by Jim Krefft

What was it like to date an ex-seminarian?

The way we met I didn’t know right off the bat that you had been in the seminary. When I found out shortly after we started dating, I was initially surprised, but honestly I didn’t see any difference from anyone else I had been dating.  I must say, however, that I found you had a very broad knowledge of many different things.  It’s not often you meet somebody who knows the tricks of flicking out votive candles, the art of scrubbing out urinals, and can recite all of Hamlet’s lines.

One aspect of being with an ex-seminarian is that you are also around his ex-seminarian friends.  To me this aspect was very enjoyable, and I loved hearing stories about the seminary: your mission trip to Guatemala, the plays you put on, and the overall fun of being in a beautiful place surrounded by lots of friends who had much in common.

What do you think of celibacy?

I think it’s an antiquated requirement for any human being.  I feel that if priests were allowed to marry, we would not only have an abundance of priests, but also the Church would not have the problems it’s having with abusive priests, both homosexual and heterosexual.  Most other religions allow their clerics to marry, and it seems to work better, but not perfectly, since other religions have had abusive clerics too.

How do you feel the church is handling the crisis with its pedophiles?

I guess they’ve been, at best, starting the process to find out what’s been happening, and why.  Ironically, though, the victims can feel like victims all over again since they’re often doubted.  Their entire lives are not only scrutinized but also plastered across the front pages of major newspapers.  The Church has to do more not only to punish these child molesters, but also to make immediate strides in making sure it does not continue to happen.  They must discontinue the practice of relocating priests who will just do it all over again.  These priests must be taken out of service.

Were you ever hit upon by a priest?

Luckily, I have never been close enough to any member of the clergy for that to have happened.  Some years ago, however, a priest did make me feel uncomfortable by hugging me from the wrong direction and placing his hands on me in an inappropriate way.  To this day I feel creepy about it.  It was several years before I even told you.

Do you believe in Catholic teachings today?

I believe in most Catholic teachings.  I have for years, however, had my own opinion about several core teachings.  For example, the Church’s position on physical love between a husband and wife once she’s beyond childbearing capability is impossible between two people deeply in love.  Sex is about more than procreation: it’s also about the deepest form of love between the souls of a husband and wife.

I generally support the Church’s pro-life advocacy.  I admire the Church’s proactive efforts to ban abortions in the third trimester.  I am also against engineering of babies, in and outside the womb, and especially oppose “selective reduction” of embryos because of the parent’s preference for number and sex of children.

I don’t feel the need to confess my shortcomings to a priest.  I know when I’ve done wrong, and my own sense of guilt seems to be penance enough.  I have lived with my version of Catholic teachings so long that I often ask, “Oh, is that still a sin?  I thought I could do that.”

Did you ever think you had a vocation?

For 12 years I was educated in the Catholic school system.  Early on in grade school, like most of my friends, I thought I wanted to be a nun.  I also thought I wanted to be a stripper.  Maybe I could have been the first stripper nun.  I have to explain.

As a child growing up in the 1950s, our family like most others had only one car.  I lived in a suburb of New Orleans, and all medical and dental offices were located downtown, and so I had to take the bus to get to them.  I would put on hat and gloves, as would my mom, pay my seven cents carfare, and embark on a 45-minute, often hot, bus ride that went through the French Quarter.

Back then the club posters of Bourbon Street strippers showed pretty women with clothes on, really shiny clothes.  I thought they were beautiful.  I guess I didn’t know they had to take the shiny clothes off to get paid.  I think my mom once told me that she got my name, Lynn, from a newspaper ad for an actress performing in the French Quarter.  I may have thought that all “Lynns” had to be strippers, or nuns, or stripper nuns.  To this day I adore sequins.

Seriously, after fourth grade I never thought I wanted to be a nun, and in the eighth grade I resisted aggressive recruiting efforts by Sister James.  Here’s what happened.  Sister James asked all girls in the class if they wanted to devote themselves to the Blessed Virgin Mary in a special ceremony.  I remember Sister James calling me out into the hall and whispering to me, “Do you want to devote yourself to Mary?”  She was greatly surprised when I replied, “No.”  She immediately asked why, and I explained that my mom and I had talked about it, and my mom said I wasn’t perfect so I should not devote myself to Mary.  I was the only girl in my class who did not make the pledge.  The real reason was that I didn’t want to have to say the required prayers and did not want to encourage additional recruitment of me to the nunnery.

Did you know any pedophile priests?

No, I have not personally known any.  Nor do I know anyone who was sexually abused by a priest, or by anyone else.  However, when my mother worked as a volunteer “cafeteria lady,” she saw young girls running up to the priest on the playground and hugging him around the waist.  She explained to me that hugging a priest was not a proper thing to do.

What did people say about priests and nuns when you were growing up?

Mostly, people felt that priests and nuns were devoted to the work of God.  My dad, however, called nuns “disappointed old maids.”  As a child he had had a bad experience with a “mean nun,” and therefore he had no love or respect at all for them.

Did you like priests and nuns when you were little?

Yes, I like them, I respected them, and I feared them.  I remember one time when a few strands of my nun teacher’s hair came out of her habit, and the entire class started whispering about it.  It was the biggest thrill of the year.  By the way, she was blond.

October 27, 2005, Centennial, Colorado

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