Decline and Fall and

<p>Iwalked to the Vatican Museum, the night I landed in Rome. I don&rsquo;t know why it was my first stop. Given who I am &mdash; gay, trans, ex-Catholic, never not mad at the Pope, etc. &mdash; I felt a little like Captain Ahab making a visit to the Museum of Whales.</p> <p>Maybe that was the point. For most of my young life, &ldquo;the Catholic Church&rdquo; was a cloud of smoke that I moved through. It was everywhere and nowhere &mdash; a set of values, a culture, and not a place. Those values told me that I didn&rsquo;t exist, or that I was bad for existing. They told me to sit still and accept pain in the name of virtue, to strangle my real self in the cradle so that people would love me.</p> <p><a href="https://judedoyle.medium.com/decline-and-fall-and-ec7ff5167e65"><strong>Read More</strong></a></p>