There Are No Catholics in Colorado
I have come to this shocking conclusion as we are in the week of All Things Catholic Holy, also known as, St. Patrick’s Day.
By now all the stores in St. Louis would have had their corned beef stocked in, and on sale for 99 cents a point for point cut, and 1.19 a pound for brisket. And cabbage would be 19 cents a pound. And the bakeries would be filled with rye bread, and baby potatoes could be bought by the bushel.
I had my suspicions a few weeks ago, when Mardi Gras came and went with nary a purple bead or a King Cake to be seen. I work at a college; in St. Louis there would have been a whole day of celebrating on my campus, including traditional foods and festivities. Well, except for that whole show-me-your-tatas thing. There would have been a parade downtown, or maybe two of them, and lots of publicity. There was nothing here. Not a whisper. I never saw anyone wearing beads, and there were no local bars with Mardi Gras festivities being advertised.
Then there was Ash Wednesday and I saw not a forehead blackened. And no Friday Night Fish Fry signs in front of the Catholic churches I drove past. Actually, come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve even see a Catholic Church in my town. Wait, let me Google that. Oh, look. One. There’s one. There are 87,000 people in my town. St. John the Baptist boasts that it has 4500 families registered. There’s no mention of fish fries.
Bummer. Until now, there wasn’t much I missed about St. Louis. Well, I miss Ted Drewes, Cardinal’s Baseball, the best free zoo in the world, and giant rivers. Our rivers here are creeks. You can wade across them.
But I digress. I paid 89 cents a pound for a cabbage today at the grocery store, and the corned beef was tucked away in a little corner of the meat section, and there was very little to pick from. And it was 2.99 a pound. Outrageous! As for the rye bread, I guess I’ll have to buy a loaf in the bread aisle because the bakery didn’t have any, and the baby potatoes will have to come from a can. Appalling.
I guess all the Catholics stopped in Missouri where the ground was reasonably tillable and looked like Germany. It was much too much work to come to Colorado, where the ground is hard and full of grass or granite, depending where you are. Hard to grow a potato in that kind of dirt, I suppose.
Happy St. Patrick’s Day to you all!
I grew up in Central Illinois and never saw these things till moving to St. Louis. St. Louis is definitely a Catholic town (all the towns are named st something a friend of mine pointed out when we moved here) so it would stand to reason that we would have an overabundunce of St. Patricks day and Mardi Gras celebrations. However, most of the Catholics I know aren’t German – they are Irish or Scottish (which would also account for the St. Patty’s day celebrations). Hard rocky ground doesn’t deter them either – we grow rocks in Farmington and they have tons of Catholics there – as well as in Fredericktown which I think the per capita of Catholic’s to Prodestants is 3-1. LOL!
I didnt’ see any soot smeared foreheads this year either – maybe they all slep in!
While I’m truly half-Irish–I’ve NEVER liked corned beef. Cabbage and potatoes, of course!
Anyway, being that my “not here” living was in Europe, people may not have been *religious* but churches are everywhere and everybody celebrates all fetes, Catholic, Pagan, etc. (far MORE than here–we got off 2 weeks every 5-6 months for what were historic Pagan festivals, although not “celebrated” anymore; people still got off work!).
Point being, I’ve never lived in a “very” secular area. You’re absolutely right that STL is a “very” Catholic area but out by me, there are FEW Catholic parishes and they’re not popular or “strong.” Nevertheless, we have BAZILLIONS of tiny (often not even … I don’t know the word but where they have a larger church organization to “answer to?”) churches and they all do fish fries, etc. (and those are the kind of “Christian” churches who say Catholics aren’t real Christians–so go figure why they do Lent; I can never understand organized religion!).
At any rate, that’s got to be a bummer to miss out on festivals
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