My first inkling that all was not right in the Catholic Church occurred in 1973. While attending Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, I was invited to a gathering of the Catholic charismatic movement.
I did not own a car, so I went with my friends. They were excited by the prospect of seeing the rave of the day. The meeting, or whatever it was called, was off campus, where I can’t recall, but the interior is vivid in my memory – large space, low-ceilinged, fluorescently lit – as enchanting as mold on a saltine cracker.
Hundreds sat on the floor. Sitting on the floor is fine if you are 5’5. A 6’1 guy struggles where to place his legs – under, over, across, half and half – just as I do in an airplane seat.
Then it began.
Testimony #1. Everyone anticipated speaking in tongues.
Testimony #2. No speaking in tongues. Tension was mounting.
Testimony #3. Someone stood up, swayed and fluttered – forked tongue.
It was at that point I told my friends I must go.
I had lasted 20 minutes.
Negotiations began on who would take me back to campus. An agreement was reached, and a couple of us amscrayed in a ’65 Chevy wreck.
The gathering resembled a séance, people waiting for a voice from beyond the grave.
I am told that it was modernism and that I had sensus fidelium, the sense of the faithful. Sense or no sense, experience playing cards and board games taught me when I was about to be tricked … or lied to.
Check out this trick. Yeah, the fly of modernism had me fooled initially.
I did not own a car, so I went with my friends. They were excited by the prospect of seeing the rave of the day. The meeting, or whatever it was called, was off campus, where I can’t recall, but the interior is vivid in my memory – large space, low-ceilinged, fluorescently lit – as enchanting as mold on a saltine cracker.
Hundreds sat on the floor. Sitting on the floor is fine if you are 5’5. A 6’1 guy struggles where to place his legs – under, over, across, half and half – just as I do in an airplane seat.
Then it began.
Testimony #1. Everyone anticipated speaking in tongues.
Testimony #2. No speaking in tongues. Tension was mounting.
Testimony #3. Someone stood up, swayed and fluttered – forked tongue.
It was at that point I told my friends I must go.
I had lasted 20 minutes.
Negotiations began on who would take me back to campus. An agreement was reached, and a couple of us amscrayed in a ’65 Chevy wreck.
The gathering resembled a séance, people waiting for a voice from beyond the grave.
I am told that it was modernism and that I had sensus fidelium, the sense of the faithful. Sense or no sense, experience playing cards and board games taught me when I was about to be tricked … or lied to.
Check out this trick. Yeah, the fly of modernism had me fooled initially.
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