The Altar/1985

I started feeling differently in Mass for months even before I started reading the bible. I would weep whenever Father Alberto Ruiz would preach. The words pierced me. It wasn’t that I thought he was beautiful, he was, there was a conviction upon me. I wanted more out of Church.

Reading the Bible convinced me that I needed to discuss the Catholic faith with him. There were four main points I wanted to discuss with him. 1) Confession/Reconciliation. Why did we still confess our sins to the Priest and not to God directly? 2) All the statues in the Church/the idolatry. Why did we need statues when the 2nd Commandment explicitly forbade it? 3) Why did we still need priests? When we were all priests and Jesus is our High Priest. 4) Why did we have a Pope, and why did they call him Holy Father, and kiss his ring. Why was he the head of the Catholic Church? Why was he considered infallible?

I used to watch a lot of Billy Graham crusades and would get on my knees in front of the T.V. to receive Jesus, then I wrote a letter in my notebook that I never sent to him about accepting Jesus as my personal Savior. I wrote to him June 4th, after I had been reading the bible for 3 weeks.

The first time I spoke to Alberto, he told me I was confused that I was going to other churches. He told me to stop reading the bible that it was only confusing me. I was convinced I had to speak to him a second time.

Everything in the world seemed wrong, and wasn’t what I thought, up was down, and down was up. If all of the Catholics were wrong, how come I was the only one who saw it?

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I had already upset the delicate balance Sunday, when I cried in Mass after I received Communion. But that outburst was nothing. Momma had announced we were going to my stepfather Arthur’s to watch movies. We had already argued this morning about my torn jeans which she hated. I phoned her from my job at the university to apologize. She said Arthur had invited us for movies. We’d leave around 5:00 p.m. Good, I thought then I’ll have just enough time to talk to the priest Alberto. He was about 40, with a dark mustache. He reminded me of Emiliano Zapata the General from the Mexican Revolution.

I didn’t tell momma about my appointment with the priest Father Alberto. I knew it would have infuriated her. Professor Thorpe, my boss said there was really no work that day. I began to write the Scriptures I was going to use to show him why I believed the way I did. I had this optimistic fantasy all planned out in my head, that Alberto would see what was in the Bible and leave the priesthood.

So, I was at home by 2:00 in the afternoon. I put on my new red shirt and my sister Misi’s blue pants. I couldn’t bring myself to tell momma that I had made this appointment which was very important to me. Somehow, in the back of my mind I knew she would make me miss this appointment. But, I so desperately wanted to discuss the bible with the priest Alberto for two reasons. I became disillusioned with the Catholic Church, and the second reason I really liked him. When I told momma she got angry. She told me to go to my cousins Sandy’s church, who was a Jehovah’s Witness. Leave your beliefs outside the church, which made no sense. Well, I couldn’t very well do that, as outspoken as I was. I went back into my room to listen to the Osmond’s. I must have fallen asleep because momma woke me up, and screamed, “I’ll take you!”

“Forget it momma, I cancelled the appointment.” Which wasn’t true at all, so I told her I was going for a walk. She threatened,

“Get back inside, or we won’t go to Arthur’s.” Her second husband she wasn’t even living with.

But, I stormed out of the apartment anyway I was 20 and filled with conviction. There is nothing worse than that.

Momma shouted a cruel remark, before I left, “I’d rather have you a thousand times pregnant, than to have you act like this!”

What was so bad about the way I was acting? Momma was a control freak she had to control everybody in the family since her divorce with daddy.

I left, to St. Anthony’s Church. It was at least 4 miles away, but I was filled with adrenaline. As I cut across the fields, there were workers taking a break from the heat. I took off my tennis shoes, to punish my feet, and carried my tennis shoes under my arm. I needed immediate punishment the stickers began to stab at my bare feet. I finally came to Maple Ave. Chestnut still looked a mile away. I was already angry, so I decided not to see Alberto. Instead I stopped at the 7-11 to buy a soda. I sat on the patch of grass on the corner, to assuage my thirst and contemplate the Scriptures I had written down to discuss. I don’t know why I began to think about the different forms of harassment I had encountered until now. The Army and the discharge I got. I took a razor blade out of my purse and began to slice the pages in my notebook. Did it matter? Who really cared? I walked across the street to the church, and sat under the palm tree there. I began to strike at my wrists, as if the razor was a snake the pain not intense enough.

I was in a church and who saw me? I went over to the front of the church, it was locked, of course, I thought. I sat on the bricks that surrounded the plants. Was this the kind of pitiful life I wanted to be miserable, destitute, lonely and naked inside? Death perhaps was more inviting.

I rang the rectory doorbell, and Father Barron answered. He was the older Mexican priest who always had a somber look on his face. He was nice, not at all as I expected from Mass. He allowed me to use the phone to call momma. I hid my wounded hand from him. He smiled, and I left. I washed my wrists in the fountain, in front of the rectory. I walked into the side door of the sanctuary which wasn’t locked. The statues looked unconcerned, their God. God, God could see me from the time I was inside the womb, all through my life up until this moment. I sat in a pew in front of the altar and began to cut my wrists. I was melodramatic. As if to say, “Let God see me.” As I sat there, emptiness stabbed me, as if I was dying from loneliness.

