Something That Started out Being a Short Peice for the Newspaper, but Kinda Turned Weird

A subject that comes up here frequently is that of music: music as “expression;” music as an art form; and most predominantly, music at Mass. This really is quite natural considering that we are at a Catholic school and the Liturgy is the “source and summit” of the Church’s actions. We should definitely give the Mass all of the honor and awe that is due to it.

In The Closing of the American Mind, Allan Bloom writes that “music is the medium of the human soul.” Music speaks to and speaks for the soul. One of the most prominent external aspects of the Mass is its music. It is an expression of our worship of Christ and a way in which God’s glory can be made known to us. It should be no surprise, then that this element of Mass is argued about quite frequently.

There is really only one aesthetic requirement that music at Mass must meet: that it be beautiful. This is because, as Pope Benedict XVI says, beauty “enables us to experience the presence of God.” Here one may say "but beauty is subjective." I answer: not quite. Beauty is defined as by Webster's dictionary as "the quality or aggregate of qualities in a person or thing that gives pleasure to the senses or pleasurably exalts the mind or spirit." Yet again one might say, “what exalts individual minds or spirits is subjective.” I answer: not true.That which is the highest Good is God. The ultimate goal of every man is (or should be) to reach the greatest Good. Man cannot reach Good without goodness; man's spirit cannot be lifted to the highest Good by something that is not good. Because of the nature of “good” something cannot be good and not lift man's spirit to God, even if man does not realize that his spirit is being lifted. This is why beauty is not subjective. But, because of sin, beauty can be perverted but still seem beautiful. A prime example of the perversion of beauty is seen in human sexuality. I am not saying that human sexuality is beauty perverted. Human sexuality is wondrously beautiful when it is not used in a perverted fashion. It fulfills the requirement of lifting the soul to God. But when a man (or a woman) uses his sexuality in any way other than that which was intended, it no longer lifts his soul; in fact, it drags his soul away from God, yet, it still can be mistakenly perceived as good.The same is true of music. St. Augustine said, “Music, that is the science or the sense of proper modulation, is likewise given by God's generosity to mortals having rational souls in order to lead them to higher things." Beautiful music lifts the soul to God. This is the purpose of music at Mass: to lift the souls of the faithful to God.

The Church has given us guidelines about which types of music are more appropriate at Mass, which type of music best lift souls, and, as always, explanations about why. In his Chirograph for the Centennial of the Motu Proprio Trale Sollecitudint on Sacred Music, Pope John Paul II quoted, and hence, reiterated Pope Pius XII’s statement, "The more closely a composition for church approaches in its movement, inspiration and savour the Gregorian melodic form, the more sacred and liturgical it becomes; and the more out of harmony it is with that supreme model, the less worthy it is of the temple" This is because Gregorian chant was developed specifically for the Latin (as in Roman) liturgy. The music was developed to fit the words, the words of the Word; the Word was not fitted to secular music. Gregorian chant is so special in the Church because it has no roots in secular music. It was made to fit the sacred. The sacred was not conformed to it. This singularness is why Gregorian chant is given “pride of place” in the Roman Liturgy.

This is not to say that chant is the only music that can or should be used at Mass. Sacred music should be developed; cultures change. But just because sacred music should be developed does not mean that “the old stuff” should be forgotten. Quite the contrary, it should be treasured and kept alive to be passed down to all generations.

Sacred music should be developed from the sacred, not the secular. The “liturgical musician” should be educated in the history, purpose, and rules of sacred music because the way in which we adorn the Mass should not be arbitrary. It should not be based solely on how someone feels or what someone likes. It should be based on the appropriateness for the liturgy, which is judged by an historical, a theological, and an aesthetic standard. Each piece of the Mass that is sung has a different historical, theological, and aesthetic meaning and purpose. It is the work of sacred music to portray those meanings. It is not the work of Sacred music to make people feel good, or to make them happy or comfortable. I’m sure Christ wasn’t comfortable on the Cross.

