OPLAN PEPE: Patricia Malay
Posted by Ana on October 18, 2009 · 5 Comments
Patricia Malay, radio personality and former Catholic speaks about her intensely devout Catholic upbringing and her feelings of restriction and isolation.
Just like Shirin, Patricia is part of a new generation of free-thinkers, tired of being silenced, tired of being taught not to question and to just blindly follow.
Three years ago, I made a conscious decision to turn away from Catholicism. I didn’t abandon Christianity though, and am now a practicing (to the best and worst of my abilities, with God’s help!) Christian.
I grew up in an Opus Dei school. I was taught that the highest calling for women was to be a wife and a mother. I was taught to be impressed with the many Opus Dei-practicing families who had six, seven, eight or more children and it was impressed upon me that this was something I needed to aspire to [have]. I remember being a naive 16 year old, announcing to everyone that I wanted to be married by 24 and have six kids.
I went to mass almost daily, performing menial tasks during mass like trimming candlesticks to be one level. I liked boys, just as so many of my friends in my all-girl school, but I was told that even holding hands with them was an occasion of sin, so I just stayed away completely. Our Opus Dei priests and numeraries (civilians who practice celibacy and live in a communal center for men or women) who taught in school were always right and could not be objected to.
Then, college in ATENEO – it was everything that my grade and high school weren’t. I was shocked because the Jesuit priests actually welcomed opposition and encouraged free thinking. I was overwhelmed by the fact that there were so many boys around me because my restrictive upbringing didn’t teach me how to socialize with them normally. It soon became clear to me that I was duped…I felt like I was honestly duped. I had subscribed to the Opus Dei ideal for so long and so blindly, that when I saw what the real world was like, I felt very much like I was cheated, and had no recourse but to run the other way.
I stopped going to mass completely. I stopped my weekly confessions. I stopped praying. I had gotten angry with God all of a sudden and wanted nothing but to stay as far away from anything Catholic. I dabbled in other faiths, curious about Buddha, the Tao and Zen teachings. I read up on the Kabbalah and wondered if the answers I was looking for could be found there. It took a while, but I found my groove again and was reunited with a much more comfortable idea of who God really is in my life. My born-again friend reintroduced Him to me at a difficult time of my life, and I rediscovered a God who is just and also full of mercy; a God that is understanding and full of love, who has a heart for the lost, who wants His children to enjoy a life of abundance.
I’m a proud Christian and am at my happiest here. Although I do believe that everyone has a choice to believe what they want to believe, I feel I have a moral obligation to tell as many people as I can about the lies of the Catholic Church in order to keep the people dumbed down. It’s impossible for me to keep quiet about this because I know how it was to be that way… and I know how it is now that I’m not there anymore.
I suppose my change in point of view also came when I realized that God is more pleased with a sincere and earnest search for Him, instead of the ritualistic repeat of responses and prayers and observations that we don’t even know the meanings of anymore. When we pray “Our Father” or “I believe in God”, I wonder if we say these words with conviction. Because in my head, words like that — if they’re meant — should be shouted and declared loudly because they’re powerful. These are the tennets of what Catholics believe. But see how they pray. But that’s only one aspect of why I’m displeased.
One of the many things I’ve realized is how damaging it is for a priest practicing celibacy to be in charge of so many people with different, individual needs. How can denying that a person has natural urges be good for him? So maybe some priests can do it successfully. But some, as we’ve heard, haven’t been so successful. Or how can a priest know how to counsel a married couple when he has no experience at all with marriage? These things make me angry.
I felt a little bit of guilt from my decision. I still do sometimes when I see my parents, who are staunch “sagrado katolikos”, displeased with my decision. But I also think that guilt is part of the Catholic psyche and should be acknowledged, dealt with and then rejected.
I believe, as I said earlier, in every person’s right to choose. The Catholic Church should respect that, too. They should also stay away from matters of government and give advice to leaders only when asked, not muscle their congregation into supporting or not supporting leaders and proposed laws that aren’t in agreement with their dogma.
The Catholic Church must also remember that our world is constantly changing, our country with so many varied needs. If the church really has a compassion for the people, they will put these people first, just as Jesus did and allow them to be equipped with information that can help them make wiser decisions. For example, I really, truly believe that the RH [Reproductive Health] Bill is not against God’s plan –it is a means for people to be plan their life, to live a better quality of life. There is no provision in the RH Bill for termination of life or abortion. How is that not in unison with God? The bottom line is that the God I believe in says in the Bible that poverty is a curse, NOT a situation or circumstance that people should just bear in His name. Disallowing poor people from having access to contraception ties them to poverty even longer. It doesn’t make sense.
I go back to my point of how can a priest or a nun know anything at all about how it is to be poor and married to an unemployed drunkard with ten mouths waiting to be fed and another one on the way? How could they know what it feels like to have to send these kids to beg on the streets instead of going to school where they can learn and play, like all children have a right to? What do they say in the face of this poverty and suffering? Don’t have sex? Stop sleeping with your spouse? I think these questions are just the tip of the iceberg. But I don’t think these are questions that will ever be answered by any priest or nun in a satisfactory way. The Catholic Church has now, more than at any other time in our nation’s history, proven itself to be more hurtful than helpful. They don’t address the problems of this country and, in fact, keep those problems from being solved. We’ve been kept in the dark for too long, and we shouldn’t stand for it anymore.
