have never quite put a label on it myself. So to address it, to name it is hard for me because it’s a deep rooted feeling within me that I often don’t talk about. I equate it to someone’s organized mess, it makes sense to whom the mess belongs to but from the outside looking in it seems disorderly, with no beginning and no end in sight. When my children are overwhelmed with a homework assignment I tell them to always start from the beginning, so let me start this journey from my beginning…
As a little girl I was raised by devoted Roman Catholic parents. Attending church every Sunday was just part of our weekend routine. There were times when I didn’t listen or reflect very much in church, and there were moments when I felt deeply connected to the spiritual rituals of mass. My parents took us to Sunday mass that was always held in Italian. The responses, the prayers, and the homily were all in Italian. Even today I can safely say I don’t always know how to respond in English because the Italian responses are second nature to me. As far back as I can remember during my childhood years I’ve worn a gold metal cross around my neck, sometimes neatly hidden underneath my clothes, or often displayed as a simple accessory. I said my prayers every night before bed and kissed my mini glow-in-the-dark plastic baby Jesus in a manger figurine that was positioned underneath my lamp on my night stand for decades.
Parallel to these formal religious teachings and rituals were deep feelings of having lived life before. What exactly do I mean? I will try my best to explain thoughts I had at the age of 4 and 5, in kindergarten, that I later came to understand quite clearly. When I started school a sense of dread came over me. I thought, ‘oh no I have to learn to read and write again?!’, and every year I felt the burden of having to ‘re-learn’ subjects in school such as language, math and science. It felt tiresome and repetitive. Namely, the daily grind of school life felt monotonous in a way that was almost too familiar. I never connected the dots to deep spiritual connections at that young age but there was a sense of familiarity to life that never occurred to me to question. I’ll return to these thoughts later…
At a certain age, I would say around 12 or 13 years old, I felt a confusion starting to build inside me. I was unsure about a decision I felt I had to make. I felt a specific calling to become a nun. I remember one summer day as I sat on the front porch with my mother who was busy embroidering a bedspread, one for myself and each of my sisters as a wedding present (an old southern Italian tradition), I told my mother of the calling I had felt. She responded, “if God wanted you He would have called on you already”, and with that I never broached the subject with anyone, or even myself, again. I whole heartedly believed my mother’s words to me on that day.
“I fell into the abyss of mourning. It was deep and wide and felt dark and endless”
I soon found myself in high school, and within the first few months I joined the liturgy committee. The liturgy committee was responsible for setting up for school masses in the gymnasium, and often participating through writing and presenting intentions or reading passages from the Bible. I initially enjoyed these days and met wonderful students that were mostly older than me, and who seemed to have found a deep connection to the Catholic religion. Our leaders were two religion teachers whom I respected. So what changed? One very distinctive life altering circumstance made me question life and all my beliefs. On September 13th, 1994 I was told that my 13 year old cousin, Viviana, who had gone on vacation to Italy with her family had died, at the 13th hour, on the very day she was to return home. I had known she had fallen ill approximately three weeks prior to this date. Exactly one month before, on August 13th, I had a dream that she had died. I woke up gasping for air and ran to tell my older sister and my mother. They told me that it was just a dream and not to talk about it with anyone for fear that I might be misunderstood. I wanted to reach out to her but in those days no one had cell phones, and calling Italy from a landline was costly. She had left on vacation in July and we had corresponded through handwritten letters (my last letter to her was typed, my older sister had purchased a computer that summer). Soon after that dream Viviana fell ill, and never recovered. The last thing I said to her in person was, ‘be careful’ when I said goodbye to her at the airport in July. I had a sinking feeling on that day as well, but I didn’t say anything to anyone at the time.
I fell into the abyss of mourning. It was deep and wide and felt dark and endless. I put my uniform on each day to go to high school, but as soon as I got home I changed into black clothes, a cultural tradition as a sign of mourning. I did this for almost three months. One day, just shy of the third month of the anniversary of her death, I stood in the mirror in my bedroom and looked at my young pale face dressed in black and I said to myself, ‘no more’. I took off my black clothes along with the gold cross around my neck, that had been a part of me for years, and tucked it neatly away in my jewellery box. I distinctly remember thinking, ‘maybe one day I will return to it again’. I was nearly 16 years old.
That cross did not return around my neck again, but that is not to say I did not carry it in my heart from that moment on. I didn’t return to the liturgy committee. I don’t think I out right rejected my religion, I simply didn’t find solace or purpose during my time of need. I believe I was too young to fully make all the right connections inside me. After that my spirituality just took on different forms…
Thoughts At F___ It Forties 