Several times in the history of the Church, it has been necessary to remind the faithful of the sacredness that should be present in the music used at Mass. Sacred means something special, different, set apart for something higher than one’s self, something that is not ordinary or mundane. The Mass is the prime example of Sacredness. There is nothing more sacred than receiving the physical body and blood of our Savior. The music used at Mass should remind of this. Music at Mass should not be modeled off of the everyday secular music that we listen to. The music of the Mass should be built around the sacredness and mystery of the True Presence of Our Lord.

And this is why modern music really has no place at Mass: it has more roots in the secular than in the sacred. We often hear that today’s society is highly individualistic and ego-centric and, while it may seem far-fetched to some, that is clearly seen in lots of the recently (last 40 years or so) composed music used at Mass. “Here I am, Lord” “Gather us in” “We are the Light of the World” “Servant Song” “City of God”- those are all very mild examples of this. There are many that are much worse; there are the quite blatantly the “pat ourselves on the back” type songs. The words of the music are supposed to lead us to worship and to praise; what the words are saying is what we led to praise. If we constantly hear songs that praise ourselves in relation to the world and to God, rather than praising God in relation to us (us as lovers, worshipers, helpers, and guides to others or children of God [note the feel goodness] as opposed to God as a creator, Redeemer, Saviour, ect,) we are going to get into the mindset of "me".

This is what leads Monsignior Grau (President of the Pontifical Institue of Sacred Music) to say, "How far we are from the true spirit of sacred music. How can we stand it that such a wave of inconsistent, arrogant and ridiculous profanities have so easily gained a stamp of approval in our celebrations?" Open any OCP hymnal and you will find words that are over-flowing with me-ness if you’re lucky; with heresy if you aren’t.

Dr. Bruce stresses the importance of words. Psychological studies show that words even subconsciously affect the way a person thinks and acts (a random series of words- five words a line and about ten or fifteen lines- which a person is supposed to make a sentence (4 words) out of as fast as he can - something like green mean lights shove go, only each sentence has a trigger word and the trigger words are all connected to a concept or an emotion, such as getting old, or agression or politeness and the trigger words, though the person is unconscious of any change, actually do change the way a person acts. It's called priming.) If something as random as placing the words "wrinkle" and "Florida" together in series of scrambled sentences make our unconscious minds think of getting old and manifests itself in our wlking more slowly (one of the studies I read about), how much more so will something done consciously make us think of what it says? The I and me do not go unoticed. They spill into the way we think about Mass; and then, the Mass becomes more about "me" than about God.

And that is why people get so passionate about music. It isn't just something random, it's indoctrinating.

Awed by Love

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not
proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it
keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the
truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

My father loves me. I'm ashamed to admit that I never realized or appreciated just how much. Ever since ... forever, really, but especially since we born, my father has worked so hard to provide us with what we need, and even harder to give us what we want. I remember when I was a little girl, that spending time with Dad was a special thing because he normally worked 80-90 hours a week, night shift. He would always make time for us, though. His favorite thing was to make his girls smile.

When I was about five, my mom took us to Philadelphia so that she could help my grandmother pack and sell her house. I don't remember how long we stayed, but I remember the day that a package came for us from my dad. There were all sorts of things inside of it, but I only remember one: a video. He had and borrowed a friend's recorder and made a movie of him taking care of the farm. He went through each of our animals (mine, believe it or not, was a goat. her name was Goldie and I had bottle-fed her and she was kind of like a dog. She was always getting out of the fence to come greet us), and he showed us how much they missed us. Goldie wouldn't stay in her pen at all and went wandering around the yard bleating, Carolynne's dog, Dixie, would not stop barking, Christina's chicken hatched her egg, but the little one kept getting picked on so Dad assured her that he had moved it and taken care of it for her. We still have that movie; it's labeled "Dad Loves his Girls."


