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Jayne works in DC as a program coordinator for an international nonprofit. A recent college graduate, she is the jack of all trades to her supervisors: she organizes, she researches, she saves the world one photocopy at a time. Every morning, she shows up at her place of work and every morning, she wonders why.
My generation was raised on Cocoa Puffs cereal and Nickelodeon cartoons, but all that saccharine dissolved for me one day in September 2001.
We had witnessed the demise of communism and lived through the awkward impeachment of our president, but by the end of the 90s, we were accustomed to excess. As a country, we were invincible; as a generation, we were privileged. The terrorist attacks of 2001 shocked us out of our stupor.
What is it about Texas that can make an East Coast girl feel like such an outlaw? I’ve barely been here 24 hours and I already feel like chirping “Ya’ll” to everyone I see and am fixin’ to fit myself with a pair of cowboy boots. And one short day after flying in, I have already caved into the sins of the flesh: This evening I -- a dedicated vegetarian -- moseyed on over to a food festival where I found myself inspired (more likely by my inner carnivore than the Holy Spirit) to eat a dead animal. And it was delicious.
I’m home this Holy Week –and by home I mean the Long Island house in which I grew up. Although I’ve only spent a few months at this house in the past five years, I don’t know where else to call home.
Live-blogging my flight: An anxious flyer takes to the skies.
2:00: I’m standing in line to board at Midway airport and the Southwest airline attendant announces that they have overbooked the flight and wouldn’t one generous volunteer just love to receive a $200 voucher to give up his seat and take a later flight? At first, I’m steadfast: I’m getting on this plane. As the attendant becomes desperate, the offer goes up. I become weak. I sell out. $420 Southwest voucher, here I come!
With next week’s sober Easter Tridduum just around the corner, I paid a final Lenten visit to my spiritual director.
In the five months that we have been meeting, Sister B has helped me to laugh at myself, to learn from myself and to seek wisdom within Catholicism’s spiritual depths.
There are some very promising signs flooding into Chicago’s department stores: There may come a day –and it may be soon –when wearing shorts and a T-shirt will not be considered an activity in recklessness. Spring just might find its way to the shores of Lake Michigan. And retailers everywhere know what a change in season means. Warm up your credit cards, it’s time to go shopping!
As Sen. Obama taught us last week --by way of Sen. Clinton’s rebuke --one man’s plagiarism is another man’s allusion.
The Catholic Church recently found itself in a similar predicament, with this report out of Poland:
“I had not thought about it like that before.”
I have learned to love those words.
This past weekend I took a trip to San Diego, where I was talked my favorite duo --religion and politics --with an acquaintance who is currently training with Navy special forces teams. We agreed on the threat posed to democracy by religionists of all stripes who want to forcibly impose their religious world view.
Are you there Catholicism? It’s me, Elizabeth.
I moved to Chicago for grad school five months ago and will pack up my bags and head out just four months from today. My time here is really more of an extended vacation –one involving several student loans and one absurdly small living space. Ahh, grad school...
The millions of Christians walking the earth Wednesday, bearing an ashy sign of the cross on their foreheads, may seem to some to be conspicuous trumpeters of their own piety.
To the wearer, however, the sign traditionally indicates his penitence, sinfulness, humility and mortality.
In a great cosmic convergence, the United States has endured just about all the festivities it can handle in the span of four days: We’ve had Super Bowl Sunday and Super Duper/ Mardi Gras Tuesday, only to be followed by the considerably more subdued Ash Wednesday.
And today, another chapter in the endless saga between advocates of “Peace through Strength” and proponents of “Strength through Peace . . .”
"World’s Most Powerful Rail Gun Delivered to Navy” reads the headline from Popular Mechanics. The article is rife with jargon but conveys one can't-miss-it point: This is one big, bad-ass weapon.
Here's the first paragraph:
“For true sci-fi fans, any mention of a real-world rail gun with draw an instant, slightly audible gasp. Instead of relying on chemical propellants –such as gunpowder –a rail gun uses magnetic ‘rails’ to launch a solid, non-explosive projectile at incredible speed. Theoretically, rail guns would be able to precisely strike targets at extreme ranges, and would negate the risks associated with carrying around tons of explosive ammo. More to the point, they’re cool-sounding, just like lasers.”
