All that you can’t leave behind

You’ll never guess where I found myself last Friday evening. At the pub? In a restaurant? Auditioning for a remake of The Golden Girls? Not even close – I was sitting meekly at the back of a church trying my best to not stick out like Victoria Beckham at a weight watchers meeting.

The reason I was there was that my Occasionally Holy Friend was giving a speech and I went along for support. You can imagine my shame when I realised my usual banners, chants and whoops were not the done thing in those parts and my support was best shown in silence with the odd supportive glance in his direction.

It was the first time in about ten years that I voluntarily went to such an event. It was Good Friday so it was all about the cross and Jesus dying. Ironically it was the bizarre ritual of everyone kissing the cross on Good Friday in church that first put me off religion all those years ago. I remember looking at this piece of wood covered in lipstick and thinking now why would I ever want to queue up to kiss that. I was ten years old.

What I did find both terrifying and magical last week was how in many ways things had not changed since I was a boy. I was all grown up now thank you very much and here I was in an English speaking church in the Netherlands hearing the very same songs that I heard in St John’s Church Tralee all those years ago. The same prayers and same stories. I almost felt like a kid again (no priest jokes please!). It was an extremely startling experience witnessing all of this again- something which had been an integral part of my life long ago. Both my parents were professional Catholics so to speak - so going to church (and all the other accessories) was by default a major part of my life. But I had moved on and the church and I had simply grown apart. It wasn’t them – it was me!

What was curiously different though was that this church had ushers. At one point you had to put up your hand if you hadn’t received a little booklet so the ushers could rush one to you- thankfully I had already acquired said book and was able to look around disdainfully at those with their careless hands in the air. Then when it came to the Cross Kissing part the ushers guided everyone out row by row in an eerily ordered manner. I of course stuck to my guns and my pew. I wonder is this a new phenomenon. Do they have ushers in the churches of Kerry these days? Surely not. Half the fun was the scramble to get communion and see if you could get there before your sister.

When I left an hour and a half later (Who thought you could pray for that long) I felt quite baffled and dazed. I couldn’t help but think of my father who passed away a year and half ago. He liked nothing better than a good pray and was never happier than when in church. He loved Easter because you got to go every day for a week! I also realised how quickly things change and how the kid I was then is long long gone and with him went so many different parts of my life.

I met up with my friend who arrived from backstage (I didn’t get a pass sadly) and we cycled off together for an evening of drinking and fun (including a visit to a gay bar of all places- far removed from the experience we just had). Hours and hours later as I swayed drunkenly on my bike across the roads of The Hague trying to remember where I lived I found myself inadvertently humming one of the hymns from earlier. They’ll not get me that easily I thought and broke into a louder chorus of Tori Amos’ Crucify.