I have a friend, a confirmed and enthusiastic atheist, who rates the intensity of Catholic churches by the number of crucifixes she counts in situ. 

The higher the number of crucifixes, the scarier the church, apparently. “Your lot really embrace a savage-looking cross and a bloodied Jesus Christ,” she once remarked to me.  “What’s with the endless suffering?”

I don’t see the savagery of Catholic symbolism when I enter a church.  Even lapsed as I am, a church, for me, is a place of sanctuary. 

On the worst days of my life, I’ve fled to the refuge offered by the nearest church.  One particularly memorable Wednesday lunchtime, I found myself sobbing in St Stephen’s Chapel in Brisbane.  I’d chucked in my job of just 7 weeks on feminist grounds.[2]

I’m NOT even that Catholic, not compared to previous generations of my family.  My grandmother, Cecilia, once told me about the time she waited to find out if her son was going to survive a catastrophic injury.

My grandfather insisted that they pray the rosary.  Cecilia reckoned they must have prayed in that hospital for hours. She wanted to stop but Pa wanted to keep on praying.  “And your grandfather was right,” she’d say, “because your uncle got through it.”

Just hours before her death, Bridget was focused on getting Henry to mass.

“The deceased [Bridget] then required him to attend church.  [Henry] [f]irst consented and afterwards refused. Both then returned to the back yards where words took place between them.” [3]

Bridget was a Catholic, as was Henry. [4] There’s no surprise in a practicing Catholic wanting to head to Mass on the weekend.  It’s an obligation to attend mass on the Lord’s Day (Saturday night vigil, or on a Sunday).

Bridget had already likely dragged Henry off to mass on that Saturday morning on 17 January.  One of the witnesses at Bridget’s murder trial, the keeper of a boarding house where Henry and Bridget stayed from Thursday 14 January to Saturday 17 January, noted their attendance at church. [6]

It isn’t unusual for a devoted Catholic to go to mass more than once a week, particularly in those more observant days. 

My mum used to nick into a lunchtime mass sometimes on a weekday when I was a kid.  I’d ask her why she would go when she didn’t have to.

To my complete astonishment, she’d say, “It’s a good way to spend a lunchtime.” My future estrangement from the faith was pretty clear even then.

Still, twice in a day seems excessive, even for an ardent Catholic like I assume Bridget to have been. 

Unless you were in trouble.  Unless you knew something was terribly, terribly wrong and thought you needed God’s intercession.  Or someone you loved needed God’s help.  Desperately.

#Wild Bridgie

End notes

[1] B. Moulder "Green Beaded Rosary with Metallic Crucifix." 13 April 2024. Own Work.

[2] Long story, short? I deeply dislike cheating husbands who expect their assistants to buy anniversary gifts for their loving wives.

[3] ITM665959, Hopgood, Bridget Mary, 18 January 1914 – 1 April 1920, Queensland State Archives, Runcorn, Brisbane. Murder file (administrative).

[4] Marriage Certificate of William Hopgood and Rosanne Connors, 16 June 1868, Births, Deaths and Marriages, Melbourne, Victoria. Marriage Certificate. Henry’s parents were married in a Catholic church.  Bridget, like all of my mother’s family, was Catholic.

[5] Crowd gathers outside St. Stephen’s Cathedral for the funeral of Archbishop Robert Dunne, Brisbane, 1917. John Oxley Library, State Library of Queensland, 2008.

[6] "Mayne Murder." The Week (Brisbane, Qld. : 1876 - 1934) 30 January 1914: 26. Web. 21 Apr 2024, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article185004739.