up the aisle every morning after the service had started drew too many embarrassing
stares, so eventually I reformed my straggling ways and began to settle into the
regimen of discipline which Catholic schools are noted for.
Until now, my religious training had consisted of Mother’s teaching me the
Lord's Prayer and the Hail Mary and I knew the grace before meals that we always said
in unison at Wallaces’. At Saint Pete’s, I was immersed in the Catholic faith. There
were many new prayers to memorize: the Apostle's Creed, the Glory Be to the Father,
the Angel of God, the Acts of Love, of Hope, of Charity, the Angelus. We learned
stories from the Bible as well. In addition, I had to attend special First Confession and
First Communion preparation classes with the second-grade children. Finally, and
hardest of all for me, was catechism - the questions and answers on the teachings of the
Church. We were required to memorize everything and I found that agonizingly
difficult at first because most of the time I had no idea what the words meant.
Mother helped me in the evening but I usually got too sleepy to learn much.
It was Aunt Jeanette who, in the afternoon after school, took me in hand and drilled
35
The “new" (in 1931) Saints Peter and Paul School/Ursuline Academy.
The steeple is that of nearby SP&P church.