A director for the rail gun project “compared the force [of the projectile] to hitting a target with a Ford Taurus at 380 mph.”
The future of warfare is here. Do you like what you see?
As I mulled over the implications of this technology, one question struck me:
Can efficiency in warfare be a Christian mandate?
Just in time for -7 degree temperatures and unrelenting snow, I have begun to commute into the heart of Chicago to report from Medill’s downtown newsroom. I survive the hour train ride into the city by shoving my headphones into my ears and, in a polite nod to the Lord God of all creation, listen to ‘Pray as you Go,’ a brief daily podcast from Jesuit Media Initiates. In 10 minutes, the gospel is read – in a British accent, as it sounds more authoritative and refined this way – brief reflections are offered, and the narrator invites the listener to quiet reflection.
Twelve drummers drumming: The twelve points of belief in the Apostles' Creed
The creed is a statement of beliefs that Christians hold in common and publicly affirm. But there is also a lived mystery in Christian life, an acknowledgment that the holy is not only experienced in sacred tradition, but in witnessing life’s depth, monotony, joy and pain.
Some may think that believers who struggle to process life’s complexity and heartache contradict themselves. Those believers may simply be honoring the truth they have experienced.
NPR had a story this weekend on Douglas Fenton, a Presbyterian Minister who served in Iraq and is suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder as a result of his service there.
“Chaplains are not allowed to have problems,” Fenton said. “Chaplains have to focus on other people’s problems. And if you get to that point, God help you. God help you.”
Eleven pipers piping: The eleven faithful Apostles
Tradition holds that after Jesus’ death and resurrection, the apostles went out to the corners of the earth to spread the good news.
Nearly 700 Sisters of Notre Dame have taken a new approach to spreading good news in life and after death. For more than 20 years, the sisters have been the subjects of a study of “Alzheimer's disease and other age-related brain disorders “with Dr. David Snowdon of the University of Kentucky. As a final gift to science, after each woman’s death her brain will be donated for examination. The research Snowdon has already compiled has contributed significantly to the understanding of Alzheimer’s disease. According to the AP article on the study:
One reason the nuns are such a valuable research tool is that as members of the same religious order, they all had decades of similar medical treatment, diets, reproductive histories and preventive care. Almost nine out of 10 had been teachers.In the general population, finding such a uniform pool of test subjects is difficult.
Sister Treanor, a 93-year-old former school principal who is one of the last of the volunteers at a Wilton convent, looks at her participation as service, not sacrifice.
"I've tried to do good while I'm alive, and I liked the idea that I could do something good after death," she said.
From their faith in their God and in science, we will all benefit.
Ten lords a-leaping: The Ten Commandments
This summer during my trip to Egypt I made a climb up Moses Mountain, which many revere as the site on which Moses received the Ten Commandments. The pilgrimage itself is an interfaith act as Muslim Bedouin guides take mostly Christian pilgrims to a place of importance for Jews, Christians and Muslims alike. The hike begins in the dark at midnight and winds its way around camels and over uneven rock until it reaches the top of the mountain in time for sunrise. By the time the sun had come up and sleep deprivation had set in, I realized that no groundbreaking revelation would come to me during my time on the mountain. But now I recognize that I may have found something more sublime.
As I followed our 19-year-old guide Musa back down, he loosened up and began to tell stories about his life in Sinai, his girlfriend and his dreams for his future. He asked questions about America and appeared dazzled by the answers.
Nine ladies dancing: The nine choirs of angels
My mother raised her three children on an eclectic musical amalgamation of Sister Act, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, Handel’s Messiah: A Soulful Celebration and Annie Lennox. I was rapping Sr. Mary Clarence’s (played by Whoopi Goldberg) Salve Regina before I knew how to translate those words.
My family, hardly a choir of angels, became one eager cadre of Church Singers. Unlike the Church Yeller, the lady who seems to think that shouting the Our Father and Creed louder than any other church goer will get her prayers heard more effectively, Church Singers aim not to be particularly noisy. Rather, we strive for melodic consistency, quickly thumbing the thin pages of our Gather hymnal each time the cantor announces the song. As we sing, we fill ourselves with the lyrics and send them outward. We create something beautiful that was not present before, and will soon pass.
