The child abuse that is religion

[ucrdem]

84. Sylvia Plath wanted to become a Catholic and her mother laughed at her.

She wrote:

Lately I had considered going into the Catholic Church myself. I knew the
Catholics thought killing yourself was an awful sin. But perhaps, if this was so, they
might have a good way to persuade me out of it. . . .

I thought I might see how long you had to be a Catholic before you became a nun,
so I asked my mother, thinking she'd know the best way to go about it.

My mother had laughed at me. "Do you think they'll take somebody like you,
right off the bat? Why you've got to know all these catechisms and credos and believe in
them, lock, stock and barrel. A girl with your sense!"

That's from page 86 of the "Bell Jar," which is autobiographical fiction but by all accounts a more or less accurate account of Plath's youth. The point is that some people understand religion and others don't. Her mother evidently didn't.