From the Desk of...

Dawn Comer,
visiting assistant professor of English

November 19, 2004


Following the Nov. 2 election, a friend wrote a blog entry titled, “On Being Different Than My Parents.” Her first line read, “Way different.” While this sparked an initial laugh, I sobered up quickly as I began reflecting on my own differences. Even more importantly, I began thinking about how I came to own my own beliefs.

Like most of us, I inherited my parents’ beliefs. And so, I have spent the better part of my life sorting through my inheritance, treasuring the good, trashing the bad and generally working to own my beliefs rather than just parroting theirs. While I have tested, transformed and come to treasure some of my inheritance (my mother’s trust in God’s faithfulness, my father’s pride in doing a job right), many of my strongest beliefs have been forged through relationships with those whose life experiences and world views were different from my family’s.

All I can really do is tell one short part of my own long story.

Catholics. My father hated Catholics. It all started when Bill, this guy from church, turned my dad on to these (supposedly true) comic books published by Jack T. Chick.

I was young at the time and already had this obsession for comic books. What better way to learn than through comic books? So I read these hate-filled, fear-driven comics, and, wanting to be like my dad, I believed them. Catholics were bad. Catholics were idolaters who worshipped Mary. And the Beast described in the book of Revelation would, without a doubt, be the product of the Roman Catholic Church.

Once when my family drove through South Bend, Ind. and saw a car full of nuns, my father told them through his closed driver’s-seat window to stick their rosary beads up their butts; I, a wise 11-year-old, laughed and repeated him all afternoon.

My older sister responded to her inherited anti-Catholic bias in a more “helpful” manner. She slipped Chick’s “Are Roman Catholics Christians?” tracts into the lockers of Catholic kids at school in hope of saving their souls.

Though I still wince when I reflect on my inherited belief, this story does end better than it began. By high school I had encountered enough ideas and people that my need to always be right had begun to wane. I became close friends with Annette and Diana, who wore crucifixes not because they believed Christ had never risen from the dead, but because they wanted to be reminded of Christ’s sacrifice.

My father, skeptical of my Catholic friends’ influence, could not accept the explanation for the crucifix I had shared, but in time, even he would become more open. One year he carpooled with Ron, a neighbor, and found that not only did Ron pray to God and not the pope, Ron also loved his family as much as my father loved his.

Funny how being in a relationship with even one person has the power to change one’s perspective about an entire group of people.