Communion Stones

I recall my First Communion not for my supposed closer embrace of my Catholic God, but for being dressed down severely by the Principal of Corrimal Public School. I was heading off to a chilly early-morning preparatory class, just before 7am.

Cutting through the school’s grounds, to cross the highway to our church, I’d found some stones close to the back of one of the tall brick classroom blocks. I’d taken aim at pigeons foraging on a patch of playground lawn, adjacent to the headmaster’s back fence, and had managed to throw only two large stones before this secular authority figure exploded out his back door, screaming for me to stop. And in shock, I dropped my remaining stones and slunk away to practise at being a good Catholic.

Later that same day, one of our senior nuns called me in front of my class and gave a non-secular dressing down for the same offense.

As I hadn’t aimed at anything other than much flightier birds, I felt my acute embarrassment rising again. I realised that while, on one hand, I should have been better behaved, on the other I’d been far from criminal in intent.

I thought then I could never really trust non-Catholics to keep their silence. For several years, I felt it boiled down to nothing more than religious jealousy.