The Louisiana Priest and His "Lived Experience"
I was reminded yet again how personal context colors our point of view.
This morning’s New York Times headline struck a chord for the Beloved1 and me. “At U.S Masses, the Dawn of a Homegrown Pope Brings an Air of Electricity.” So it was that we headed to Mass in tiny Duson, Louisiana, excited as well about the prospect of getting some local reaction to the first ever American-born pontiff — news, by the way, that brought me to tears of hope and relief because I firmly believe Leo XIV will be a strong moral counterweight to the soulless Trump Administration.
But the tiny parish’s Nigerian priest said not a word about Robert Prevost’s elevation, even though the Pope hails from Creole bloodlines. Nothing. Instead, he delivered a Mother’s Day homily encouraging moms in their roles of taking care of the kids and cooking while we men go off to work as providers.
Even though he likes to cook for himself every now and again, the women back in Africa just kept chasing him out of kitchen, he told us.
His words seemed particularly antiquated even in today’s rural deep South — at least to my California sensibilities. I feared the Beloved1 was going to bolt out of the pew.
But then again that was his lived experience.
I’ve seen its effects among friends, too. We recently had a spirited dinner-party discussion that started when I said I worried about my kids’ seeming aspirituality. They’re good, responsible kids, both now is their thirties. Still, I wondered aloud at table about where they would find their own moral compass — and how they would pass it on to their own children.
What my guests heard, however, is that I worried that my children weren’t practicing Catholics, like me. One, a gay married man, who left Catholic seminary years ago and is now an Anglican priest, became especially impassioned. So much so that he apologized the next day. “I guess I’m a recovering Catholic,” he texted.
Such was his lived experience, having felt rejected by the Church for his sexual orientation.
And so it goes.
The trek to Louisiana is a bucket list experience for me. I’ve never set toe in the state. Nor have I ever visited New Orleans, where we’re headed next.
Our Duson RV park provided plenty of southern hospitality and cooking. The staff whipped up a complimentary Mother’s Day dinner of beef stew, green beans with lots of bacon, and — new to me — “rice stuffing.” It was a high-carb, high-fat repast but damn it was tasty. I savored every bite.