I Almost Wasn't

I almost wasn’t. My mother was born with heart defects, and having children was an unlikely and dangerous prospect. When she married my father they wanted to know if it was possible to raise a family, and they took a train to Boston to meet with renowned cardiologist Paul Dudley White, who was Dwight Eisenhower's cardiologist. He told her she could have two kids. I'm the third. Thanks, Catholicism.

It certainly could be said that I owe my life to the authority of the Catholic Church, but I don’t owe a thing to Catholicism. It is a fake religion, long descended from the original Christianity, so long that it has little resemblance to the life and words of the "holy man" "Jesus," who may not even have existed. We have been told by authorities that he existed, but we also have been told that priests haven’t been molesting children for, hmm, centuries, a couple of millennia.

I grew up Catholic. I remember being told in grade school that only "baptized" Catholics went to "Heaven." By having some water poured on your head you qualify for eternal reward. Obey, obey, and obey, and maybe you get into Heaven, but "Hell" awaits you if you don’t have water poured on your head and don't obey, obey, and obey. And it isn’t just any water, or any baptism. "Protestant" baptism doesn’t count, or at least doesn’t get you any farther than "Purgatory," sometimes known as "Limbo." Everyone else though, no luck for you, especially Jews, who killed Jesus, a Jew, if he existed. To paraphrase Bob Dylan, you ask why I don’t pray here, why, why, why you gotta ask me that!?

So much for Catholicism. I’m grateful for my life, but I don’t credit Catholicism with its eternal damnation threats for making my mother risk her life to have me. Life is. People incarnate. Lots of people. Too many, these days. There were too many in 1945 when I was born, and there are way too many people now. I have had a pretty good life, but I am under no illusion that my presence on this planet is something it couldn’t exist without. It is something determined on a higher level, so I’m glad to be here, and hope I have done some good.

Abortion isn’t my top concern in life, but the subject has come to the fore in recent days, and I was reminded of my own circumstance in the grand question of to be or not to be. People engage in sexual activity, and pregnancy often results. Some women find having a child to be something they are unable or unwilling to do, and they seek ways to terminate the pregnancy. As of now it is legal in this country, but various authoritarian religious groups – not just Catholics – have doggedly attempted to dissuade, prevent or limit abortions. Some of the more fanatical opponents have tried terrorism and murder as a method of being "pro life."

My attitude towards abortion is probably similar to that of most "Americans." It isn’t murder, but it isn’t nothing. Eternal damnation doesn’t await women who get abortions, because there is no such thing as eternal damnation, authority notwithstanding. A developing fetus is not yet a complete, viable human being, but it isn’t an appendix or wisdom tooth either. A potential human has some worth. Still, the decision to complete the pregnancy is best made by the person who bears the most burden – the mother. Fathers bear a burden as well, but not to the degree that mothers do.

In my case my mother made the decision all on her own. My father was an Army doctor serving in the Philippines in World War II when I was born. Since I look like him, I can safely assume that my gestation began when he was home on leave before being sent overseas. My sister was eleven months older than me, so I was neither planned nor expected. Irish fertility and Catholicism make for a lot of surprises. After I was born my mother got a "dispensation" to have her fallopian tubes tied, so that she wouldn’t be able to have any more children. Her dispensation likely came from the legendary Cardinal Stritch, the archbishop of the Chicago archdiocese. Birth control was forbidden by the Church, just like abortion, but a dispensation can be a get out of Hell free card. One would think that if you can get a dispensation to prevent pregnancy that you could get one for abortion, but no such luck.

The whole issue of abortion is phony. Religions are cults, and they keep their followers in line by making threatening, scary rules. Deviate from the rules and authority and you become eligible for eternal damnation, and maybe even temporal damnation. It is all about power, and the combination of power and sex is where humans battle for supremacy.

It is worth mentioning that the most fanatical supporters of both Bush presidents in their murderous invasions of Iraq were "white" Christians. And the second Bush's invasion of Afghanistan. Some now support Vladimir Putin’s slaughter in Ukraine, even though most Ukrainians are Christian. It was easier when the invadees were Muslims and/or Arabs – someone comfortably "other," but when it comes to tribal identity, a way is found.

"Liberals" aren’t much help. It is a black and white issue with them, as it is for "Conservatives." Rights versus the sanctity of life. Two different arguments. It’s not rights versus no rights or pro-life versus anti-life, but one category versus another, and ne'er the twain shall meet. What it boils down to constituency versus constituency, tribe versus tribe. "Pro-lifers" are predominantly "Christian," though the attributed quotes from the reputed savior of all mankind, "Jesus," don’t include anything about abortion.

Rights are what people say they are. There is nothing inherent or written in stone about rights to anything. We are animals, evolved as biological beings. We breathe, consume water and food, defecate, urinate, cough, wheeze, vomit and make sounds. And we reproduce. Or not. I don’t look at abortion as a "right" so much as something people have done since we individuated into a species, and likely before. It only became "murder" when men declared it so, using cult religion as the authorization and power to forbid and punish declared "sinners."

So now the "Supreme" Court is going to reverse the previous "Supreme" Court decision that made abortion legal in every state. Five of "justices" are "Conservative" Catholics. Another is a Conservative sort-of Catholic. They drink the Kool-aid of Catholicism on a daily basis, though only symbolically. Authority says that abortion is forbidden. This is the same authority that the Catholic Church used to burn people at the stake, among other atrocities.

I know this religion. I went to Catholic schools for seventeen years. I have had my hair and ears pulled by nuns, had my head knocked against a classmate’s head, numerous assaults with thick wooden rulers and yardsticks, even a big wooden slide rule. A priest slammed me against a locker when I was in high school. A pedophile priest, James Beatty, CSV, told my class that I was "Dr. Hamilton's only mistake" – for no reason, just that I was available for insult. I was lucky. At least he didn’t molest me. Maybe my butt didn't look attractive enough for him. He grabbed guys by the penis in the hallways between classes. He hit boys in the face with closed fists. Again, I was lucky. He only insulted me. He might be in "Hell" now. (Update, September 5, 2023: The State of Illinois Attorney General's Office has released its report on Catholic clergy abuse, and it includes James Beatty. They have him listed as John Beatty, but I am certain his name was James. De nada. I may have been wrong about him getting married and defrocked, but also de nada. He supposedly "retired" in San Diego, a haven of-sorts for predatory priests. The State of Illinois report lists one victim, but there were many more.)

I knew a few of the guys he molested. They never talked about it, but it scarred them for life. One of them drank himself to death in his 20s. The priesthood – religious authorities who molest, but who can command others to give birth. I wonder how many of these religious “authorities” have availed themselves to the innocence of children during the time of A.D. – Anno Domini, in the year of the "Lord." It could be millions.

So, a crackpot religious element is fanatical about something other people do, something they do themselves when push comes to shove, or dalliance comes to pregnancy. "Pro-life" is phony. Maybe we should make crackpot religion illegal. First we need to get the crackpots, molesters and sexual deviants off the "Supreme" Court. They should be forced to become priests.

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Here's a song. Jimmy Cliff. Garcia and Grisman. Norman Greenbaum. R.E.M. The Byrds. The Edwin Hawkins Singers. Joan Osborne. George Harrison. Bob Marley. Another from Bob Marley. And this. The Steve Miller Band. Another from the Steve Miller Band. The Grateful Dead.

This interview is worth seeing.