Judgment of Divorce in Religion with Dawn Ziegerer

Rebecca:

Welcome to Beautifully Bloomed, the podcast where we explore how to break
you out of the box of rules and beliefs that are holding you back from the
life you are meant to live. I'm your host, Rebecca Tervo, join me as I
share mindset tools, coaching conversations, and human design to help you
uncover your unique gifts and create the life, relationships and business
you desire. Today, I'm with Dawn Ziegerer who is a dating coach who helps
women to find their happily ever after.

Dawn:

That's me.

Rebecca:

Hello. Thank you for coming to my podcast and we're not going to talk today
about divorce or well, maybe it comes up, but we're not. That's not the
main reason I had you on. So fun. So I just want to ask you a couple things
because as my audience might know by now, right now I'm in the middle of a
series of interviews about faith transitions and faith crisis. And you had
replied to my Facebook post about this topic. So I'm really curious now. So
tell us, because we didn't talk about this before we got on did you grow up
in the church or what was your growing up like?

Dawn:

I did. I have to say overall, I had a wonderful experience in the Catholic
church. So had a dad and a mom, like most of us do and then six kids. So
they definitely practiced the Catholic version of no birth control kind of
thing. And so we were there, the Ziegerer family, I grew up in Plainfield,
New Jersey and Fallston Maryland. And so we would go to church every Sunday
and we were like, we're all gargantuanly tall. So they probably thought,
damn, the Ziegerer people are here again. This is like a mountain of eight
people that you could barely see over. So, yeah. And my dad and my mom were
both, they call them Eucharistic ministers, meaning they can-

Rebecca:

Okay. I don't know what that means.

Dawn:

So you've probably see the Catholic church besides all the standing up and
sitting down and kneeling. There's a point where you go to communion,
right? And so they have a priest that what they call transubstantiation
because the Catholic church believes that the bread and wine is not a
symbol of the body and blood. It is the body and blood of Jesus. And so the
priest distributes communion, but lay people can become trained to become,
they call it Eucharistic ministers. And so my parents were Eucharistic
ministers. My dad, God love him, he's wonderful. He passed away, but he's
awesome. He taught CCD, do you know what that is?

Rebecca:

Yeah. I had Catholic friends in high school, so I was close to them so I
heard about all the things like CCD yeah.

Dawn:

Called Catholic Christian Doctrine, I think is what it stands for. And so
he taught like the juniors and seniors, like the love sex, drugs, and rock
and roll course or whatever. And yeah. So, like I said, I had no complaints
about growing up in the Catholic church like I said, they took us to church
every Sunday, most Sundays. I was kind of like [inaudible 00:02:56]. Okay,
whatever. And then I had a period of time when I first got married that I
was just way too lazy. I didn't go to church. And then I started having
kids. I had three kids and my ex-husband, the father of my three kids is
not Catholic. But part of the deal is if you get married in the Catholic
church, I don't know if you this or not, but if the person you're married
is not Catholic, that's fine. But they have to agree to raise the kids
Catholic.

Rebecca:

Oh, you have to sign like a document or something?

Dawn:

In blood.

Rebecca:

Oh, interesting.

Dawn:

Just kidding now. It's just an agreement. And so in the Catholic church you
take they call them pre-cana classes where you meet with the priest ahead
of time and/or we did a weekend retreat called Engaged Encounter. Have you
heard of Marriage Encounter?

Rebecca:

No. Well, yes. I've heard of it. Yeah.

Dawn:

Yeah. Okay. So we did an engaged encounter, so we got married in the
Catholic church and like I said, he didn't care. He's like, "Yeah, that's
fine." And so during the time when I was married to my first husband with
the three kids basically was me dragging the four of them to church.
Because he didn't really want to go, but it was just like, ah, and then my
kids went to Catholic school for probably until middle school. And then
yeah, I was involved. I would help, like after my kids left the Catholic
school and went to what I called the dark side public school, then I made
them go to CCD, which now I have to regret and I'll tell you why later.

Dawn:

And then even for a while I was a CCD teacher when my son, all three of my
kids got confirmed, which do you have confirmation?

Rebecca:

Yes. We have confirmation.

