1950s Catholic bedtime prayers and doctrine instilled death anxiety in children

Evidence

When I was in third grade, my mother noticed I was afflicted with an addiction. It was 1954 and my sister and I had just been transferred from P.S. #25 to St. Anthony’s Catholic School. Each night before sleep, my sister and I would get on our knees to say our mandatory children’s bedtime prayer: “Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take.” Then Mom would tuck us both under the covers in the same big bed we shared and give us our good night kisses. My younger sister Ginny would fall right off to sleep the moment her curly head hit the pillow, but I would remain awake in the dark, suffering a strange anxiety brought on by the gruesome thoughts of my early demise suggested in our bedtime prayer. … Like many little girls who hid their hands beneath their covers to touch themselves, I knew it was way too risky and would guarantee a trip straight to hell before dawn, so I sought another handy activity above the sheets to lull me into slumber. I’d lie in bed in the dark and with my right hand I’d pluck the cotton tuffs out from my floral chenille bedspread. This went on for several nights until mom finally noticed that half the flowers were missing on my side of the bed, leaving a gigantic hole in the floral pattern of the pretty pink and baby blue bedspread. Mom consulted with my aunts, who had the good sense to suggest I needed a distraction to occupy my hands. — Dolores DeLuce, Blow Jobs, 71

Categorization

• DEFINE: Explains the window into mid-century Catholic childhood catechism around venial and mortal sin, purgatory, and the ‘Now I lay me’ death prayer.
• XREF: Could connect to the author’s own work on moral panics and how religious doctrine structures children’s inner worlds. — connects to: Religion both causes anxiety and relieves it through punishment and comfort — Norenzayan, Ara, Big gods - how religion transformed…, 619; Children first fear death, and only later learn to use culture against that fear — Sheldon Solomon, Jeff Greenberg, Tom Pyszczynski, The Worm at the Core: On the Role of…, 152; Mid-century Catholic schooling instilled visceral death-and-damnation anxiety in young children — Dolores DeLuce, Blow Jobs: A Guide to Making It in Show…, 71

Related

• Mid-century Catholic schooling instilled visceral death-and-damnation anxiety in young children (similarity 0.93)

Broader Connections

• Children first fear death, and only later learn to use culture against that fear #exemplifies (0.80) — Sheldon Solomon, Jeff Greenberg, Tom Pyszczynski, The Worm at the Core, 152
• Religion both causes anxiety and relieves it through punishment and comfort #expands (0.75) — Norenzayan, Ara, Big gods - how religion transformed…, 619