Patricia, part of a new generation of freethinkers, banding together to fight for a secular Philippines.
Patricia, isa sa mga bagong Pepe na nagsalita na sapagka’t pagod na sya maging pipi. [Patricia, one of the new Pepe’s who has finally spoken up because she’s tired of being silenced].
Ikaw, Pepe ka ba o pipi?
Email your thoughts to: oplanpepe@yahoo.com
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“Or how can a priest know how to counsel a married couple when he has no experience at all with marriage?” —
Well, both Catholics and born-again Christians are counseled about death by priests/pastors who have never died…
I am not defending the Catholic Church or anything, but you know, despite the fact that I grew up surrounded by priests and nuns (I went to school run by nuns and we have priests in the family), I have never really felt like I was “muscled” into “supporting or not supporting leaders and proposed laws”. In my family (and school), we are free to vote for whoever we think is the right leader; express our opinions on the RH Bill without fear of getting reprimanded or being called sinners; hold hands with the people we love.
Maybe we should look at these things on a case to case basis and not make generalizations about Catholics and Catholicism.
I think your idea of Catholicism is muddled. Priests are physical representatives of Jesus Christ, doing Jesus’ works and continuing the work of God in this world… “Do this in memory of me.” Sigh, I don’t know what born-again Christians are so proud about, when you have very radical views and can’t rationalize it well enough to find eternal truths.
Compassion is present in the Catholic Church, and I think Pope John Paul II was very instrumental in that mission. We Muslims look up to him. A little visit to vatican.va might help you get further insights on what the Catholic Church is currently doing or had been doing, if you think they’ve left you in the dark. I sure don’t seem like I’m in the shadow.
So Catholics don’t do bible study groups or service like you do or rock the church with loud music… you think Catholics line up aimlessly to receive communion and blindly say their prayers every night or every morning? You think they don’t practice it as devotedly as they should… maybe some don’t, but a visit to their churches everyday will show you that quite a lot do too. How ignorant you are and how appalling it is to read articles like this to bash one’s own Christianity–to put down your own religion like that, it’s disappointing. And here I am a Muslim defending Catholicism.
You should have summarized point by point why the RH Bill 5043 will work for our country to convince people like me who think this bill is trash, because it’s incomplete. What concrete plan does it have other than to service the pockets of those who made it? I think that will make you a RATIONAL hero.
This particular line got me to think that many of us doesn’t really know the reason behind things and we are so quick in offering our judgment. ( and now you may think that I am passing my judgment too… well, i’m not. I am just trying to give some light on this particular comment by the writer)
“One of the many things I’ve realized is how damaging it is for a priest practicing celibacy to be in charge of so many people with different, individual needs.”
The very basic human tendency is the animal side of everyone. The “BASIC INSTINCT” that resides in the very core of our being human. Now, to set things straight on the celibacy issue and the logic behind this very challenging and very self denying vow, let me tell you this:
According to the Catholic encyclopedia, “Celibacy is the renunciation of marriage implicitly or explicitly made, for the more perfect observance of chastity, by all those who receive the Sacrament of Orders..”
Now, what is chastity? It is a vow and according to Anthony Malaviaratchi in his “Initation Into Religious Life”, “A vow is a free and deliberate promise made to God. It is a voluntary act of religion by
which we deliberately bind ourselves to something better, which is not commanded by God. It is a
sign of self-offering. As religious, we bind ourselves with vows in total self-giving to God. They
bind us in conscience and must be lived in a spirit of generosity and love”
To practice celibacy is to deny one’s self of what is basic. This is being voluntarily practiced by priests for the love of God, of what is GOOD and what is RIGHT. It is a vow that binds our conscience. By nature, we humans are good and we are always guided by our conscience to perform and to do what is good. Educated or not, Catholics or non-catholics, knows what is good and what is bad. Good is what makes one truly happy and genuinely satisfied without hurting anyone and denying anyone of what is rightfully theirs.
By voluntarily entering into the vow of celibacy, the priests consciously give themselves and consciously enter into the vow of chastity. Both “chastity / celibacy is freely chosen and lived for evangelical reasons. It is viewed as a commitment of love and not just a renunciation of marriage and sex. To view this vow merely as a
renunciation has a great repercussion in the actual living out of the vow of chastity. The old /
traditional understanding of chastity which focuses more on denial and renunciation and a negative
attitude toward sexuality and marriage as a Christian vocation is often seen today as overly
characterized by fear, guilt, repression, and leading to serious affective underdevelopment in many
religious” as what Sandra Scheider said in her book “New Wineskins Re-imagining Religious Life Today”.
If one can successfully perform these vows, then it only means that your self discipline and commitment to what is good is so strong since this is also guided by love and generosity. To have self discipline, genuine love and generosity is one of the many factors that may neutralize and then eventually eradicate the evils that we are all facing in this world. It may sound idealistic but if we spend some time thinking about it, it makes sense. Some may agree, some may not.
Going back to what the author mentioned as damaging for priests, i believe this is a manifestation of grave ignorance that led to biased accusations and self-righteousness. If priests have taken on these vows voluntarily, it means to say that they are doing their duties out of love and compassion and generosity and an enlightened conscience/soul, how can they go wrong and how can this be damaging? For one to be in charge of so many people from all walks of life with different individual needs, does anyone need anything aside from love, compassion, generosity and an enlightened soul?
Peace everyone…