Being raised in the Catholic school system is kind of like hooking up with the unfortunate looking girl you met crossing Winspear Avenue at 2 a.m. Sure, it’ll get you where you want to be, but is it really how you want to get there?
This week, sophomore Hafez Rizek recounts his religious pilgrimage to Mecca, a generally once in a lifetime experience which all Muslims are called upon to follow. More importantly, the story details a journey of emergence into one’s faith and belief. At a time when religion is gradually losing its standing in society and becoming more of a title of self-empowerment, a window opens up where you can see a truly incredible thing; someone embracing what they were raised to believe without just blindly accepting it.
Twelve years of Catholic education would assumingly be enough to convince anyone that we all descend from a pile of dirt and a stolen rib. At the very least, it would shed some light on the purpose, if any, to this great shindig called life. For the better part of my time spent under the ruling of nuns and Jesuits, it did. I went through Sunday gatherings at church and accepted what I was told. I sang along, quietly and to myself, with the choir during weekly mass.
My ultimate fate rested in the hands of a guy who allowed himself to be tortured and crucified for the salvation of all mankind. If I played my cards right and said enough prayers, I’d be kicking back and enjoying a never-ending tour of the Labatt factory—samples on the house. If for any reason I took a couple names in vain and had sex before I signed a legally binding contract, I’d be, for lack of a better term, fucked. Catholicism went down cold and easy.
It wasn’t until my later years at an all-guys high school that I started to look around. I felt something awkward and unsettling—doubt. I walked through the hallways and saw teachers who were able to go through the daily grind, no matter how difficult, and rest easy at night knowing that there truly was a light at the end of the tunnel. Grown men were so convinced by the religion that they were able to devote their entire lives not only defending it, but preaching about it. My faith was now a deck of cards that came crumbling down in a manner quite similar to Dr. Kübler-Ross’ stages of grief.
First came questioning the legitimacy of half the things I was told were true as a child. Biology, algebra, world history. Yea, I can dig it. Noah was able to get two of every animal into one boat? The schematics didn’t add up. How could one man shovel so much shit? I looked to the Bible and applied what I knew of the modern world. Page after
page, physical science was betrayed and manipulated. I kept my disillusionment to myself and continued with my search for the truth.
Then came the two part anger, one part jealousy cocktail. I had spent my entire youth believing something I now thought was a complete fabrication. Adam and Eve? Go fuck yourself; it’s called evolution. Get with the times. If I saw a cross, I grew resentful and angry towards the bearer of it. Soon, religion in general became nothing more than a dog and pony show trying to hide the fact that the end really meant the end. I wanted so desperately to believe in what faith had to offer but I couldn’t convince myself to stomach it.
Soon after I came to UB and opened my horizons to beyond Western New York, I met the final stage—acceptance. There was something about living away from home and the birth of a new kind of independence that brought a wave of reassurance to me. Suddenly, not believing what my parents hoped I would didn’t seem so bad. I learned how to say, “I disagree.”
Religion is a funny thing. It can give someone the courage to perform incredibly brave feats or the fortitude to be able to turn the other cheek. Some of the greatest and worst characters in history used their beliefs to change the world. If I could, would I go back and throw myself into a different school, a different life? Absolutely not.