Eight maids a-milking: The eight Beatitudes
What is a peacemaker?
A member of the U.N. Peacekeeping force?
An American soldier in Iraq hoping to bring security to Iraqis?
A Peace Corp volunteer?
A child standing up to a bully?
Seven swans a-swimming: The seven gifts of the Holy Spirit (wisdom, understanding, counsel, strength, knowledge, piety, and fear of the Lord
For the first time in my life, I was not under the long umbrella of Eastern Standard Time when the ball dropped in New York City. Spending New Year's on the West coast, in Seattle, was rather disorienting for this East Coast girl. That geographic vertigo is my excuse for my lack a resolution as of this morning.
Half of Americans say that they have resolutions to change in 2008. According Franklin Covey’s New Year’s Resolution Survey, the top three resolutions are getting out of debt or saving money, losing weight and developing a healthy habit.
To which all I can say is student loans, cream cheese and internet addiction.
Six geese a-laying: The six days of creation described in Genesis
Sometimes a blogger posts a tidbit so precious that a fellow blogger cannot help but use it. So, with a courtesy to Andrew Sullivan of The Daily Dish, I would like to post the following quote from Pope John Paul II:
"The Bible itself speaks to us of the origin of the universe and its make-up, not in order to provide us with a scientific treatise, but in order to state the correct relationships of man with God and with the universe. Sacred Scripture wishes simply to declare that the world was created by God, and in order to teach this truth it expresses itself in the terms of the cosmology in use at the time of the writer."
In other words: Don’t take the biblical account of creation literally. But where should Catholics look for information about the origin of the world?
Four calling birds: The four Evangelists--Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John
The four authors of the Gospel, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, are credited with writing the “Good News,” the Gospels on the birth, life and resurrection of Jesus. After each Gospel reading at mass, the priest declares the reading to be the “Gospel of the Lord,” to which the congregation replies “Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.” We then take our seats and prepare to get our homily on.
Three French Hens: Faith, Hope, and Charity
When I hear the triad of words “faith, hope and charity [love]” from St. Paul’s famous passage in his letter to the Corinthians, I don’t immediately conjure up benevolent Christian images, although I perhaps should. The phrase “faith, hope and charity” is one that I long ago memorized, no doubt in order to score well on a religion test at my Catholic high school, a place where Saints names were uttered during prayer as speed talk, morning mass was a place to meet boyfriends and frenetic, uniform-clad teenagers mingled freely with Franciscan brothersclothed in heavy black robes.
Two turtle doves: The Old and New Testaments
A few years ago, I purchased a red-letter bible, bringing color-coded pizazz to my New American Bible This bible highlights Jesus’ words in red font so that they stand out, and so simpletons like myself can pluck Jesus’ moral one-liners from the page and apply them at whim. Catholicism’s understanding of scripture, however, is more complicated than my approach implies: The bible is interpreted contextually, yet understood as an inspired work containing divine revelation.
The partridge in a pear tree represents Jesus.
On this, the “First Day of Christmas,” I will be enduring the treacherous, gravity-defying feat of air travel. The whole process is a one-man obstacle course with luggage.
I don’t want miss my flight, so I end up at the ticket counter three hours too early, but, predictably, fifteen minutes after the previous flight has departed. Then I hurry up and wait my turn to perform a juggling act of my shoes, license, ticket, toiletries and laptop. By the time that I’ve walked through the magical doorway [also known as a metal detector] I’ve broken out in a sweat and am desperate for the water bottle that I was just forced to throw away.
Christians have a special sympathy for unmarried pregnant teenagers, especially during Advent. Jesus Christ was born to one. Our particular religious history is one reason why the news that Britney Spears’ 16 year-old sister Jamie Lynn is three months pregnant is an important cultural moment.
Jamie Lynn is a star in her own right, the lead character in the Nickelodeon TV show Zoey 101. After her pregnancy became public, Viacom issued a vague statement about their respect for Jamie’s “decision to take responsibility” for her pregnancy.
I am so over Ordinary Time. Now on to the exciting stuff. . .
December 2 was the first Sunday in Advent, the liturgical season during which Christians wait in hope for Christmas Day: the ancient celebration of getting lots of presents.
