Religious Mumbo-Jumbo
May 5, 2004
Rich always made it clear that religion to him was not something you get from attending church every Sunday. I, on the other hand, have been a practicing Catholic for most of my life. It wasn't until about 10-years ago that I stopped believing that if I didn't go to church on Sundays, I would go straight to hell�no passing "GO", no collecting $200. Now I attend church mostly for my kids, but I also use church as inspiration to be a good person. On an occasion in our youth, Catholic religion played an important role in our friendship when we shared a significant sacrament of our faith. When Rich was getting confirmed, as Catholic teenagers do, he asked me to be his sponsor. For those of you that aren't Catholic or don't know about this sacrament, it is a "coming of age" thing in the church. After you go through religious studies long enough, they tell you that you are ready to be a full-blown Catholic. This is the sacrament of confirmation. Your sponsor must also be a confirmed Catholic generally of the same gender and they usually ask that you don't invite a parent for sponsorship (I guess they feel that the parents do enough). A sponsor in this context is intended to be some one that you respect. This is when Rich approached me for this honor. To me, this distinction was more about Rich attesting his love and friendship to me and less about his religious believes. I have a feeling that Rich deemed it the same. I took this privilege to heart. For a while, I preached to Rich the goodness of church and that he should attend with me or else we were both going to hell now that I was his sponsor. I didn't believe my coercion and neither did Rich. Rich continued to neglect masses and the only thing (other than a great picture of us posing with our suits and mullets that still hangs on Aunt Elaine's walls) that came from the experience was the faith in each other.
Over the years, my ideals have simplified a little. I believe that all the 10 commandments and all religions on earth can be boiled-down to just one and I try to follow it as best I can. I will call this the "Dan Commandment". I trust that if you treat people as you would yourself, you are living a good life and will join God in heaven. When I say that, I mean treat each other with the respect they deserve. Now that I'm done with my "holy speech", the reason I say all this is because I feel that Rich also felt this same way. I think it is ironic that my early religion was so different from his, but we ended up at the same spot. Yes, we had two different faiths, but only one belief. This is why I feel Rich didn't consider the church as the place to go to be a good person. I think he felt that there is good and there is bad in this world and they both can be found everywhere you look, including church. I also think that he didn't want to hear how "bad" or "unholy" he was from a person that may or may not be a good person themselves. He never liked hypocritical speeches.
Now that I've completely offended everyone and trampled religion and all my Catholic beliefs, I will get to the point of this story. I'm not sure if I know what heaven looks like or even what heaven is, but I do know that Rich is there. Rich is in heaven not because he went to church and prayed on Sundays. Rich is there "looking down" upon us because he lead a good life and was a good person. He was kind to people. He had his faults, but did that outweigh the goodness in his soul and the kindness in his heart? His devotion to church didn't matter in the end because in spite of my empty sponsor threats, Rich turned out to be a good person. He often poked fun at religion without completely offending even the most religious. He was able to do that because he was a compassionate person with good intentions�to make people laugh. Here's to you Rich, you are a reason I will start believing in the world again. Not because you were taken from us at such a young age and with so much to look forward to, but because you lived your life and you taught me how to be a better person without preaching. |
