folk Catholicism
or,"of faith and fairytale"
my other neocities page, The Church in the Woods
it feels like home; it feels like reclamation; it feels like connection.
let's start here: i am a leftist, feminist, witchy individual who despises American nationalist evangelicalism. i was also raised Catholic, and from a young age instilled with these stories and characters, spirits that throughout my life have felt tangible and available for help. I also have OCD, which has often resulted in "scrupulosity" obsessions - an ambient guilt and fear of being morally or religiously transgressive. over the years i've done a lot of reading and thinking and experimenting and i discovered folk catholicism, a place for people like me who feel genuine love and connection to these ancestral spirits and saints, who feel heartbroken and furious at the modern human church.
it feels like home; it feels like reclamation; it feels like connection.
it's catholicism for the "folk" - the people. it's decentralized, personal, and "witchy" (in the modern sense; that is to say, mystical, not the evil "witchcraft" feared in the middle ages that is so often incorrectly and harmfully conflated with modern alternative spiritual paths). it's not the bigoted megachurch spectacle or the careless recitation of words without meaning; it's a quiet, sacred relationship with a force you met as a child. it's a continued veneration of the earliest spiritual allies introduced to you. it's paying respect to a familial line that decided to pass these stories down to you, while also actively learning and undoing any harmful misconceptions that have slipped in through the game of telephone. i personally am of the belief that every spiritual path is using different words to point towards the same truth, the same "source"/"God"/"way". raised as i was, the most familiar and comfortable set of vocabulary for me to understand that infinite "source" is that of Catholicism. that's not because i think i'm right and everyone else is wrong, it's just because it's the path i know best. i like praying the Rosary, i feel really close to Mother Mary, and i like keeping track of what phase the moon is in. i say the St. Anthony prayer when i misplace something ("Dear St. Anthony, Please come around, ___ is lost and needs to be found!"), i call on St. Francis when i drive past a dead animal, and i pick flowers and light incense to say thank you. it's everything that feels right to me, and nothing that doesn't.
it feels like home; it feels like reclamation; it feels like connection.
lately, i've been really into these vintage depictions of Christian figures that look straight out of a brothers grimm book. deeply anachronistic images, like the Nativity scene in a snowy forest, speak to me about syncretism and the "folk" understanding of these stories throughout history. humans like their spirits to feel familiar and immediate, like neighbors and native plants. these images remind me of how Christianity felt as a child; in the mix with fairy tales and fables, fantastical and magical. are miracle and magic really so different? could someone stumble upon Mother Mary in the forest like a fairy godmother? modern Christianty often feels so sterile, rigid, beige, and confined. I adore how kitschy and homey and alive these images feel. warm like a grandmother's knitting and fantastical like a storybook. hard-to-pin-down. courageous. beautiful.