In anticipation of this holy occasion, we stockpile things –all sorts of sparkly, fantastical things –for the day that is coming. And truly, nothing says “Thank you Jesus Christ for being born into the world to show us The Way and to die for our sins” quite like that inflatable family of penguins on the front lawn.
I have always had a thing for the dorky types: undiscovered hunks hiding beneath glasses and philosophy texts. I felt like a secret investigator, constantly on the lookout for a guy with an opinion on the nature of reality –and great facial structure. So when I found him one night, a copy of Marcus Aurelius in his pocket and a smirk on his charming face, I was instantly smitten.
Three years have passed and as it turns, he is The One. I knew I wanted to marry someone tall, dark and handsome, but as fate shall have it, I get to add another adjective to that list: He is tall, dark, handsome and Catholic.
Like many matriarchs throughout the ages, both of my grandmothers prayed for me to meet a nice Catholic young man. I considered it a kind gesture, but thought that restricting myself to dating Catholic guys might be pushing my romantic luck. In an attempt to increase the odds, I chose to attend a Jesuit university, which is close enough to Catholic. (Just kidding, St. Ignatius!) Then, of course, I met a guy who went to another school.
From the AP Stylebook:
“Use anti-abortion instead of pro-life and abortion rights instead of pro-abortion or pro-choice.”
In class, our editing professor affirmed his belief that the use of ‘anti-abortion’ and ‘abortion rights’ is unbiased.
When a classmate raised objections to the Associated Press' 'neutral' words on abortion, she was literally laughed at. Where is academic freedom when you need it?
Why did the AP decide to define the 'anti-abortion' group negatively? Why not make it fair across the board and use 'rights-based' terms? Pro-lifers believe in a 'right' to life.
In light of the recent statement on faithful citizenship statement by the U.S. Bishops, I am increasingly unsure that the Stylebook got it correct.
At an opening lecture when journalism school began, one of our professors gave us this bit of wisdom:
“Being a journalist isn’t safe,” he said. “If you’re going into journalism thinking that you can avoid danger, you’re going to be a bad journalist. When everybody else is running away from a situation, your job is to run towards it.”
I think that example is perhaps more in line with the job description of policemen, firefighters and soldiers, especially after William Quinn’s insight into Jesus’ criticism of the Pharisees. Look at the example of emergency responders on September 11th. When others fled, they entered.
William James Quinn was 24 and a veteran of the Iraq war when he began his freshman year of college. While in Iraq, he worked as an interrogator at Abu Ghraib and Camp Cropper. He recently penned a Veteran’s Day piece for The Washington Post Outlook Section about his experiences in Iraq and Georgetown. I recently interviewed William on his Roman Catholic religious beliefs and how they interact with his roles as a soldier and student.
William on faith:
"It has not always been very easy for me to believe –either in God or in Catholicism. And there were many times, particularly before I went to Iraq, that I would have said that I pretty much couldn’t feel it at all. And in reality, I even feel that way now. I don’t go to mass and sit there and have this deep sense of warmth and communion with God. If that happens to other people I think that’s amazing but it doesn’t happen to me.
"As far as Catholicism is concerned, it may be true that if I had been born into a family that practices a different religion that I would practice a different religion, but that’s just as good as saying that if I had been born into a family that spoke a different language then I’d speak a different language. English is still the one I have to communicate with so Catholicism is the way that I communicate my religious beliefs."
‘Book Buyback’ is a magical ordeal where students line up to sell their three-month-old, $75 textbooks back to the bookstore in return for ten bucks and a wallop of intellectual shame. Penniless with just days until Christmas, a few years ago I found myself in that line bearing a somewhat guilty conscience and several heady philosophy books.
That day, a similarly desperate student stood in front of me carrying his own load of academic baggage including one book by Georgetown’s own John F. Haught titled ‘What is God? –How to think about the divine.’ You know the times are tough when you’re selling insight into eternity back to the bookstore.
Intrigued, I asked him if I could look at the book. He handed it over and generously added that I could keep it. A small Christmas miracle.
It is three years since I received that book and I just began reading it. I wasn’t ready for it until now.
Haught on how to get to ‘The Divine’:
“I shall attempt this location of transcendence by asking you to reflect on five ordinary aspects of your own life experience: your experience of depth, future, freedom, beauty and truth.”
