What's he on about now?

In case the articles, essays and opinions throughtout this site just weren't enough for you, here's my online diary (a.k.a. 'blog'). It's as close as you'll come to the inside of my head, so don't say I didn't warn you
(and remember, you can always e-mail me if you love or loathe anything you're about to read)...


   Thursday, July 25, 2002

IN THE MIDST OF THE HOLY

Strolling across Nathan Phillips Square after seeing Tara off, I found myself walking alongside three priests in plain black suits discussing their arrival in Toronto. One said he had just come from a press conference in Detroit concerning "the installation of the new bishop." I liked the word "installation," as if the Robo-Bishop 3000 is now operating. With the grim knowledge of exactly why the bishops are being reassigned these days, I listened in as the priest commented on how the new replacement "did very well" at a conference that "had more press than people" (and that's a distinction I loved). Even better, a homeless man then wandered into view with his palm outstretched, saying, "Please, Fathers, spare fifty cents?" The one closest to him waved him off with some sort of grunt. He did it again with a second panhandler a minute later. Of course it's not their job to tend to every homeless person who runs up to them but I couldn't help but frown at this.

Their conversation resumed when the third priest starting to enthuse about "the great restaurant" in the Sheraton. "I eat there whenever I'm in Toronto," he said and the others nodded in approval. And that's when the strange sense of deja vu I was experiencing sorted itself -- I'd heard all this before because I've spent time around Bay Street. These white men with wire-framed glasses and white hair discussing practical concerns with no music in their voices were no different from businessmen -- bankers for God. They had the same no-nonsense stride, the same air of entitlement, the same dark power suits. I'm sure I'm being unfair -- I don't know these men or anything about their lives -- but there are happy times in my life when I've briefly felt the presence of the divine, and this encounter was not one of them.

I'll admit I've been unduly resentful of the Catholic kids clogging our streets the last couple of days (walking through the downtown core has been a nightmare!) but World Youth Day is pushing my buttons (did I mention the nuns?). I've long been quite ambivalent about Gay Pride Day because so many aspects of it grate on me -- the impatient crowds, the commercial interests, the groupthink conformity that descends on otherwise thoughtful people. WYD features all this, but replaces Pride's carnival sexuality with exuberant righteousness, making it that much more creepy. Getting closer to home, I passed a group of twentysomethings with a Brazilian flag who began loudly singing, "We are the champions," and I felt myself shudder. Who are the champions? Brazilians? Catholics? Youth? And who have they defeated?

Labels: Trawna