Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
Catholic
Family, Parenting and Religion
The Problem of Mother Church

The Problem of Mother Church

Last updated on: March 17, 2023 at 1:54 pm by Mary Pezzulo

0 Comments

The Problem of Mother Church 2023-03-17T13:54:47-04:00 Mary Pezzulo

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

I haven’t been myself lately.

Well, that’s not true. I’m ridiculously unable to be anything other than myself. That’s just the trouble.

The corner I’ve painted myself into is remarkable. Insofar as I have a following, I gained one as a Catholic writer back when I was so sick with a misdiagnosed chronic illness that I couldn’t do anything but sit up in bed and write about being a Catholic, and now here I am. And I’m more and more concerned about what I have to say.

There are quite a lot of topics I want to write about lately, but I’m having trouble finding my voice. I feel like a hypocrite when I write about Catholicism.

I’ve been trying for a long time to summarize what I feel.

I keep coming back to my mother.

I love my mother. I love her goofy sense of humor and her creativity. I lover her passion for children and the arts. I loved watching television with her and going shopping. I loved that she took me out of school to homeschool, because homeschooling and the homeschooling co-op we belonged to were a much better choice for my introversion and anxiety. I have good memories of her. But I had to cut ties with my mother because she wouldn’t stop hurting me.

This was made so much harder by the fact that she didn’t believe she was hurting me, and I knew it.

She thought she was being a great parent. She forced us into a high-control religion that promised to keep us safe from the coming wrath, because she wanted us to be safe more than anything. She restricted my media intake to a ridiculous degree, because she’d been allowed to go to see terrifying R-rated movies with her friends and been traumatized as a preteen in the 70s. She emotionally tortured me for my weight, because she wanted me to be healthy and attractive and honestly thought that was the best way to accomplish it. She mocked and berated me for my social awkwardness and introversion because she thought it would help me come out of my shell and make friends. She was just giving me the opposite of her neglectful childhood. She was trying to be a devoted mother.

It got so bad I was trying to make myself throw up in the bathroom, and hating myself that my hand wouldn’t fit down my throat.

It got so bad that I hated myself and contemplated suicide, but she wouldn’t stop trying to be a good mother.

I tried to set boundaries with her, over and over again, and those made her angry. I tried to explain to her that her behavior had been hurtful, but she wouldn’t listen. She hadn’t meant any harm, therefore she hadn’t caused any. No one but me had accused her of boundary issues, therefore she didn’t have any. She had received many compliments on her patience with such a difficult child. The problem must be me. And that’s where the conversation always ended.

Finally, I went no contact. I didn’t know what else to do. I would rather have set boundaries and had an arm’s length relationship– or even, eventually, with work, a healthy relationship. But that wasn’t an option. That’s where things stand with my earthly mother.

I was also given to believe that the Catholic Church was my mother. And I’ve tried to give her the love, loyalty and obedience of a grateful child to a perfect mother. But it hasn’t gone well.

The Catholic Church is the place I came to know God, and I do believe that God is real. I have never found a better verbalization of everything I know from my own experiences of God, then in the creed I was taught in the Catholic Church. I think the Holy Trinity is real, and I love the Holy Trinity. I think the Gospels are true, and I have tried to live them. I think the sacraments of the Catholic Church, or at least six of them, are really lifegiving and more beautiful than I can say.

But the Catholic Church also ruined my life.

I will never like myself, because of the Catholic Church. I will never be at peace with the fact that I’m bisexual, because of the Catholic Church. I will never be financially stable or out of student debt, because of the Catholic Church. I will never be able to go to bed without terror that God is going to punish me for entertaining the wrong thoughts or forgetting to confess a mortal sin or doubting what I ought to have believed firmly, because of the Catholic Church. I lost what was left of my family to the Catholic Church. I still have severe religious OCD episodes because of the Charismatic Renewal, and the Catholic Church refuses to suppress the Charismatic Renewal. They act like it’s a good thing. I was made to go to meetings of the lay arm of the Legionaries of Christ and watched innocent girls go away to those abusive boarding schools and come back traumatized. But the Catholic Church has refused to suppress the Legionaries of Christ even after it became public that they are a cult founded by a pedophile. I went to Franciscan University and I’ve already been very public about all the abuse and religious trauma there, and nothing will ever be done by the Church to shut them down. At this point, my panic attacks are so severe that I don’t know if I can ever go into a confessional or sit through a Mass again.

And the Catholic Church is proud of what she did.

The Catholic Church doesn’t think she can do wrong.

She thinks she has the fullness of truth, and anyone suggesting ways she can do better is an infiltrator from Satan. I’m just being difficult because I’m a sinner who needs discipline. I need to learn to die to myself and take on the Life of Christ. I don’t understand my apologetics. I don’t have enough appreciation for the Eucharist. Maybe I should go to Holy Mass and pray for the gift of obedience. Glorious saints had been able to remain faithful under her cruelty, so why can’t I? She didn’t mean any harm, therefore she hadn’t caused any. The problem must be me.