I’ve been stuck on the 13-page Depth chapter for three weeks, reading a bit each night and digesting it while I sleep. Does my languor suggest that I’m really deep, or completely superficial?
In that chapter, Haught writes:
“The experience of depth has two faces. It is both abyss and ground. . . . . What would happen, though, if we allowed ourselves, or were forced by ‘circumstances,’ to plunge into the abyss? . . . . The depth will show itself to us not only as an abyss but also as ground. In the final analysis, the depth is ultimate support, absolute security, unrestricted love, eternal care.”
A blog is a strange place to talk about a spiritual 'feeling,' but I’m going to try. . .
I have spent years in the abyss. I know its endless emptiness. But lately another side has shown itself to me.
I have noticed something drawing me in, something strange and ineffable that I hesitate to name or psychoanalyze. It might be the caffeine talking or neurons over- firing or hormones zipping around my body. But it might be God; or as the Jesuits say, an “internal movement” of the soul.
Without my consent, something within me has decided to go through a spiritual transformation and I can feel my old walls being torn down. I am being moved into a place of peace and growth. I feel pulled there, like I am being grasped by the wrists and compelled onward.
I think I’m experiencing depth’s grounding.
The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius talk about a similar movement:
“It belongs to God our Lord to give consolation to the soul without preceding cause, for it is the property of the Creator to enter, go out and cause movements in the soul, bringing it all into love of His Divine Majesty. I say without cause: without any previous sense or knowledge of any object through which such consolation would come, through one's acts of understanding and will.”
Skeptics might call the interior movements I am experiencing ‘indigestion.’ I am open to that possibility. But indigestion is seldom this joyful.
On a related note:
"If God dwells inside us, like some people say, I sure hope He likes enchiladas, because that's what He's getting." -Jack Handy, Deep Thoughts
Confession: I am a convert.
I’m an embarrassment to my family.
They say I’ve disowned my roots.
I’ve forgotten where I came from.
Family, forgive me, for I have sinned:
This New York born and raised, thoroughbred Yankee loves country music.
Somewhere between listening to Alison Krauss on Wyoming’s wild highways and Tim McGraw on weekends out in Virginia, I realized that doggonit, I like this country stuff! And did I just say doggonit?
Due to the lousy male to female ratio at the Naval Academy, every weekend a horde of midshipmen escape from the yard (also known as taking liberty) and close in on Georgetown to talk politics with young, Jesuit-educated female scholars. Or something like that.
We, the ladies of Georgetown, were all too willing to welcome those mids from down Route 50. It was our patriotic duty, a service to our country.
They also looked quite handsome in their uniforms.
I would like to introduce you to two couples. Both of the women are Hoyas, both of the men are Naval Academy grads.
On Saturday, October 27 I drove out to Aurora, Ill., to cover the Pro Life Action League’s protest of a new Planned Parenthood facility. Critics say that Planned Parenthood misled the public by applying for permits during construction under the name “Gemini Office Development” even though Planned Parenthood fully intended to build one of the nation’s largest abortion clinics in Aurora. Planned Parenthood contends that it did nothing illegal but instead used deft tactics to diminish opposition by a “low visibility approach.” Here are images and audio I captured at the event.
At the protest, anti-abortion activists carried signs that read “Planned Parenthood Lies to You” and “Stop Abortion Now.” In front of the clinic, protesters prayed the rosary. I stood by them to record their prayers and watched teenage girls and young women enter and leave the facility.
My peers entered Planned Parenthood in front of me while my spiritual brothers and sisters prayed for them next to me. The space between all of us was apparent, and troubling.
David Brooks wrote Friday about his “outsourced brain,” which, he said, has evolved as a result of such glorious technological advances as a GPS system, Amazon.com’s product recommendations and Wikipedia . As a member of the baby boom generation, Brooks writes, the way that his mind functions has been altered by recent advances in technology.
Try being born into that world. I swear my mind works like the internet: I think in terms of connections but lack the depth of knowledge that coming of age in a slower world may have cultivated. My ability to concentrate is about as fickle as Drudge Report: Sirens go off in one corner of my brain while bold red text catches my eye in the other and oh my goodness can you believe Hillary Clinton said that? I read four articles at the same time while playing music, e-mailing my professor, checking my blog roll and sipping my hazelnut coffee.
