August 2020 – On the Path

Today’s blog is a guest blog from a good friend on mine. He had written this essay to me recently and I was very impressed with his story and thought it would make a good “guest blog.” The subject is in line with the theme of my blog “On the Path, It’s a Wonderful Life.

“Do you renounce Satan?” “I do renounce him. ”“And all his works?” I do renounce them.” “Do you believe in the holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints, the resurrection of the body, and life everlasting?” “I do believe.” “This is the faith of the Church. We are proud to profess it, in Jesus Christ, our Lord. I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” And they all said “Amen”. I was baptized on Sunday, October 12, 1952 at St. Stephen’s Cathedral in Owensboro, Kentucky. I was twelve days old.
The responses above were spoken by my oldest brother and sister who were my godparents. Thus, was my fate sealed. I was to go to parochial school, a catholic high school, and adhere to the beliefs and dogmas of the Roman Catholic Church for the rest of my life. Except that it didn’t turn out that way.
Growing up, I was a good little catholic boy. I was even an altar boy. No girls allowed on the altar then. I went to mass (the rituals and robes fascinated me), confession (I was a pretty good kid so sometimes I had to make up sins), received holy communion (if you touch the host you will immediately drop dead and go to hell), revered the priests (escaping molestation), and got an excellent basic education of readin’, writin’ and ‘rithmatic while also enduring the mental, emotional, and physical abuse of the nuns as just a natural part of life. At least life in catholic schools. It appears that some of the horrific memories are burned in my mind forever. I once went to the local convent cemetery looking for the grave of a particular nun so I could spit on her grave. Extreme, you say? Disrespectful? You should hear what she did to me. But rather than wallow in the past too much, I’d rather move on to my journey out of the Church. It was natural for catholic boys and girls to consider the religious life. I was no exception. I thought I wanted to be a Franciscan friar. Francis himself was never ordained and didn’t feel a call to the priesthood. As a senior in high school, the Holy Cross brothers of Notre Dame came to the house one day and actively recruited me. But if I was going in, it was going to be the Franciscans. My high school guidance counselor (a nun) was setting up an after-graduation summer live-in with the local Franciscan Conventuals, who would help me arrange to enter the Order of Friars Minor brotherhood in Cincinnati the following September. Then, overnight, something changed. I went to the guidance counselor and told her to forget it with no explanation. Was I going to tell her that I was realizing that the attraction I was feeling for men was not ever going to subside? Not on your life. I already knew the scoop. It was a mental disorder (this was the early 70’s). It was a natural inclination to sin. It was disgusting, sick, and an abomination to God. I would not be worthy to wear the same habit Francis of Assisi wore.
With some fortuitous, non-Catholic counseling, I escaped Owensboro two years after high school graduation. After some moving around, getting used to being on my own and making my own decisions, I flippantly stopped going to mass and landed in Denver, Colorado, living the life of an ordinary, working, young gay man, going to bars, making friends and “tricking” every chance I got. One of those “tricks”, a one-night stand, left a notebook in my apartment. It had one written page in it. It was an essay of sorts. It spoke of an experience where he was deserted by two friends in Santa Monica. He went on to say that if we are all one, one cannot be deserted. It’s not possible to conceive. That in Truth, oneness is not dividable, etc. etc. It sounded like a bit of jibber jabber at the time, but it stirred my curiosity. Where did these ideas come from? Bit by bit I did research, and through friends, and even other “tricks” these esoteric ideas started coming out in conversations. I found out that there were entire religions that espoused these kinds of beliefs and thinking, such as Buddhism, Hinduism, Gnosticism, and the new age religions such as Science of Mind, Unitarian, and Christian Science. My own unique, personal, spiritual journey to God had begun and it started with a “trick” whose left-behind notebook became the first volume of my spiritual journal.
Three cities and two states later, I am now on volume four. Most of my immediate family remained faithful Catholics, so I keep up on the evolution, or lack thereof, in the church. Not only has there been very little change in the last 48 years, but in many respects, it’s gone backwards from the visions of Vatican Council II. The current Pope seems ready to open that window again and let the fresh air in, but the collective body of bishops is still very conservative. Mandatory celibacy for priests, a male-only priesthood, prohibited divorce, forbidden same-sex marriage, and a tenacious condemnation of a woman’s right to choose birth control are just some of the abuses the church still imposes on its members. I call these abuses because they are devoid of any loving consideration that changing these policies just might save a person from a life of misery, loneliness or in many cases, worse.
In my journey to God, I also found Jesus who I call by his Aramaic name, Eshoo. The flesh and blood man who did not judge or condemn, except for the hypocritical religious and political leaders of his day. He hung out with the common folks. The rubble. The sinners. The marginalized. The prostitutes. The tax collectors. The poor. The homosexuals. He said God is in us and we are gods. His message and teachings were about love, peace, and non-violence. And then, of course, they killed him. After I left the church, I wondered about how I could’ve done it so suddenly, dismissively and callously.
The answer was and is, it just wasn’t spiritually fulfilling enough to hold me. It kept God someplace out there where I had to search, pray, and beg for any communication or answer to a prayer. Usually the answer was no, or no answer at all. I haven’t become a guru, a mystic, or a sage. I have had many a dark night of the soul, dark nights of doubt, confusion, and frustration. I have angrily cursed and denied God. But I have always come back to the realization, that the God I cursed and denied was not real. He was the one I thought was out there someplace. The true God is what Eshoo called the realm of God that is within. Every time we say “I Am” we speak God’s name. Every time you speak your name, you speak God’s name. Truth is what God is. Here is where God is. I Am who God is. Love is what God does. I thank God for the many revelations I have received during my numerous and continuing trips around the sun. And I also thank God for sending me that “trick”.

