You don't have to stay Catholic.
There is no reason you MUST stay in the Catholic Church.
Leaving the Church is not wrong.
It is not the work of Satan.
It is not evil.
I might be painful and it might be hard but that doesn't make it wrong.
Childbirth is painful and hard too but on the other side you (usually) have a new life.
There are all sorts of reasons to leave.
I don't even need to go into them.
You should go into them, if you need to not be Catholic any more.
You should talk to a spiritual director or a pastor or a good listener.
One who won't tell you "oh you should be..."
But one who will hear you out.
Share with someone who will hold your pain.
Who will be ears and tissues and be with you.
But know.
Know. Know. Know!
That God is not a Catholic.
God is God.
And the Catholic Church is one way to follow God.
Their are all sorts of Churches that are a LOT like Roman Catholic Church.
(Some Churches even believe in real presence in the Eucharist)
Be an Orthodox Christian, or a Lutheran, or an Episcopalian.
And if you want join something that has no liturgy.
That is praise and worship and preaching.
Then do it.
Or go bigger and wider and find your community their too.
God can use all sorts of ways to connect with you.
God is a fucking genius. If you are listening God will use nature or music or sex or poetry or NPR or Netflix or whatever...as long as you are listening.
So if you can't do just this way or just that way, then don't.
If the latest scandals prove anything it is that "Satan" is as much in the church
as outside of it.
And God, our great big, wide full, and tiny voiced God
is wrapped up every which way around life.
You can ignore her but she is there.
So go looking.
Go...wander...for God.
For intimacy with that God (who I call her/she most of the time)
And when you find that subtle (and sometimes unmarked path)
Take it. Pay attention in the Catholic Church or not.
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