For the members of my generation, the world is literally at our fingertips, and knowledge is just a type or a click away. Thomas Friedman recently branded us “Generation Quiet,” suggesting that we are too busy with our iPods, signing online petitions or chatting away on IM to change the world in a way that he considers noteworthy. I would answer his attack, but I’m a bit occupied right now updating my Facebook profile.
Have you seen The CW’s new television show, "Aliens in America"? It is about the adventures of a Pakistani teenager named Raja on exchange to Wisconsin. You can watch full length episodes online, and since I am without a TV but laptop ready, "Aliens in America" is my new favorite show.
After his first day at school, Raja is shaken by a episode in class where he is cited for his “Muslimism,” and told that “his people attacked the buildings in New York.” Frustrated, Raja prays the Shahadah in front his host family’s son, Justin.
Raja: What prayers do you recite when you’re upset?Justin: I… I don’t usually uhh, I don’t really pray that much. Usually I just like, you know, eat a brownie or buy a C.D.
Things I have done when I am upset: Cut my hair. Curled my hair. Blow-dried my hair. Enhanced my hair color with subtle tone enhancing highlights.
For years, I have also recited a prayer that I found on the back of a prayer card sent to our house. As a child, the peace I found in it was less intellectualized than my understanding of the prayer now. Both then and now, I trust Jesus/ God/ the spirit/ the universe/ all that is good to be with me, to surround me with peace in difficult times, not deliver me from these hardships.
“Compassionate Jesus, I remember your gentle invitation to come and be refreshed. I bring you now all my worries, fears, needs and doubts, and those of my world. I entrust to you my loved ones, both living and deceased. Enfold us in all your love, now and forevermore. Amen.”
And if you are wondering if it is possible to recite this prayer while furiously styling a new hairdo or stuffing a chocolate chunk brownie into your mouth, the answer is yes.
I have been doing a little spiritual director shopping lately. I am looking for a Catholic guide, a person trained to help me channel my religious angst in a productive direction. I have met with several people –spiritual first dates, if you will. After a painful search and some heartache, I believe that I have found The One. It was love at first insight.
My most recent date gone wrong was with a priest who wanted to bring me back in step with the church by exploring the ways that I have been hurt throughout my life. If I determined where I had been wounded in my personal life, Father suggested, then my objections to certain church precepts that have hurt me would diminish. (N.B., I have a quite normal—even lovely –personal life.) While I think psychoanalysis might be worthwhile for some people, I was hoping to move forward constructively. Furthermore, I am not trying to fall in line, but rather I am looking to be honest with the questions that I have.
And then I found her. She is a Benedictine nun in the Chicago area. She is thoughtful and compassionate. She caught what I threw at her. We laughed. I tried not to cry.
I have been looking over my photographs from my trip to Egypt and was reminded of an important episode.
My tour guide, a highly educated Cairo native, was a walking encyclopedia for Egyptian history and present day politics. She was quite progressive compared to many of her peers. She often traveled alone throughout the country. Her modern sensibilities and independent outlook were just two reasons I was shocked when she turned to me one night and asked: “Is it true that the Jews control the American government?” I was too shocked to put together a cogent answer.
My tour guide was not alone in that thinking: a political cartoon in Egypt’s newspaper that ran in June, while I visited, depicted Israelis as monsters in bed with Uncle Sam. The conspiracy theories, the fear and distrust are reminiscent of a dark era in world history.
I have written before about the importance of making Christianity relevant in the lives of youth, but I advocate doing so with bold, Jesus-centered initiatives. Others have a different idea of what ‘relevant’ means. . .
Take Halo Ministry for example. Matt Richtel wrote an article for Sunday’s New York Times with the headline: “Thou Shalt Not Kill, Except in a Popular Video Game at Church.” The premise is that some Christian churches are organizing Halo video game sessions as a way to get teenagers to attend religious youth groups.
Halo, the video game, is rated M for “Blood and Gore.” Yummy.
In June 2007, Michael McCarthy of Vassar College spoke at the Annual Workshop of Boston College’s Lonergan Institute. I get the sense that he deeply cares about the health of our church.
