Confirmation Day Update

Last week, we went to our son's school for his Confirmation in the Catholic Church.  As I mentioned in my post last Sunday, I was extremely proud of how well he has done in church and how much he has grown.  We were very grateful for the work that the lady who conducted the classes did for my son and the other kids that had their Confirmations that day.

This week, we received a card with a handwritten note from the woman that conducted the classes.  This is what she wrote:

I want to take this opportunity to say thank you for giving me the privilege of preparing your son for First Communion and Confirmation.  He did an excellent job and you can be very proud of him.

I was blown away.  Here, we should have been expressing our gratitude (which we did) for her hard work and she was writing to us to thank us for letting her prepare our son for the sacraments.  This type of attitude goes to further enforce in our hearts and mind that our son is in the right place.  The people there really do care about the kids and make an impact in improving their lives.

Confirmation Day

There are some days when you just can't help but be proud of your kids and want to brag on them a little.  Today happens to be one of those days.  We went out to my son's school to celebrate the sacrament of his Confirmation in the Catholic Church.  Aside from the obvious significance of the event, it also served to show us just how much our son has grown since we made the decision to send him away for school.

When our son was younger, we tried taking him to churches whenever we had a wedding to attend or a cousin was having First Communion or Confirmation.  His behavior during those attempts was, in a word, atrocious.  More often than not, my wife or I would have to take him out of the sanctuary into the vestibule so that his outbursts would not disturb the others in the service.

When the school first approached us about our son going through the classes that they gave for First Communion and Confirmation.  We were concerned about his past behavior and whether or not he would understand what was going on.  I still don't know if he fully understands the significance of the sacraments, but his behavior during church has been exemplary.  He really enjoy going to church.

The thing I like about attending the mass at the chapel in his school is that they tailor the homily to the special needs kids in attendance.  The priest reads the gospel to them like he is reading a bedtime story to the kids.  He then gives a very short homily, again as if he is telling the kids a story.  It allows the kids to not get bored while listening to the sermon.

My son, really likes the priest that they have at the school.  Whenever he sees Father Paul, his face lights up in a big smile and he says, "It's Father!"  Father Paul always comes over to my son and greets him with a fist bump.  I think it is pretty cool.

Today, while watching my son during the service, I was struck by how well he did.  Whenever the priest did the sign of the cross, I saw my son crossing himself.  During prayer, he placed his hands together in the typical prayer position.  During the songs, he often started to dance a little.  I think of King David dancing before the LORD.  More importantly, throughout the whole service, he did not break into any of his ritual word games that he likes to do with us.

For the Confirmation sacrament service, the local Bishop officiates the mass.  Father Paul still read the gospel reading to the kids.  The Bishop also has a background in dealing with special needs kids and did an excellent job of giving a nice homily for the kids.

Prior to the start of the service, the Bishop spoke to my son.  My son was particularly taken with the crucifix around the Bishop's neck.

Here, my son gets anointed by the Bishop.

All in all, it was a wonderful day.  I am so proud of what he has accomplished so far at the school and how much he enjoys attending their church services.  Of course, afterward we had to take a drive to the Golden Corral for lunch and then to Target to get a new CD player and CD.

First Communion

Today is going to be kind of a big day for our family.  Later this afternoon, we will be heading out to my son's school to attend his First Communion.  18 years old is a little older that is typical for a child to go through First Communion, but with my son's developmental delays we seriously doubted that anything like this would ever take place for him.

Over the years, we have tried to take my son to attend weddings, First Communions, Christenings, and other events for family members that have taken place in churches.  With his disabilities has come a number of behavioral issues that have led him to be disruptive.  Often, one of us would have to sit out in the vestibule while the other sat in the sanctuary to observe the occasion.

When my wife and I got married, I was not active in any church.  My wife was raised Roman Catholic, but converted to Mormonism a few years back.  When our son was born, he was Christened in the Catholic Church, but we never really attended church.  With our own lack of participation and his behavior issues, we never thought we would see this day.

There have been times when we have been able to keep him occupied and quiet for such occasions.  Unfortunately, it often required that we allow him to sit with his CD player, listening to music with his headphones on.  We were also able to get him to keep his constant speaking at a whisper so as not to disturb others at the occasion.

The school my son attends is a special needs residential school on the Eastern Shore that was established by a group of Benedictine nuns.  When they first asked us a few months ago whether or not we would want for them to have our son prepare for First Communion and Confirmation, we were unsure as to how he would take to it.  Reports from the woman running the class have been glowing.

My wife had to go out to the school to take my son his medications.  When she talked to him, he was excited to talk about events that were coming up; his First Communion and his upcoming long weekend home during the Memorial Day weekend.  He also gave her a kiss without any prompting, which is something he normally does not do.  We usually have to ask for kisses from him.

The past month since his 18th birthday have been among the most encouraging since he has been at the school.  His diet has improved dramatically.  Previously, he would only eat chicken and some salty snacks.  Now he is eating peas & carrots, peaches, mashed potatoes, pizza, and just about anything they put in front of him.  It is further confirmation that we made the right choice in sending him away to school.

Communion and Confirmation

Image via Wikipedia

As I have mentioned on numerous occasions, my son attends and lives at a school on the Eastern Shore of Maryland.  I believe I have mentioned this, but just in case I haven't, it is a Catholic school.  My religious background is Protestantism, primarily Baptist, and I have studied other religions such as Buddhism and a few other Christian denominations, including Catholicism.

My wife, on the other hand, was raised in the Roman Catholic Church.  Our first marriage occurred in the country clerk's office in Key West.  We then had a church wedding a few months later to make it official in the eyes of the church and her father.  During the early years of our married life, we did not attend church much.  However, when our son was born, we had him Christened in the Catholic Church.

From then on, we pretty much stopped attending church.  I had a few bad experiences with some of the Protestant churches that I had attended.  I do a lot of studying on my own, but quite frankly nothing on a consistent basis.  My wife eventually became totally disenchanted with the Catholic Church.  I think a lot of her disenchantment occurred during the time frame of all the reports of priests molesting young boys.  She eventually decided to seek a new church and decided on the Mormon faith.  She attended regularly for a while, but has not attended regularly for the past year or so.

Cover of Rich Mullins

The bulk of my son's religious instruction in his almost 18 years has been through children's religious music.  I also introduced him to the music of Rich Mullins.  We used to watch one of his concert videos together for hours on end.  I still remember my son reciting one of Mullins' monologues when Mullins talked about Jesus being a little boy and imagining him playing baseball.  "If Jesus was going to play baseball, just how many windows would he knock out around Nazareth, and who was going to make him pay?"

The reason that I bring all this up is that we had a meeting today at his school to discuss his IEP (Individualized Education Program).  When we got home from the meeting a couple hours ago, we had a letter from the school.  At first I thought it was going to be an incident report from the school that they talked about at the meeting where he ended up getting a bruise on his back from some behavioral incident.  Instead it was a letter from a woman at the school who prepares the kids for their First Communion and Confirmation sacraments.

I would like for my son to go through some sort of religious training.  Even though I do not agree with everything that the Catholic Church teaches, he is there and I think it would be important for him.  I do wonder if he would be able to understand what they are teaching him.  Another question that I would have is would he eat the Communion wafer, or would they have to douse it in BBQ sauce?  The biggest question would be whether or not my wife would want him to go through it given her disenchantment with the Church.    It could make for interesting dinner conversation this evening.