Dawn:

Yeah. So they all got confirmed in the Catholic church and it's funny
because now none of them are Catholic, but yes, that's what I did like went
to church pretty much every Sunday.

Rebecca:

Did you have a spiritual connection? Did you feel like this is just so
right, as a kid and or is it just this is what we do?

Dawn:

I would say probably both. Like I have a deep faith, Jesus is my dude. In
fact, right now I'm looking at a picture of Jesus. It's a Rembrandt
painting called Head of Christ. So totally faithful, but most of the time
in church I was bored because I only been to a Catholic mass, but it's the
same thing every week. And then the only thing that varies is the sermon or
the homily. And then some priests are really shitty homilist and then my
mom would say, "Well, you don't go to church to be entertained." And I'm
like, "Well I do." Anyway, so-

Rebecca:

Exactly. But you continued going after you got married. And so I'm just
curious, like it was just a thing you did or?

Dawn:

Felt like my faith is such a positive thing in my life and I kind of
thought I'm a parent and so it's my job to help them. Like it's my job to
help them do a lot of things, let's go to school, learn how to eat right,
have faith, whatever. Yeah. So we went and a lot of times it was kind of a
struggle because they didn't really want to go, but they went, yeah.

Rebecca:

So I mean, as far as practicing Catholics, is it just going to church or is
there other quote rules that follow or?

Dawn:

Yeah, it's interesting because I have one sibling, I have five siblings and
one of them would've called me a cafeteria Catholic and that would've been
a slam. And it's kind of funny because every single person and every single
religion is a cafeteria whatever. Like we all pick and choos... You know
what I mean? It's like, because here's an example. So if you're a Catholic,
so if you're a true Catholic you're not using birth control, you don't get
divorced or if you get remarried you get an annulment there's a lot of
things that you just do as a Catholic. So since I may quote or used to be a
cafeteria Catholic, like I got my tubes tied or I always say I got spade
after my third kid. Because I was like, this ain't... No, we're done.

Dawn:

But like I said, my very Catholic aunt took me to the appointment to get my
tubes tied. So even though she was practicing Catholic, but my mother would
not have driven me. And then of course, pro-life from conception to natural
death, but then there's plenty of Catholics that are not pro-life. But
yeah. So it's called a catechism. Have you heard of the Catholic Catechism?
Like it's an actual book with all the rules written by a bunch of men. It's
extremely patriarchal and so do you want to hear a little bit about why I'm
no longer?

Rebecca:

Yeah. I'm just curious where you came from, like as far as how you grew up,
if there was a lot of rules and strict doctrine in your home or any of
that. It doesn't really sound like it's the same as what I grew up. You
know, it sounds-

Dawn:

Probably not. I mean, like when I was growing up I wouldn't say there were
taboo things, but like we could talk to my parents about sex, but it was
always just known like sex is for marriage. You don't have sex outside of
marriage.

Rebecca:

Exactly.

Dawn:

And then, I lost my virginity when I was almost 20 and I was like, oh, the
earth is still spinning. Everything's fine. Actually, I still really like
the way that I think I was raised to respect sex rather than think it's a
way for me to use people to get my jollies. And so I still like that. I
still like that idea.

Rebecca:

So the moral stuff or the kind of the moral parts of going to church kind
of-

Dawn:

Oh, yeah. And so the reason I'm a cafeteria or used to be a cafeteria
Catholic is like they have... And like I said, I haven't really been
Catholic probably for the last five or six years. So some of this I might
be getting wrong, but there's like mortal sins and beanie old sins, meaning
like serious and less serious. And so-

Rebecca:

Did you have to go and confess your sins to the?

Dawn:

Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Rebecca:

And you did that on a regular basis, right?

Dawn:

Not really a regular basis, but yeah. So in the Catholic church, there's
the seven sacraments. So the first one is baptism and then there's, let's
see reconciliation, which you call confession. One of them is holy
communion, which you get communion. One of them is confirmation, then
there's marriage. So marriage is a sacrament in the Catholic church. And
then there's holy orders, that's if you become a priest or a nun, and then
there's anointing of the sick. And so I've been baptized, had
reconciliation, first communion, matrimony, and anointing of the sick.
Because I had open heart surgery about three years ago and I had a heart
attack like 15 years ago. And I'm 57 now. So anyway, I've been in the
hospital before and I've been anointed. So they used to do it like on... It
meant you were on your death bed, but it doesn't necessarily mean that now.
You can get anointed when you're not necessarily going to die. When you're
just really sick.