Father Gomez walked in and said, “Hello.” “Are you the young lady Father Alberto had an appointment. He waited an hour.”

“I didn’t feel like meeting with him.” I said. He didn’t see the razor blade the first time. Blood was bubbling under the fabric of my shirt, seeping out.

“Do I know you; your eyes look familiar?” he said.

“I have those kind of eyes” I answered sadly.

He left the sanctuary. I talked to my heart as I often did, as I had no friends. Loneliness swallowed me deep inside like a voracious mouth, burying me alive. I began to sob like a child. Momma was harsh we didn’t understand each other at all. Since the divorce, she was a different person, controlling and bitter.

When Father Gomez returned he caught a glimpse of the shiny razor gripped in my fingers. His face seemed slightly horrified.

“Please give me the razor blade.” He said gently with his hand extended.

“It’s mine.” I said irrationally.

“I know”, but let me have it."

I handed it believing he would bring me out of this state I was in, the lonely place of execution.

“What’s your name?” he asked.

“Michelle.” I lied.

He took me by the arm to the rectory. “Let’s go to my office to talk.”

Suddenly I spied Alberto in blue jeans. I had put so much trust in him.

“Look who I found”, Father Gomez said, “Michelle.”

“My name’s not Michelle”, I said irritated.

“Her name is Matty”, Alberto said. “How come you never came?” He had brown shoe button eyes.

“My momma didn’t let me come.” I said.

The three of us sat in Father Gomez’s office.

“Why did you do that?” Father Alberto asked. “I saw you on the corner, why didn’t you come?” “You came this far?”

Right there I wanted to tell him what a bastard he really was. But I couldn’t bring myself to cuss, since I never swore. Momma wouldn’t allow her children to cuss, even though she and daddy always did. Besides, he was a priest, even if our beliefs conflicted a little.

“You don’t care.” I said like a spoiled toddler to her father. This was my favorite accusation. What would it have cost him to have gotten out of his car to see if I was alright? He couldn’t even give me a little consideration. “I trusted you.” I told him on the phone the other day. When I tried to leave, they wouldn’t let me. They both stood in front of the door. I was suddenly thirsty. I asked him for some water. Alberto left the room to get the water. He came back a moment later with a large glass of ice water. I greedily gulped at it. But I wouldn’t talk to him. He sat next to me on the couch.

It was a beautiful carpeted office, with a desk, office phones, cards, typewriters. It was all so nice. This made me angry, as I looked around. He couldn’t take the time to see if I was alright. I couldn’t tell him, I was numb, just dead it was that feeling again of not being real.

The other priest, Father Gomez brought bandages for my wrists it wasn’t bleeding too badly as I was too cowardly to cut too deep. It already hurt. When he put it on, I ripped it off only a few minutes later. Once again, I tried to leave, but Father Alberto, grabbed me, holding onto my petite frame. I struggled to get out of his embrace, but he wouldn’t let go. He ripped my shirt, as I tried to pull away from his strong grip. Before they came he sat on me to keep me there. I felt so betrayed. He was Judas. I wasn’t Jesus, but Jesus knew betrayal from someone who pretended to love him. Alberto pretended to care.

Then the police knocked on the door of the rectory. The police with the mustache had an intense countenance. The other police officer seemed kinder.

“What did I do?” Why did you call the cops?" I demanded to know. I began to weep. “I didn’t do anything wrong.” In that moment I wanted momma, I wanted to go home. Before the police took me outside, I hugged Alberto hard for what seemed like minutes. The police tore me away, and handcuffed my aching wrists.

“You’re hurting me.” “Alberto, please don’t let them do this?”

But he did. It was then I realized the utter horror of what happened to me. I needed Jesus, and not this man who betrayed me.

There was an ambulance waiting outside for me. I didn’t want to go to the hospital again. My body struggled against the mustached officer’s grip, as he walked me in handcuffs to the paramedics in the ambulance. "The officer with the mustache told me. “If you don’t want your feet tied like a pig, behave!”

The paramedics began to ask me questions.

“How tall are you?”

“5,2”, I answered in a daze.

“How much do you weigh?”

“110 lbs.”

I had been in the U.S. Army nearly 2 years, graduated in the top 7% of my high school class. I went to City College. And who cared? I gasped, the sensation you feel when you’ve been under water too long. I couldn’t catch my next breath. I was in between breaths, wondering if I should even bother to take the next breath. My soul ached; he had bruised it. I don’t know what I expected from Alberto. I gazed at Father Barron expectedly from the back of the ambulance with liquid brown eyes. He gazed back at me similarly with pity in his. I don’t know what I wanted from him. My gaze should have been on Jesus, and not a man. He told me I would be alright, and made the sign of the cross over me.

“I’m sorry I messed up your church.” I wanted to sob, my voice sounded like a child’s.

“You didn’t.” He replied, “I’ll pray for you.”

Father Barron promised to pray for me. Not even Alberto said he’d pray for me.

“The Lord is near to those who have a broken heart, and saves such as have a contrite spirit.

(Psalm 34:18)

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