“Hello son. It’s your mother”.
As ever, I immediately start to feel guilty without quite being able to put my finger on why.
“I want to ask you a question”.
Mum’s questions are usually along the following lines: “Do you think your sister H is sleeping with her boyfriend?”
“Well Mum, I cannot be entirely certain, but as she is 30 and they have been sharing a house with him for 4 years I’m sure it must at least have crossed her mind. Would you like me to take steps to confirm it for you? What sort of evidence would suffice?”
This time, however, she had a something new in mind – a fresh, invigorating inquisitory breeze to rinse the cobwebs from the conversational rafters.
“Do you believe in the Apostolic Church?”
“Excuse me?”
“Do you believe in the Apostolic Church?”
“Yes. It’s part of the creed I regularly recite”
“Yes, but do you believe it?”
“Do you mean, do I stand up in Church and lie my arse off before God and my fellow man?”
“I don’t remember mentioning arses – do you know what it means?”
“Yes I do”
“Do you know anything about the history of the early church?”
“I do, in fact I am presently reading the surprisingly droll ‘A Short History of Christianity‘ by Stephen Tomkins”.
“Well I worry about you you know”.
“Why? Of all your children I’m the only one who could deploy a rosary to see off a vampire with anything like conviction”
“Because you show insufficient respect for the Blessed Virgin”
“Bleh?!”
“It worries me, it really does”
“What the fuck?!”
“She’s appearing you know at Medjugorje and you don’t believe it”.
She had me. I do find it intrinsically hard to believe that the Blessed Virgin is regularly appearing to a couple of people in the former Yugoslavia and, inconveniently for the rest of us, proving stubbornly invisible and inaudible to everyone else.
“Mum, while I enjoy our little chats may I ask what the hell has brought this on?” The answer, it appears, is that it was America’s fault. My mother has discovered an online Catholic TV Channel called EWTN. She loves it so dearly that she has maxed out her broadband usage and, gripped by withdrawal symptoms, had decided to share with me some of the gems from its broadcast schedule.
She was anxious that the next time someone attacked the Catholic Church I would be in a position to rebut their calumnies. No amount of assuring her that no-one had ever asked me to justify the Borgia Popes or launched an all out conversational assault on the Vatican seemed to be able to convince her that it would be better if we could draw the conversation to a close and allow me to return to watching the football on Sky.
I will soon post a “Mary” photo for you. Just for you. I’ll let you know when.
Heh.
The first thing my sister said when she got pregnant was to express her horror that our parents now had undeniable proof that she’d had sex.
A Short History of Christianity. Sounds promising! It’s next on my list after the Lemony Snickett books.
I have a friend who has a pancake that looks like a profile of Mary with her head bowed in prayer. How’s that for proof?
“Well I worry about you you know ……words that strike dread in our hearts.
Wow…religion and a mothers worry……soooo glad my mom is an athiest!
She still does the worry thing…but usually over the state of my house.
wow…that’s some heavy stuff to be putting on your shoulders. your mom should contact my mom so they can conference call the catholic channel together. did you say, mary has been appearing for years in medjugorje and i’m thinking the frequency has been on put on static?
This was hilarious, Moobs. Maybe because I can SO relate to the non-point, vagueish guilt before an explanatory word is even uttered. That, and the Catholic thing. Then again, isn’t guilt and Catholicism kinda synonymous?
I find the last 1000 years of Catholic history to be rather more interesting than the first 1000, that’s when they did most of their best persecuting.
Okay. Present for you today. Oh. The. Joys. (of Catholic Mary Love)
I was raised Catholic and now I’m not. Don’t tell Mum I said this, but Mary was just a woman who gave birth. She was important in His day, but not so much after that. Mum needs to dwell more on Mary’s offspring. 😉
Hey, don’t throw that rosary at me.
Found you through Oh, The Joys.
Hys-terical!
I’ll be checking back in.
Apostolic Creed – wasn’t he a character in the “Rocky” films?
You know, black guy. Rocky’s first adversary, later his trainer. Eventually gets brained by Ivan Drago.
Apostolic Creed was played by the great Carl Weathers, I believe.
Wow, your mother sounds like a colourful character. It’s hard to imagine anyone getting hooked on Catholic TV, highlights: 24 hour mass marathon. But I guess addicts are addicts and some people really do get a buzz out of watching old women mumbling the rosary.
I actually did laugh out loud (but i’m still not too friendly with the use of LOL)! What a comical relationship you have with your mother–love the first half of this blog entry the most.
I can’t believe you said: “fuck” to your mother in a conversation about the vigin mary. You’re a rock star.
And since today is “Take every single thing personally day”, I will have you know that my American parents were kicked out of the Catholic church before I was born – so it’s not MY American fault that YOUR mother called you to talk about the virgin mary.
OtJ – Thanks for the beautiful, if frankly bizarre, picture.
Kate – Did suggesting a virgin birth not occur to her?
Jozet – how could anyone not believe with evidence like that.
Crunchy – We solve that problem by never lettting mum into the house.
Wenchy-woo – I can take out a stampeding cow with a rosary at 25 paces.
Mamma- You are most welcome.
Menace – Yes that’s the one – with the groovy shorts. I believe in that sucka
Emma – Being a US cable channel most of the people who appear on it have disturbingly white teeth and seem to be preserving their youth through sinister means
Hollly 0- Mum is available for hire this christmas.
Claudia – I am Wimbledon’s answer to Sid Vicious (i.e. “Sidney Scrupulousy Polite But Inclined to Talk Down To You”). Unless you allow everyopne else to blame America for eveything there will be a complete global guilt meltdown. France, in particular, would simply implode.
You could have just said: “is too”
Claudia – lawyers get paid by the hour
again we can blame everything on americans and television 🙂
Quite a mum you have there! Moms are always so fraught with worry while we’re just trying to watch our damned football, or whatever.
Everything is America’s fault. We’re used to it.