Dawn:

And so things really I'd say kind of started to fall apart after my
divorce, from my husband, the one that I had three kids with. And then I
started dating a man who subsequently became my second husband. And I knew
that I did not want to get an annulment. I did not.

Rebecca:

What does that mean? So an annulment is not a divorce, is that what you're
saying?

Dawn:

Well, so really a divorce is done by the state. So I live in Pennsylvania,
so the state of Pennsylvania divorced me and I do respect this and I
understand why like marriage, as you know, is a serious, can I cuss on this
podcast?

Rebecca:

Yeah. I mean sort of, but you know-

Dawn:

I won't.

Rebecca:

This is super funny for me to even answer the question. I'm like, oh.

Dawn:

I'll say freaking.

Rebecca:

Yeah. Okay.

Dawn:

Marriage is very serious.

Rebecca:

It's serious. Yes.

Dawn:

Right. I mean, it's a big deal. And so the Catholic church doesn't want it
to seem like it's this a revolving door that one didn't work out get a
divorce, get another one. I get it. Because there's a lot involved in
getting a divorce. Children and just all kinds of stuff.

Rebecca:

Yeah.

Dawn:

So in the Catholic church to get remarried in the Catholic church, you have
to get an annulment. And no, it doesn't mean that your kids are bastard. It
just means that a marriage didn't take place like there was something wrong
before you got whatever. The reason I never wanted to do it, is because I'm
like, and I still believe this wholeheartedly it's like, you know what? We
believe that God is Omniscient and Omnipresent. And He, She, God already
knows everything that happened in our marriage. I'm not going to write it
down. I don't want to feel like I'm throwing him under the bus. Because
then I think in the annulment process like other people have to kind of
chime in about problems they saw and I'm like, "That's bullshit. I am not
doing that." Sorry I said bullshit. But I was like, I'm not, that's not
going to happen.

Rebecca:

That's interesting.

Dawn:

I was like, in fact, one time I was teaching CCD with another teacher to my
son. He was like a junior in high school and the whole idea of annulment
came up and like, I almost just lost it in class. I'm just like no, I'm not
getting an annulment. Anyway so I didn't get an annulment. I don't want an
annulment. I think for some people the process is very healing because
you're thinking of what happened and what did I do wrong? What did he do
wrong? Like where were the stumbling blocks? What do I want? Not want to do
again? Like, so I know I have friends that have gotten an annulment and it
was very healing for them, but for me it would not have been healing.
Anyway, so then I got married the second time and we got married in a
Methodist church.

Rebecca:

Had you switched already or was just-

Dawn:

No. I never became Methodist. I just kind of felt like I would go to
Catholic mass sometimes, I would go to church with my second husband
Methodist sometimes. I was just kind of like, and that was a big deal
because when I was growing up you were Catholic, the one true faith. It was
founded what rock? Peter, the rock, Jesus appointed, whatever. And so I've
heard that so many times. I also don't believe that but when I was growing
up, like if I had a friend, I can remember like being maybe in college and
going to church with a friend at a different denomination, like let's say
Lutheran or Presbyterian and getting communion. And my mom like, "What? You
had... " Like you know [inaudible 00:12:54].

Rebecca:

Yes. It's a very big deal. I get this.

Dawn:

Because in the Catholic church, the sacrament and is believed to be the
actual presence of Jesus, where at other churches, it's a symbol. And so
anyway, so I just remember having this mental drama, like, "Oh, my God, am
I doing something wrong by going to communion here?" Anyway, I no longer
feel that way. Yeah. So at the time of my second marriage, two of my
sisters came, but my mom, one of my sisters and my brother, and then I have
one sister who had passed away. So obviously she didn't have an opinion or
maybe she did have in heaven, but yeah, they didn't acknowledge it at all.
They didn't send a card. They didn't call me, no congratulations. It was as
if it didn't happen.

