The Confession Booth

If you are, or ever were ever a practicing catholic, you know what the confession booth is all about.

I grew up catholic. Yep, the knee highs, white button down shirts, and that itchy, hard-to-iron, plaid skirt.

8th grade was my favorite year. I had a best freind that I will call "Mary." The two of us most likely have more scars on our hands than anyone else that ever went to parochial school. That is because the nuns would hit us on our hands with rulers if we disobeyed the rules. The rules were a growing list of absolutely everything it seemed. A sample of the rules Mary and I broke:

*No gum (this was a repeat offense of mine and my left middle finger has two scars from this alone)
*Knee highs had to be white (Mary seemed to wear gray but I think it was her washing machine)
*No ear rings (How do you flirt without twisiting ear rings? They were a "have-to-have")
* No cussing. No comment.

Then there were the rules that nobody knew were rules until you "broke" them. For expample:

*No sunbathing (well, we stayed dressed for crying out loud. We just sort of hiked up the skirt a little)
* No writing notes in class (Ok. Everyone should know this is a rule but they never actually said it was a rule)
* No carving into the trees on the playground (I think "I love Perry" is still on the tree next to the rectory and he was worth the ruler treatment)

All of these offenses were on a longer list that got both myself and Mary sent to confession. Confession! This is such an intersting thing. It feels a little like meeting GOD, except through blinds. (Not that I have ever met him before. (although I have met a few people that think they are God) I just think it may be that scary.

You kneel in the dark. and you say "Forgive me Father, for I have sinned" (even if you think you didn't. Now this is very very important. You say it anyway or "confession" never starts and you are in the dark forever.

Then, the priest opens the blinds and light comes into the booth. And then he says stuff, you say stuff, he says stuff, you say stuff..... then he says "say 5 Hail Marys and 10 Father's Prayers."

You dutifully go to the pew and start ticking away on your rosary beads. Now, you think this is personal and nobody but you and that preist knows how bad you are. HA HA HA!

Mary and I knew exactly who the very bad people were. You see, it's a time-based approach. We figured the longer you stayed on those beads, the worse you were. Which is why we came up with short hand prayers. We were up and out faster than you can say "Forgive me Father, for I have sinned."