No Music, Per Week

The most absurd thing I was ever required to do as a child is attend daily mass, prior to the start of the school day at Saint Martha’s Parochial School. From the beginning of my third grade year, through and including my eighth grade, I attended a mass conducted in Latin, in a freezing church, while wearing nothing more than the school sweater to keep me warm.

The church was cold because the pastor was trying desperately to save money, St. Martha’s having only come into existence a matter of two or three years before I became a pupil. I actually attended St. Joseph’s as a first grader, where we did not attend daily mass, and where the church was warm and cozy.

At St. Martha's in an effort to have all students appear the same, we were not allowed to wear anything other than the school uniform of salt/pepper cords and white shirts, with light blue school sweater the sole option for outer wear. We were not allowed to wear jackets.

At the time, though I intensely disliked the practice, I never questioned it because that is the way young Catholic children rolled. To question these matters was to bring into doubt, the salvation of your soul, and we certainly couldn’t have that, could we?

Now, I have no compunctions questioning the practice. I wasted close to an hour per school day for six years, including herding us to and fro as a school, lining up outside in front of our classrooms, and being led inside by our nun-in-charge to begin the real school day. It's not quite the same thing as noting that a particular class, in any given year, did not help with forward progress.

If we arrived late for mass, we were required to enter the church unobtrusively, and adjourn to the back to a special pew for miscreants. After mass, Father Mac came around to where we were lined up out in the cold, and grilled us individually as to why we were late. 

I hated it because if I were tardy, it was inevitably due to a carpooling development, and out of my hands. It was embarrassing, unnecessary and served to do nothing more than stress me out. For six years attending mass is the way I got ready for my school day.

I wonder if an hour of art, music, PE or study hall might not have been more beneficial? The year I graduated from 8th grade I got 45 minutes of PE per week, one-half hour of art per week and no music, per week. That’s a lot of weeks without music.

I have tried, diligently, to envision what that would look like today. I’m talking specifically about escorting about 40 eighth graders (the number in my class back in 1966) into two long pews, while they sat through an incomprehensible religious exercise. 

I might also have included "pointless" to that description, but the question remains: How would you keep a class of 8th graders focused on a religious rite, rather than on their media devices, today? Check them at the door? 

I don’t know that I have suffered irreparable damage from the experience, but I do suspect that after age nineteen, when I bailed from the Catholic Church for good, I have chosen a life which will-gasp-leave my soul damned for all eternity.

Eternity? It can’t possibly last longer than any one of those interminable sessions in St. Martha’s Parochial School, attending daily mass.