Rebecca:

Wow. That must feel... I'm just thinking, how does that feel?

Dawn:

It was awful. I felt like shit. Sorry I cussed again. It felt horrible.

Rebecca:

It's okay. You're like separated now from your family kind of, or they
separated you.

Dawn:

Well, my family is so lovely and they're so odd. Some of them are super
Catholics and so in their mind, it would've been, I'm putting words into
their mouth, but sinful for them to condone what I was doing by showing up.
And so like I said, two siblings showed up and then the rest of them didn't
really acknowledge it. But then when my second husband and I went to visit
them in the Midwest they're perfectly lovely. Like it wasn't like, your
son, you not spoken through my hope. Yeah, it was fine. But they never...

Rebecca:

Yeah.

Dawn:

After I got married, the second time I went to Catholic mass, and one of
the priests said, like I had a meeting with the priest and he said, "The
doctrine of the Catholic church is that you can't receive communion." Like,
if you are a divorced Catholic who remarries outside of the church, it's a
moral sin or something and you can't receive communion when you're in a
state of moral sin. And I said to him, I said, "This is a pile of crap." I
said, "There's some pedophile who's looking at child porn all freaking
night. He's in line to get communion, but my sin is public, but I can't
receive communion." So I thought that was a pile of crap and the priest
just said, "You know what? You're welcome in my communion line anytime."

Dawn:

So there's a lot. So the thing is though, just like Republicans or
Democrats or libertarians or Catholics or anything like it's a spectrum of
beliefs and everybody's a cafeteria American, Catholic, Lutheran, Jew,
whatever. Anyway, some priests would say, "Do not darken the door in my
communion line." And other priests would just be like, "Hallelujah, praise,
Jesus. Glad you're here." But yeah. So then my second husband left me after
a year and a half of marriage and I won't go into that, but it was a
debacle. It was one of the lowest times in my life. I wasn't suicidal, but
I didn't want to be alive, put it that way.

Dawn:

And then I swore I'd never ever date again or remarry, which is kind of
funny because now I'm married. But about a year and a half after he left
me, I started dating and I met a guy who's Presbyterian, but he's not...
We're so lazy. I mean, we went to church every week in the Presbyterian oh,
I'm sorry, Episcopal. Oh, my God I mean, I was saying Episcopal church. We
used to go every Sunday and we had our wedding blessed by an Episcopal
priest and had a reception just this past August. But during COVID we just
got out of the habit of going to church.

Rebecca:

Yeah, exactly.

Dawn:

And now we have no excuse. Like they're having Episcopal mass like every
Sunday and so I was told by my friend, Carolyn, "Bring me... Tell me to go
with you next Sunday. I need to go." But really how it started was that
just kind of feeling like I would go back to the Midwest to visit and then
I would go to mass with my family and I would go to communion because I was
like, I don't think Jesus is saying like get out of line, woman. Like I
didn't feel that at all. But I felt judged by my family. Like, "Oh, she
really going to communion. She's a remarried Catholic." And so on. I just
kind of felt like, you know what? [inaudible 00:16:53].

Rebecca:

Yeah. That judgment feeling. Yeah.

Dawn:

Yeah. And then my daughter who gave me permission to say this, well, I have
three kids, two of them are girls. One of my daughters is gay. And a couple
years ago she said to me, she's like, "Mom, how can you go to a church
where I couldn't get married and where women can't become priests?" And at
the time I was kind of like, "oh, doesn't really affect me. I'm not gay and
I don't want to be a priest." But then I realized like, you're right. Yeah.
And so now I've got a big sign that says down with the patriarchy.

Dawn:

So I was just like, you know what screw this patriarchal crap. I'm not, no.
And so the Episcopal church was fascinating because my husband was raised
Episcopal, but he kind of stopped going to church. And so he went through
classes at the church that I'm going to go through as well when they
reinstitute them. But he got like reaffirmed in the Episcopal church. And
so I will take the classes and then I will be like welcomed into the
Episcopal church. And it was great because at the ceremony, it was a female
Bishop. And I was like, "Oh, my God, what? There's a woman in church." And
then the church like it's very formal. It's a very formal mass, but there's
pride flag hanging on the building on the church.

