This may shock many of the people who know me, but I go to church every weekend. But that doesn't mean I believe everything that the church tells me!

Unfortunately, most of my negative views of the Roman Catholic Church (and trust me, there's a lot) will either get me in trouble or cause my grandmother to have a heart attack.

So here are five trivial aspects of Catholicism that I don't buy into.

1. Drinking The Holy Wine

If you think that I'm putting my mouth on a cup that is being shared by 50+ senior citizens, you're out of your mind. God already gave us the meningitis vaccine, so why are we slapping him in the face by continuing to share our drinks?

2. Getting Ashes

I work very hard to keep my pores clean so there's no way I'm clogging them up with black soot just so people know that I go to church. Also, nobody is putting their finger anywhere near the general area of my face during flu season.

3. Transubstantiation

When I made my communion, I assumed that this was a classic case of willful ignorance, but it's not: people actually believe this. Really?

I seem to remember my seventh-grade science teacher saying that the states of matter are "gaseous, liquid, and solid" not "gaseous, liquid, solid, and body/blood of Christ."

4. Lenten Sacrifice

This is more of a criticism of churchgoers than of the actual church, but Lent is supposed to be a time of unselfish sacrifice in the model of Jesus Christ, a man who sacrificed his life for the love of his people.

Is giving up candy and television really on the same level as getting nailed to a cross?

5. All Of The Singing

When I'm home, I normally go to 8 a.m. mass, which doesn't include singing of any kind. And guess what?

I'm home by 8:30.

When I go later in the day?

Mass takes over an hour.

So to all of the overzealous (and usually tone deaf) catholic music directors out there: cut the shit and let's get out of here.