McCarthy offered a handful of initiatives for Catholicism in his lecture, “Towards a Catholic Christianity: A Personal Narrative,” parts of which were recently published in Boston College Magazine:
When I say the Church, I mean us -- the pilgrim people of God in history. It is we who are vulnerable to these failings, who commit these sins, who dishonor God by the images of the divine we project and defend. Yet we are called to be the salt of the earth and the light of the world. The most powerful witness, for or against the gospel, remains the lives that we actually lead.What would a Catholic Christianity faithful to the message of the gospel and the mission of redeeming the world be like?
• Our thought and speech would be realistic and critical; we would be as truthful as we can be in understanding ourselves, our past, and the complexity of the world that we serve.
• Genuinely repentant, we would not justify past failures, conceal present weaknesses, nor shrink from the challenges of conversion and change.
• Our understanding of the Church and the world would be deeply historical. The redemptive message of the gospel is constant, but it has to be proclaimed with fresh credibility to each culture and people in history.
• An ecumenical Church would treat everyone with dignity and respect. Without glossing over differences, its internal and external dialogues would be directed toward mutual understanding and, where possible, consensus in judgment. Continually learning and teaching, the Church would candidly acknowledge its limits as well as its strengths.
• The whole baggage of patriarchy would be abandoned. Women and men are equally created in God’s image, equally redeemed by Christ’s sacrifice, equally inspired by the Spirit, and equally called to the service of God in the world. All the ministries of the Church would be fully open to women.
• The principles of collegial governance and meaningful lay participation proclaimed in Vatican II would be fully implemented. The unifying role of the pope is consistent with a far less centralized, bureaucratic, and secretive manner of conducting the Church’s affairs than has prevailed for centuries. The Church’s internal practice must become a model of freedom and justice, if its prophetic ministry to the world is to be taken seriously.
We live during a complicated and fascinating time. McCarthy suggests that the church can and must conduct rigorous dialog with these issues, while always retaining Christ at the center. My generation must be brought into the tradition by honest outreach to the places where we dwell. Christ dined with the sinners, and He did not condemn them. He found them where they were, and he met them in love. We deserve a Jesus-centered church that engages the honest questions of a desperate generation. Some would be satisfied to spiritually exile agitators, questioners, sinners. I prefer Jesus’ way.
Deep inside a drawer, I recently found a CD belonging to my mother, an old favorite that reminds me of the warmth inside our home on blustery December mornings in my childhood. The CD is "Handel's Messiah –A Soulful Celebration," and it won a Grammy in 1992 for Best Contemporary Soul Gospel Album. The songs on this album, which can be heard on this link from Amazon, praise Jesus Christ Our Lord and Savior in ways that will make you want to break out in wild interpretative dance. Or at least start bopping around in your chair. This stuff is cheerful, uplifting and proves that Christianity can –and even should –be bold, relevant and full of life. This is a welcome infusion in my spiritual life. Praise the Lord!
For a post-Vatican II Catholic like me, church music often consists of little more than a wanna-be James Taylor/ Joan Baez type strumming a guitar and singing soft, sweet lines like "You are My God/ You are an awesome God/ God you are so awesome." Sometimes these ballads are enough to inspire a lump in the back of my throat. At their worst, however, they sound limp and whiney, their lyrics empty except for strained spiritual pleas. They are like John Mayer, only worse, because these sob songs are supposed to relate to our eternal salvation. In fact, advocates of the Latin Mass often cite the banal music in our churches as reason enough to bring back the ethereal rite of old. While they insist that the mystery and grandeur are the missing elements in our liturgies, and the Latin Mass the solution, I have noticed another looming problem, one not easily fixed by Latin elements:
The Christianity preached from our Catholic pulpits is totally lame.
I studied Theology and Government at Georgetown, a double major that has landed me in the lucrative field of . . . Graduate School.
Perhaps because of my academic background, I frequently find myself on the receiving end of unsolicited religious confessions of all varieties. People like to tell me things. Spiritual things.
Agnostic? Southern Baptist? Jew for Jesus? I’m your girl.
For example, Upon hearing of my theology training, I’ve been informed by an acquaintance that Jesus talks to him. Fascinating.
I’ve been told by a friend that there is no God. Oh really?
I have been told everything else in between.
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