MYSTICAL MOMENTS

While growing up, I had a number of mystical experiences, many of which had a religious origin. One of the first occurred when I was seven years old, in the second grade, and living in small German town called Lich. It was there where where I received my first communion. I recall receiving a tall white wax candle and marching in a town procession. Around that time I had two older friends from school named Adolf and Walter who took me under their wing.. The two of them often pretended to be priests while I became their acolyte. They used a white linen cloth borrowed from one of their their moms, which they set on a table that served as an altar. They used small glasses filled with water and apple juice to simulate the water and wine the priest drank during mass. During this time, I developed a strong affinity to Jesus, imagining myself wearing a crown of thorns, and carrying a wooden cross. A few years later, I spent the summers after my mom's death at the parsonage of a village priest named Father Albinger. I remember that he had a wooden statue of St. Sebastian which stood in a hallway next to my bedroom. This statue made a big impression on me because it depicted the saint impaled by half a dozen arrows. What also struck me about the statue was the blissful expression on the saint's face. It was almost as if he enjoyed being martyred. Everytime I visited Father Albinger, that statue gave me nightmares.

A few years later, after I had emigrated to the U.S. with my dad, and was attending a parochial school in Cincinnati, Ohio, I actually did become an altar boy. I learned to repeat the Latin responses of the mass, learned to genuflect, swing the big censer back and forth, and carry the huge missal from one side of the altar to the other. I spent a lot of time kneeling in the pews, overcome by feelings of mystery and reverence. As I looked at the statues of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the saints, I sometimes imagined them moving.

By the time I started attending college at Xavier University, my faith began to erode. But I did have one unforgettable experience while attending a weekend religious retreat at a Trappist monastery in Northern Kentucky called Gethsemane. The Franciscan Brothers who lived there had to observe a strict rule of silence. Nor were we students allowed to speak that weekend except to say prayers during morning mass. I'll never forget the first night I spent there. I stayed in a tiny cell of a room which had only a bed, a small table, and a chair.

I had a hard time falling asleep because of the total silence. All I could hear was loud ticking of my alarm clock which seemed to get louder and louder as the night wore on. I ended up having a series of nightmares. I spent the rest of that weekend feeling groggy and sleep-deprived.

As an adult, I also had a number of mystical encounters that were not based on religion. I remember watching a 60s British movie called Blowup with a college roommate. It included a scene in which the fashion photographer protagonist who secretly takes pictures of a couple making love. What he's not aware of is that he's actually taking pictures of a murder. He doesn't find out until he develops the photos in his darkroom. Eventually, he returns to the scene of the crime where he discovers a corpse. But he forgets to take his camera to record the scene. By the time he does go back again, the corpse has disappeared. My friend and I spent hours discussing that film, and trying to make out the dead body in the photographs.

Another time, a few years later, I experienced powerful mix of transcendence and terror. It was during the summer of 1972 while I was visiting Denmark with some German friends of mine. At the time, I was living in a dorm in my hometown Marburg. There I got to know a schizophrenic friend of mine named Ottmar who introduced me to his fiancee Annemie. One night, the three of us slept in a small pup tent. It was there that I had my first sexual encounter with Annemie who had fallen in love with me. She initiated the tryst by crawling inside my sleeping bag while Ottmar slept next to us, seemingly oblivious to what was going on. In fact, I never did find out if Ottmar suspected what was happening. But I do remember getting up the next morning as dawn was breaking, feeling a powerful mix of exhileration, fear, and guilt. At that moment, I felt that a new chapter in my life had begun.