Sitting in a coffee shop with a couple of friends this morning, I noticed one of them writing with her left hand.
“Does lefthandedness run in your family?” I asked.
“No. But they were all raised Catholic, so even if any of them should have been left-handed, they weren’t allowed to be.”
Huh??!!
The conversation shifted before I could say, “Huh!!??” So now I’m left to ponder this latest scandalous skeleton in the Catholic closet.
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I heard since the ancient times the Church wouldn’t allow left-handed students to write left-handed because it was demonic.
Evidence included the fact that the word “left” in Latin is “sinister” and the word for “right” is “dexter.”
How Leonardo da Vinci slipped through is still a mystery.
My oldest sister was beaten by the nuns every time she attempted to write with her left hand in elementary school from 56 to 59. The only thing it did, besides make her hate nuns with a passion, was to make her more determined to be left handed.
Two of my children are left-handed. Nobody in either my immediate family or my wife’s immediate family is left-handed. Clearly, there is deviltry at work.
Attached earlobes are the real concern, as any cursory search of Google will reveal.
Left Hand Path
I referred my friend to this post, to which she replied: “I enjoyed your blog! There are some crazy Catholic stories out there. To finish my moms, she would be hit on the hand by the nuns if she tried to use her left hand. Further, her dad, who grew up strict catholic, put a patch over her dominant left eye, so she would become stronger with her right- strange I know.”
To which I issued this conciliatory reply: “The left-handed oppression thing is whacked out, way whacked. As a bad but devoted Catholic I’d like to extend an apology and a left-handed salute to you and your ancestors.”
I just found out — what I sort of already knew but had forgotten — that my dad had the same thing done to him as a child by his Christian Science mother. He should have been a lefty but she made him use his right hand. Not out of a twisted understanding of Satanic influences but because of “science.”
My sister is left handed, though I don't remember that she had any problems with it, although she wasn't encouraged at school.