Thank you, Larry for that most fascinating essay, a brief overview of your spiritual journey to God. I love hearing how people find their way to a real experience of the ineffable, what we often call God.

Wally

In 1973 I began my airline career, hoping to have a good time working in aviation ( being a pilot and fascinated with the business), and traveling to interesting places and seeing the world. That was my dream, my intention, my plan. If I stayed with my airline and reached retirement, I would get some good travel benefits, according to my employee handbook.

The airline business was very uncertain, very insecure. There were always strikes, layoffs, pay cuts, etc. You couldn’t plan on any security, I quickly learned. After six months employment, my first layoff occurred. I was eligible for recall to my position when things improved in the business, but for now I was out of work. Out of work with no idea when I would be reinstated to continue my employment. Fortunately, I had just completed six months employment when this occurred and at six months employment one becomes eligible for free travel passes on the airline. I could now do some of my much-desired travel.

I had developed a friendship of sorts with another employee who also got furloughed from his job at the same time (we had started together in mid 1973). One day he asked me if I would be interested in traveling with him. He was thinking of traveling around the world since our airline was one of the two U.S. airlines that had “around-the-world” routes at the time. Wow, I thought, spending my layoff circling the globe on my first airline pass. What a fantastic opportunity that would be!

It didn’t take long for me to make a decision. It was that time in life when good opportunities came my way and I grabbed them. Let the good times roll! I went to a local ticket office of my airline and got my free ticket. Well, there was a “service charge” of $57 for the round-the -world ticket. What a deal. Actually, I choose to sweeten the deal by paying an upgrade service fee of an additional $57 for first class for the entire trip, if it was available. All the travel was on a space-available or standby basis, no reservations permitted. I was young and adventurous, so that was no big deal for me.

First class cabin all the way except the Tel Aviv to Bombay, India overnight flight.

After acquiring a passport and the necessary visas for certain countries and inoculations for certain countries, I was set. We set off for our big adventure. Our plan was to go west from Los Angeles, but when we could not get on a flight to Hawaii because of full flights, we quickly changed our plans and headed east. We headed to New York and to our first stop at Lisbon, Portugal. What I remember that first night in Lisbon, our first night in a foreign country was one our our differences. I was open to trying foreign foods, my companion was not. He wanted hamburgers and all the usual American foods. Well, that’s interesting, I thought. Here we are traveling around the world and he is not open to trying foreign foods.

The next stop was Madrid, Spain. The dictator Franco was the ruler then. I remember enjoying Madrid. It was an adjustment eating dinner or the evening meal late at night as is the European custom.

Next on our itinerary were Rome and Greece. I quickly learned my traveling companion was a “lady’s man,” if you get my drift. He found a “girlfriend” in every port (as they say). When he realized that I did not have the same obsession, or interest, we had a little talk. It was time I explained myself. I disclosed that I was gay and that really blew his mind. He really had no comprehension of this fact, I think. He was a “born again” Christian and really came down on me for being a “sinner,” and really preached to me about all of this. Hmmmm, I thought, interesting.

The rest of the trip always had this tension present. We seemed to always be surrounded by whores wherever we went, which was really what he wanted. That was just the way it was. Like I said, interesting.

I enjoyed seeing the historical sights in Rome, Greece, then Israel. History classes suddenly came alive for me, it was all right in front of me. With my theological background I found Israel fascinating beyond words. The big change came when we went from Israel to Bombay, India (now renamed Mumbai). The poverty in India was something else. I had never seen such a sight, with beggars everywhere just hanging on you wherever you went. And the stench of the city was overwhelming, something I’ll never forget. On top of that, I picked up what I think was dysentery, which stayed with me long after we completed the trip. That experience caused my to just want to hurry up and get home. But here we were, halfway around the world. We had half the globe to cover before we’d be home. We did visit a national park and some caves and sights in India and then on to Bangkok, Thailand. An interesting culture. What stands out for me in my memory were the public toilets in Thailand. Just holes in the ground, period, just holes. I had never experienced that before. Not like outhouses in the states, just holes for squatting.

On a beach near Bombay, India. The woman in front of me was our tour guide.

Then on to Hong Kong (it was British then). and Taiwan. A brief stop in Okinawa and Guam and then on to Hawaii and home. Whew! That was a lot of traveling and sights to see in a three week period. The the discomfort of dysentery for the last portion of the trip.

A lot was learned during this adventure. Many different cultures, different currencies, and sights I’ve only studied about in school. The travel was all first class except the Tel Aviv, Israel to Bombay, India overnight flight. I did run into suspicion with the customs officials upon entering the country in Hawaii. They had a hard time understanding why a twenty-five-year-old would circle the globe in three weeks. They searched me very thoroughly, I mean thoroughly, for drugs. Finally I was cleared to enter back into the U.S. The big adventure was over.

So, this was an interesting and exciting time in my life, the early ’70s. Living in an Eskimo village, living and working in a national park (my previous two blogs), and now going around the world in three weeks. I’m glad I didn’t hesitate to do these things when the opportunity arose. They are great memories to have.

Just as a side note, when I went on this three week trip, my mother was very ill with cancer and I was hesitant to leave at that time as I didn’t know if she would be alive by the time I returned. After much thought and hesitation, I decided to go. I felt this was a once in a lifetime opportunity for me and I was at peace with the decision. As it turned out, she was still alive when I returned and lived several more months. Like I said, a great trip overall and great lifelong memories.

Wally

Month: August 2020

A Journey From The Roman Catholic Church to God ( Guest Blog / Blog #45 ) – By Larry J. Thomson

Around the World in 80…, Er…, 21 Days [ Post # 44 ]