Wednesday, June 30, 2010

The Baltimore Catechism



Sitting around our back yard fire the other night, drinking whiskey, we started sharing stories from Catholic school. Joe was talking about our 7th grade teacher, Sister Mary George, who seated us according to our ability and was generally just terrifying. We would stand, individually, working our way through pages of math problems, or spelling words, or recitations from the Baltimore Catechism, one at a time. She would never respond...until eventually someone would say, "Sister, I'd like to make a correction, please." It could have been the last question, or thirty questions back. Wherever it was, if it was indeed in need of correction, that's where we would start over.

The Baltimore Catechism responses had to be letter perfect.

Someone, over whiskey, said, "Does anyone have one of those catechisms?"

I do. I found it at a yard sale.

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