Dirty Little Details

As I've been spitting out the stories of my memoirs, more vivid memories of those first five years continue to surface. In the last chapter about the Novices' daily "Confession of Faults", I forgot to explain the differences between this event and our weekly Confessions. The last chapter also brings up memories of the heavy-duty Penances we were expected to perform almost daily. Each of these humiliating acts were a means of chipping away at our pride and "helping" to form us into "more humble servants of Christ". To me it was like being required to tattle on and berate ourselves in public at every turn. A guaranteed way of chopping away at a person's self esteem.

Even as I share these dirty little details now, I can't believe that I feel a bit guilty for exposing them. It's as if these secrets still shouldn't be shared with the general public. I feel almost as if I'm going to get my hands slapped with a ruler by doing so. As far as I know, religious communities stopped this practice years ago. However, with the backlash of conservatism in the present Church, It wouldn't surprise me to find out that some of these debasing practices had resurfaced again.