My dad worked at a text-tile mill for fifteen years. When I was around 12 or 13, it became pretty clear that the mill jobs would soon be out-sourced. My dad, in order to prevent long term hardship, enrolled in the local technical school to get certified as an HVAC technician. For the next two years, he went to work at 6pm, worked until 6am, drove to school, slept in the parking lot for two hours, went to class from 8-noon, came home, ate lunch with us, went to sleep, and started over again. Sometimes, he would try and get some yard work done. During the fifteen years he worked there, he took one vacation. He went to work no matter what; one time, had a fever of 104 and still went to work, despite Mom's warnings. Because he worked so hard while he was sick, he damaged nerves in his arm and suffers from that a lot.

When the mill finally did close, things still did not go that well, he went through a series of jobs, that while absolutely crummy and awful for him, were good for us-like the chicken job, so he perserved. Eventually he found a job in Birmingham, repairing reefer (refridgerator) units on semis. He loved doing that job. Unfortunately, the boss didn't like him. He was promised a raise several times and never given it. He definitately deserved it; even the boss acknowledged that he was one of his best techs; he could do things that no one else there could. But things with the boss escalated and my dad didn't like being so far from us (Birmingham is three hours away, he stayed up there with family during the week, came home on weekends). Before the things with the boos came to a head (but not very much before), he found a job only 50 miles away doing the same thing. This time his boss was a decent man. My dad loved working for him, and the boss knew how great he was at this job. His boss, however, was soon transferred and the one who came instead thought even worse of him than the one in Bimingham. His evaluations were never accurate. Things weren't good for my dad at all. A guy at his work stole his tools (thousands of dollars worth). He died and when his sister came to get his stuff, my dad didn't have the heart to tell her that they weren't his. His boss always told him how bad he was at his job (despite the fact that his boss also had to ask him how to do things). Dad went to a national training thing for ThermoKing and was the first person to ever solve the problem. And he didn't even use the computers. One day, my father was talking to his old boss- a person of quite a bit seniority within the company- about what the current one was doing- it was all stuff against the handbook. Within a week, my dad was fired for "voicing disagreement with management."

Over the next couple of years, my dad had a series of jobs 50-90 miles away. Eventually, he got tired of the commute and it became not worth it with gas prices. So he found jobs here. These jobs weren't enough, though. It stressed him out to have to worry so much about paying bills. He didn't care about the bills, he wanted to be able to give us yeses when we asked for something. He wanted to be able to bring my mom a random present just because he loves her.

Somehow, during all this time, he taught me how to wire a house, how to shoot a gun, how to skin what you shoot, how to build a barn, how to rebuild a car (we're still working on that one), how to run a farm for food and profit, and how to do so many other things, that if I were to name them all, it would take a book. But what he really did was show wme how to love.

Now, he's across the country, working at a job that he doesn't particulary care for, in weather that he absolutely hates (10 degrees is the high tomorrow. He works outside and it's snowing.) He works in a crew that doesn't particularly like him because he's better than they are at the job. They go behind him and undo what he has done. His immediate boss thinks incompetent. He wants to move him to a different crew. A crew where it wouldn't be possible for my mother and siblings to follow him. His boss's boss, though, saw the guys doing that. They've been warned, but the tension is still there for my dad. All this he has done because he loves us. He didn't do it for the money, he didn't do it because he wanted to; he did it because if he did, life would be easier for us. If he did, he would be able to say yes to things we wanted, he could have flowers randomly sent to the door for my mother, he could help his daughter buy food and pepperspray and clothes and tuition.

And I didn't care until last year. I loved my dad, yes. I also argued incessantly with him. I loved our time together, but didn't always want it. I sometimes was attitudical about it. (You guys have never seen my attitude. You may think you have, but you haven't. Think the Andy fiasco times oh, 300.)

