There's Something About Catholicism #3

Questioning Years

Being gay of course, part of me felt that the Church was against me because of what I would see on the television, in the news etc; but another part of me didn't feel rejection from the Church, but nurture, love and care in the form of my school counsellor. In her office were posters to the effect of "Homophobia is NOT ACCEPTABLE" and "This school is a homophobic free-zone." Being a Catholic school, I suppose they could easily have taken the other approach, like many other schools, private, religious, secular or state do.

In a "gothed-up" CCW uniform at the college gates.
2001/02.

Still, religion wasn't an interest to me, but quite a drag. History was never one of my favourite subjects earlier on. I wanted practical things - subjects such as art. Being in high school, my parents also gave us the option to go with them to mass on Sunday's, so I rejected that offer and looked forward to my Sunday sleep-in's. Many of the kids at school didn't go to mass because of a similar arrangement but more commonly because their parents weren't particularly religious, if at all, but wanted a good education for their child. They knew Catholic College could provide like no other school in Albury/Wodonga at the time (even at the present time, in my own honest opinion) so being religious wasn't exactly "the in thing" either.

The friends I'd attended primary school with had ditched me for being gay, so I found new friends with a bunch of girls, and we became a small group of the bazaar, myself favouring the goth persuasion. With that I opened a whole bag of ideas when it came to God and religion, and I started looking into the more strange religions of the pagans, Wicca and even Satanism, before finally settling on atheism, with a dark-leaning, where I would occupy spare time writing essays comparing similarities with cannibalism, vampirism and Catholicism, or essays on how Satanism is a plausible and humane religion more-so than any of the traditional religions or the East or the West.