And maybe it is me.

But I am the only person I can ever be, and the Church who thinks she’s incapable of error did me irreparable harm.

I am trying to learn to think of the Catholic Church as a mother, but in a different way. She is someone from whom I come, someone who taught me so much of what I know, someone without whom I wouldn’t be alive. But she is also abusive and refuses to change. She is not only capable of error, but deeply in the wrong. She ought to repent, but she won’t. And I am deciding what to do about that. I would like there to be a peace that can be made.

I’m stuck on that for awhile.

What I say from now on is from that viewpoint. I’m not speaking as a grateful and obedient daughter anymore if I ever did. I’m a problem child. But I think I have good reason to be.

That’s all I have for today.

Mary Pezzulo is the author of Meditations on the Way of the Cross, The Sorrows and Joys of Mary, and Stumbling into Grace: How We Meet God in Tiny Works of Mercy.

Steel Magnificat operates almost entirely on tips. To tip the author, visit our donate page.

Family, Parenting and Religion

Abuse

Previous Post

March 1, 2023

Sign of the Hawks

Next Post

March 5, 2023 Outline of a Cross

Recent Comments

0 | Leave a Comment

"You're talking about supercessionism, the idea that Christians "replace" the covenant that the Jewish people ..."

Alex

Yes, the Old Testament is About ..."

"Oh I'm sure it did."

Mary

A Televised Execution is a Moral, ..."

"For what its worth, it seems like the whole thing originated from Pete Hegsith speaking ..."

Evil-Striker

A Televised Execution is a Moral, ..."

"You may be right. A war and its aftermath are different than day-to-day governance. Still, ..."

Mary

On Traditionalist Bullies, and the Death ..."

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category abortion Abuse Advent America American Christianity angel angels Annunciation Appalachia apparition apparition chaser apparition chasers apparition culture art art review babies baby baby Jesus Bad Lip Reading bad statue contest bath beauty Bible story blog blogkeeping blood book review Brandon Sanderson breastfeeding bus Catholic catholic conspiracy alarmism Catholic Oppositional Disorder Charismatic Renewal Charlie the Cat chastity Christ Christian idenitity Christianity and Judaism Chronic Illness clean clothing COD piece comedy compassion conscience conspiracy theory conversion cop-on-black violence Crucifixion cry of the poor culture Daesh Daily Saints death death penalty devotional diaconate diaper diapers dirty disability Donald Trump Dorothy Day dream drugs Eastern Catholicism Eastern Christianity education election election update Elsewhere on Patheos empathy environment Fear feminism film review fish flashback fluffy buns food Franciscan University of Steubenville Friendship Room fun Gabriel gardening gospel hair-splitting Heaven hell heresy Hillary Clinton history Holly the Witch Holy Spirit holy war Homeschooling homosexuality horror human dignity humor Icon idol immigrants infection inter-religious dialogue Interpretation of Scripture Islam Jesus Jihad Joseph joy laity and lay vocations lamb dinner laundry lent lgbtq literature love manners Mary Medicine and Science Meditation mercy mess milk misogyny Missouri monasticism monster motherhood mourn with those mourn movies movis music mystery nature neurodiversity New Pro-Life Movement news nonsense nostalgia O antiphons obituary objectification Ohio Valley Ordinary Time ordination Ordo Amoris parable paradox Passover peanut butter personal beliefs pets philosophy Planet Charismatic poetry politics polls poop Pope Francis Pope Leo power in the Church prayer prayer request prayers preferential option for non-violence president presidential election priest primary private revelation pro-life prophecy Public face of Catholicism Pure Flix Q and A race racism random rape rape. sexuality reader's request Reckoners refugee religious trauma ressurrection Right to life Saints saints and celebrations same-sex same-sex marriage satire scandal secular feasts seder Seven Joys Seven Last Words sex sexual ethics sexuality silencing six months skid row slavery social justice Speculative fiction spiritual abuse spoon stain story suffering suffrage suffragette Sunday Gospel temple Tenebrae Responsories Terror the exorcist The Friendship Room The New Pro-Life Movement Things I Learned on the Internet tin cup traffic true story tv review Uncategorized USCCB vice and temptation violence Virtue virtue and vice war Way of the Cross whimsy whole life women's ordination work of mercy Year A

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 February 2026 January 2026 December 2025 November 2025 October 2025 September 2025 August 2025 July 2025 June 2025 May 2025 April 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 November 2024 October 2024 September 2024 August 2024 July 2024 June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What does "Rabboni" mean, as Mary Magdalene called Jesus after the resurrection?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Savior Messenger Shepherd Teacher