I don't know how I could have been such a brat. I haven't seen my dad in 7 months, before that I hadn't seen him for 2 months, I saw him for a couple weeks this summer, but he was always working. I miss him like crazy. He misses us so much. But he loves us too much to give up on this. He never thinks of himself. If he can think of something to do for us, he does it without question, no matter how much work it takes him. He doesn't know it, but tomorrow my mother is flying into Denver to spend Thanksgiving with him.

I must admit, I am jealous of my mother. I wish I could see him. I wish I could give him a hug. I wish there was another way for him. I wish that I had seen this before I moved away. I wish that I could take back everything awful I said to him, even though I know he's forgotten it. I wish that it wasn't so cold for him. I wish I was there to cook him dinner and wash his clothes. I wish I had smiled more when I was younger instead of throwing tantrums because I couldn't have what I wanted (I didn't do this very often, but when I did...)

My father loves me. And I wish that I could show him how much I love and miss him.

TRADITION!!!

I would guess that these last two months of the year are the two most filled with tradition: national traditions, local traditions, family traditions. But I have to wonder whether some traditions have not become routines.

I come from a family that values traditions. We've invented so many since I was little that I doubt I could count them. Traditions do not have to be ancient. This has really hit me since now a decent portion of our family is scattered across the country and since I now either don't take much part in the traditions, or I take part in them over the phone. More often than not, it's the former. It's a slightly weird feeling to be missing those traditions, like eating ice cream outside in the winter. That's just not really supposed to happen.

One thing that was stressed at the beginning of the sacraments and liturgy class is the human need for ritual; the need for something by which to order one's life; there are a multitude of examples of this in the natural world: the seasons, night and day, the cycles of the moon, and the orbits of the planets to name a few. This urge goes beyond the individual and flows into the societal. Societies also need something by which to order their lives; the ancient Egyptians ordered societal life by the flooding of the Nile. Traditions and rituals are not routines and shouldn't become so. Rituals and traditions are of a sacred character. Routines are for everyday life. The Nile was not just a river.


"There are a lot of bad isms in the world and commercialism is the worst!" While I don't think I necessarily agree with that statement (I'm inclined to think that maybe things like communism and socialism are a little worse), I can definitely see its validity. Communism and socialism wouldn't be so bad if not for commercialism. Commercialism certainly plays a part in communism and socialism.

Problems result when you allow your life to be commercialized. If you only take part in traditions because it’s what you’ve always done, or worse, it’s what everyone else does, then why do it? If traditions abound during this time of the year, then so does the secularization and routinization (so it’s not a word, yet) of traditions. Christmas carols, for example. Long ago, when Catholics ruled the world, there were rules for when what could be sung because of the special character of the liturgical year. (There still are, people are just ignorant and don’t care.) Puer Natus in Bethlehem (A child is born in Bethlehem) was not sung until Christmas. Not only that, but Christmas music was not about chestnuts roasting on an open fire. Now, however, when you walk into any shopping center after November first or so, you will hear Christmas music being blasted over the sound system in an effort to “get you into the holiday spirit,” i.e., buy stuff. The carelessness with which such traditions are flung about gives them an ordinary, humdrum type of feeling. In fact, they can get old and annoying. A person can only take Jingle Bell Rock so many times a year. And if that person happens to be Lauren, well…

Five Novembers ago, it had not been a good year for my family. Within a month, my mother’s mother died, my father lost his job due to out-sourcing, and the Quince stuff was told. While my grandmother had been sick for a couple of years, her death was unexpected. She died peacefully in her sleep, with her caretakers there. She was only 61. There are not a lot of jobs here; it took a few months for my dad to find one. He finally did find one at a chicken processing plant keeping the freezers running. The Quince stuff led to a bunch of things with my father's mother that were just plain unpleasant, to put it lightly. In the time between, Dominic was born! Yay for babies! Especially brother babies! At the chicken plant, they sold chicken to the employees for next to nothing. So we had plenty of chicken. Freezers full, actually. That year, by the time Thanksgiving came around, we were sick of poultry. None of us wanted to eat turkey. We wanted steak. So, we made a fire pit, and cooked steak and sausage (brat-like sausage, not breakfast sausage) for Thanksgiving. We had whatever sides we wanted. And tons of desserts- everyone's favorite and possibly even everyone's second and third favorites. Any outsider would have looked at that mis-matched meal (because we had little boys, I'm sure half of the sides were random and didn't really match with anything) and laughed. Maybe pittied. We had no one over except my mother's brother. But it was the most memorable Thanksgiving I've ever had. It was simple, but it was everything we needed. We had each other and we had the material things for which we were most able to be thankful at that time. The little ones gave us laughter and my parents gave me anyway one of my most pleasant and treasured memories. I'm sure that when we are all grown up and gathered somewhere, this will be one of the "do you remember whens?" most fondly remembered.