Rebecca:

That's so interesting. It sounds more open.

Dawn:

Yes. And so my daughter could get married there if she chose to. She's
not... None of my kids are really all that religious anymore. She was
thinking... My gay daughter was thinking of becoming Jewish which is
totally fine with me. But yeah. So that's kind of how it happened. I just-

Rebecca:

Yeah, it sounds to me like really the sticking point for you was just
feeling judged?

Dawn:

Yeah. And this kind of feeling like I'm not really welcome here. Like I'm a
mortal sinner because I got divorced twice. But honestly to be honest I
love Catholic people. One thing that we learned is the church is the
people. And it's like I know so many people that are Catholic and they're
wonderful. And like I said, I knew a lot of really lovely priests and nuns.
In fact, when I was 23, I lived in San Francisco with three nuns and did
volunteer work and they were awesome.

Rebecca:

Right.

Dawn:

So its just not institution itself.

Rebecca:

It's the... I don't know, in my opinion about religion is there's this
community and they form around these ideas and then it feels like all of
them are there to keep those ideas. It's like, oh, if you're like straying
off the path, we either need to get you back in or else like in my
experience we shouldn't be talking to you anymore. Like this is how it
could feel in our community. So that's why I was going to ask like how hard
is it to leave a community? But it sounds to me like Catholics might not
have the same small... Like the community I grew up in is very close knit.
That's the world we're us. That's worldly if you go out there there's all
that sin and stay here. Stay like safe in this community. And that's the
hardest part for me as leaving a church feels like where's the community
anymore? I'm having a difficult time with that.

Dawn:

Right. You can find community at another church because like the Episcopal
church there's a lot of former Catholics that become Episcopal or whatever.
But yeah. I mean, I think there's a lot of churches where you can find
fellowships.

Rebecca:

Or you don't have to go to church. So you see this is what I'm currently
exploring, right? It's like, well I don't really need religion to be a
believer in God. So there's so much to explore here, but it's like, yeah,
community is hard for me. It's like, I grew up with these people and now
they think I'm weird or you're just not. They probably think a lot of
things. I don't want to think what they are thinking, but it's a
fascinating discussion about leaving religion or leaving. Yeah. That's what
I'm doing. I'm leaving religion. I'm leaving it.

Dawn:

It's kind of funny because when I was growing up, it was like going to
church every Sunday was a chore. You had to do it. It was like, keep holy
the Sabbath. Like it was right there in the 10 Commandments. So you had to
do it. And then kind of felt drudgery and so now when I go it's almost like
if you're going to hear a really good person speak whether it's a Ted Talk
or whether it's a coach or whether it's whatever so that's why I go to
church now is because if you have a really great speaker, they're
connecting some dots for you in your regular life and you get something out
of it. So that's why I go, is not because I think like God's there, you
didn't go this Sunday. You're going to hell. But it's like, it's for my
benefit.

Rebecca:

That is what I felt though. It's like, you got to go every Sunday and when
COVID started, I was like, you know maybe I'm just not going to go and I'm
going to try not to and just see what happens. And the more I didn't go the
more right it felt to disconnect for a while and just really think about
what do I believe to be true? And going through all the things of what they
think and versus what I think. And I'm like, "Yeah, I can't go back there.
It's just not going to work." So in some ways COVID was a total gift for so
many reasons like the time off of things that you used to consistently do
without really thought like you just, well, this is just what we do, you
know, just go.

Dawn:

You've been spending like the last year and a half critically thinking.

Rebecca:

Yeah. That's what I've been doing the last year and a half. I've been
actually listening to myself, which is really new for me. Like, oh, could I
trust that I could think about this for myself? I don't know.

Dawn:

You're right. Yeah. Because even like in the Catholic church with catechism
like it's all written out there in black and white. And if I ever asked my
mom about it, like her answer was always like, "Oh, well it was divinely
inspired." And like now I just roll my eyes and I'm like, "Okay." Like it
was not that the men's thought about how things should be if it's not their
perspective it's the holy spirit and I'm like, "Okay."

