David Gibbons
Why am I Catholic? The simple answer to this question: I was born into a loving Catholic family in the mid-1950s. Some refer to this as being a cradle Catholic. The deeper answer comes with the question, “Why am I still Catholic?”
I attended Catholic grade school, high school and college in Dubuque, Iowa, which was a predominately Catholic community during these times. My grade school was taught by Franciscan nuns. My high school and college were also taught by nuns, priests and lay people with a strong Christian background.
As grade school students, we attended Mass every morning before class, along with the Stations of the Cross and many other religious ceremonies throughout the week. After high school, my weekly Mass attendance lapsed for a while, but I did start to attend soon thereafter, mostly because it was an “obligation.” I enjoyed seeing members of the congregation, donuts and coffee, and Friday fish fries during Lent.
It wasn’t until my mid-40s that I started to realize there was more to Sunday Mass than simply attending. I recall a layperson speaking after Mass one Sunday and asking the congregation what sort of relationship we could expect to have with someone we only spoke to less than one hour a week. That got me to rethink my “obligation” for attending weekly Mass.
About this same time, I started attending yearly retreats at the Jesuit Retreat House at Demontreville in Lake Elmo. This experience greatly enhanced my spiritual thinking and prayers. The retreats also gave me a better appreciation for my faith in Jesus Christ. One of the retreat directors told us he often hears from Catholics who have stopped going to Mass, saying they are “getting nothing out of it.” His question to them is “what are they putting into it?” Our Catholic faith can sometime lapse but it never expires. This is why I am still Catholic.
Gibbons, 67, is a member of St Joseph the Worker in Maple Grove. Retired from work at Nortech Systems, he enjoys woodworking, camping and bike riding.
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