Essays in Idleness

A wise brain will get you into trouble, especially if you are Christian. It is your fellow Christians to watch out for. The solution, of course, is to take the trouble to them. It is a solution that requires a surplus of will and courage, and of course, you should expect to die young — if not from assassination, from exhaustion. Apparently, you don’t have to be able to read, or know biology, chemistry, physics. This seemed largely true of St. Catherine of Siena, the Catholic Saint (patroness of Rome!) to whom my attention was first called, because she died on my (earthly) birthday, and is celebrated on the day after.

I was not even a Christian, then, but willing to be educated — like most children today, but not all. I was a rather irritating child, asking too many questions, and not liking beatings (especially from Brother Berg). My family was, as well as I could understand, “post-Protestant,” which meant that we did not go to church unless in a foreign country. I was, to some degree, impressed by the Catholics, at least those in Pakistan around St Anthony’s School on Lawrence Road in Lahore. Alas, they habitually beat the education into you, whether or not requested. My papa chose the school despite its Roman association, for its high academic standards, thinking, “I have a bright boy, he’ll never become a Catholic.” They had me a full year past the age of seven.

Today, “Our school” (St Anthony’s, it is still called) “offers Biology, Chemistry, Physics, and Computer Labs.”  … In the old days it offered books, but your parents had to pay for them.

I suppose I wasn’t such a bright boy, after all. I made it to the age of fifty, then caved. St Catherine of Siena, pray for me.