Foot in Mouth

[Gerard]

Hoping that this can continue showing some of the silly, embarrassing, human moments that we can sometimes call “foot in mouth”.

(This is long, but a background is necessary. Sorry. )

I had a complaint about a problem at my church. It all started about 6 to seven weeks ago. At that time I stopped by the church office and requested a Mass be said for my deceased wife on the anniversary of both her birthday and the day she died.

In the Roman Catholic religion we have a service that is called a “Mass”. This is a church service with additional readings and a memorial recreation of Jesus Christ at the last supper consecrating a piece of bread, or a host, a specific piece of unleavened bread used in the service.

We would pay a stipend or give an monetary offering, for a specific intention, the priest promises to offer that specific Mass for a designated purpose, such as for a deceased loved one, a sick person, or a special anniversary.

I had asked for two days, the day my wife was born and the day she died in remembrance for the next year.

When I came back to the office Wednesday, I stopped by to see if the registration for the next year had been started. She said no, the pastor had not yet authorized it. I asked about my request for days. She then withdrew a folder from a drawer that she knew exactly the placement of, and began to look for my request. I said it was on a small piece of paper like a post it note. She found it and then we saw that my dates were changed, the date for her birthday was changed from September to December.

Perplexed by the secretary who said she didn’t know how that happened. She also said the master log had not yet been authorized by the pastor, but still opened the book and found that the September date was taken in pencil by a member of the church that has many masses dedicated to their son who died in the service of our country.

The secretary could not explain it but she is the only one who has access to the files and master book.

Later that night, I sent an email to the pastor, that naturally went through the secretary to the pastor that I wanted to talk with him in person or via the telephone.

(She obviously briefed him.)

Well, he called the next afternoon. He called to my cell phone. When It rang I was napping, and half asleep, I thought it was my brother-in-law suggesting a golf day for Friday, but no, the caller ID said “Charity Call”.

Thinking it was a dammed telemarketer that found out my cell number, I never give out that number to anyone except family or close friends, I swiped to answer the call…

I was silent for a few seconds thinking a spiel may start…

It didn’t…

I then yelled: WHAT THE F*CK DO YOU WANT …

Silence…

Then a voice said; “Do you always talk like that when a priest calls?”

Who is this, I asked…

This is Father ( my pastor’s name ).

OH CRAP, I thought. “I’m sorry Father, I got a few scam calls and when the caller ID said Charity Call, I thought your call was one of those.”…

I think he believed me and said he would look into the problem of too many requests from a single family tying up the church Mass requests for other parishioner.

So, Fellow Scanalysts, that is how I stuck my foot in my mouth cussing out my parish priest.

[civilwestman]

This is one of the ripple effects of out of control telemarketing. When there are periods with ten such calls a day, my default attitude when the phone rings is “adversary”. Fortunately, I get few such calls on my cell. There, I get unsolicited political texts, calling me by (what they know is a fake) name, like “Hi Tom…. Can you help me out with just $10?” Usually demoncrats, occasionally R’s. That all get the same treatment: “Report spam and delete”. It also clearly shows the fed gov total ineffectuality when it comes to those who break the law for a living. We already know how easy it is for them to ruin the lives of the law-abiding who merely makes an honest mistake or, especially, one who pushes back by only raising questions. I’m getting to the point of reinstating my support for the death penalty for telemarketers. What body part would be amputated in Saudi, if there were actually telemarketers there? (We know from the ongoing instruction by our betters that all cultures are morally equal, so no such amputation - tongue, you say ? - should shock us.

[Gavin]

Your tale, Gerard, reminded me of an incident from a few years back concerning my parents’ neighbors, who were devout Catholics and active in church matters. At the time of this incident, the lady was serving as the choir-mistress.

This church had been blessed with a wonderful priest who endeared himself to all the parishioners. However, eventually the diocese decided that his language skills were required in a distant parish. Another diocese leant a temporary replacement priest. As one of the parishioners noted, no-one lends you his best horse. This poor temporary replacement could not fill the large shoes of the departing priest, and dissatisfaction rose in the parish.

For the choir-mistress, things came to a head over the plans for a wedding. The bride had asked if the choir could sing from the small seldom-used balcony which faced the pulpit. The choir tested the acoustics, and everyone agreed this would be a nice way to arrange the music for the ceremony – everyone, except the temporary replacement priest.

The discussion between the priest and the choir-mistress became somewhat heated, and a little unChristian. The priest tried to put an end to the argument by asserting that having the choir on the balcony would be against Canon Law. This caused the choir-mistress to cause a scene and burst out with “Bugger Canon Law!”.

Some months later, the bishop visited this parish. When he was being introduced to the parishioners, he met of course with the choir-mistress. The bishop’s face lit up – “Oh! So you are the ‘Bugger Canon Law’ lady! It is such a pleasure to meet you”. The choir-mistress breathed a sigh of relief.