Rebecca:

Right, right, right. So it's interesting. Yeah. So that is one hard thing
about even telling people, even telling friends that, oh, I've been doing
some research. I've been trying to think about what I believe, you know?
And they're just like, "Oh, you know it's just so wrong. No, we don't do
that." You just have faith.

Dawn:

What you're doing is a lot scarier. Like it's a lot easier if there's rules
and you follow them, that's where it gets scary.

Rebecca:

No, wouldn't it be easy and I've told myself this a lot. Like it would be
so much easier if I could just be one of those people that had no questions
and just had just this amazing faith. And I'm like, yes, those are the
rules and I'm following them. And that's, this is the way to heaven and
this is great. It'd be so much easier. Like I wouldn't have to go through
all this. It's super fascinating. It's been a really hard when I was
reading about things like religious trauma. I'm like, oh, my gosh. I think
I have some of that. Like religious trauma and all of these different
things that people tell you, "Well, you just want to go sin or you just
want to... " I'm like, that's not it. I'm still same person. I still have
the same values. You know what I mean? Like I have the same values, but I
just don't believe it to be true that...

Rebecca:

Here's one statement I'm going to say it, and then we can kind of wrap up
this episode. But the statement in our marriage ceremony that says the man
is the head of the wife just as Christ is the head of the church. I just
never really have believed it. I kind of I get it in my marriage, but I'm
just like never believed it and the more, it just bugs me. Because then we
live that out. We live that out as the husband is... We have to somehow be
under him, you know? And I love my husband, but you know what I mean? Like
overall that only men can be the preachers.

Dawn:

Right.

Rebecca:

Only men can be on the church board. I never want to be a preacher and I
don't care about the church board. However, some other women might want to,
who knows.

Dawn:

Exactly.

Rebecca:

I'm like, why is that? Anyways all the things, right. The history and Mary
Magdalene and why don't we talk about her? I don't know. You know, all the
interesting things that there is to talk about religious. It's been a
fascinating discovery for me. So yeah.

Dawn:

Plus it's nice too. So where you're going to is interesting because when
we're young we're just following what our parents say. And like now I just
feel like, well, now I have a very big faith in Jesus, God and because I
believe it, like I've chose... I've done my own critical thinking and
that's what I want to do. Like it makes my life better.

Rebecca:

Yes. I want to believe because I believe something not because someone else
told me to believe it. Do you know what I mean? And that was a big switch
to make. It was just like, you know, I had questions in the past, but I
just kind of keep quiet and it's okay. We're not going to ask those because
you might not get answers anyways. Like there's not really good answers
sometimes to those questions.

Dawn:

Yeah. That's not my personality. I'm the one that's like why? And it's kind
of funny because I'll even think of like the story of Jesus and the
resurrection and the Virgin Mary and all that kind of stuff. And like
there's a tenant of the Catholic faith is that you have to believe that
Mary is a Virgin. I'm like, "I don't give a crap whether she's a Virgin or
not. That's the least interesting part of her." I relate to Mary is like a
mom, like what she had to endure with her son and watching him get
crucified, like, oh, my God. You know what I mean? So I-

Rebecca:

Yeah. It's super fascinating and oh, my gosh, I could talk about that
forever. So instead of that, we need to wrap up this episode. So I just
want you to tell our listeners like if they're curious about who you are
and what you do, where can they find you? What are you doing now?

Dawn:

Yeah. Well, I don't coach about religion. I mean, of course it comes up
sometimes, but yeah, my program is called Love After Divorce. And so I
coach women and I'm going to start coaching men too. And they can find me
easily at my website. It's called therebuildingcoach.com.

Rebecca:

I'll put it in the show notes too.

Dawn:

Yeah. And if somebody wants some help finding some love after a divorce or
a bad breakup, they can just check out my website and schedule a chat.

Rebecca:

It sounds like very important work for a lot of people.

Dawn:

I love it. I love it. Yeah.

Rebecca:

So thank you so much, Dawn for being here today.

Dawn:

And thank you Ms. Tervo.

Rebecca:

If you enjoy listening this podcast, please go subscribe so that you get
notified of all the future goodies that are coming along. While you're
there please leave me a review and let me know what you think. So excited
to share this with you and can't wait to talk to you next time. Bye.