That Thanksgiving was the first Thanksgiving that I ever really was more than usually unusually grateful. By that I mean, of course I had always been extra thankful on Thanksgiving, but it was more out of habit or training than by sheer gratitude. That Thanksgiving, as I ate some of favorite things on the planet and as I sat around the table just talking with my family, I was grateful. I didn't know it was possible to be so grateful. Before that Thanksgiving, I think that we all would have thought it absurd not to have the traditional turkey and sweet potatoes and whatever else it is that is proper to eat on Thanksgiving. But that Thanksgiving we realized, the turkey isn't the tradition.

And so, because of that Thanksgiving, while I am not diametrically oppossed to eating turkey on Thanksgiving (in fact, we are eating turkey this year), I have become more conscious of the difference between Thanksgiving traditions and Thanksgiving routines. As I am here at home, finally reunited with my little boyos (who really aren't that little anymore), getting them what they need, rocking them, reading to them, being read to by them, playing with them, cooking for and with them, cleaning with them, and being fought over by them, I've been reflecting on these things. Routines are not always fun, they most certainly are not freedom. They are the measuring stick or the straight edge which makes sure that nothing is out of place, that the world keeps running as planned without interruption.

The world is not run by a routine. Take a look at the sunset one day and look again at it the next. It is not the same. It's a different sunset everyday. The colors change, the shape of the clouds change, everything changes. Yes, it is ordered awesomeness, but it is awesomeness, nonetheless. Our lives should not become bleak routines. We should value the sacred, wonder at the little, everyday things, and never be bored by the repition which sometimes seems to be the norm. For repition and norm it is not. Look closely, you will find something you've never found before. When scrubbing the kitchen for aaalll those guests, perhaps the shiney-ness of the sink, which depiste your routine you seem to have neglected, will make you smile. Perhaps some small child will show you something you've seen before at least a million times, but this child will show you something you have missed, something that only a child's joy can explain. If traditions become routines, the only thing left for routines to become is a slave master. God did not intend for us to be slaves. Besides, we can't have more than one master. If we let the sacredness and the specialness of traditions slip away and become routines, we are in danger of letting the routine become our god.

So in the midst of the bustle and hustle that usually accompanies this time of the year, take time to remember why you are doing what you will inevitably find yourself doing out of habit, whether it be eating turkey or watching football or shopping on Friday. Find the reason for these things and then you will find that scrubbing the kitchen isn't so bad after all.

Back Where I Belong

With my boyos. Life is good.


And I have a stove.


Being here makes me want to quit college and go work at a soup kitchen or an orphanage or a hospital or something. Somewhere where people need to be taken care of.


Have a really great Thanksgiving, everyone!

Reformation and Egocentrism

One of Southern Catholic College's catch-phrases is "Are you bold enough to change the world?" I believe that it actually is "ARE YOU BOLD ENOUGH To CHANGE THE WORLD?" Reflecting upon the major world changing figures in history, even those in our lifetime, however, causes me to wonder: do they really want us to be bold?

I have absolutely no doubt that the school, in choosing a motto, thought of nothing but the positive connotations of the word "bold": courage and confidence. These are good qualities to have. But, as we discussed in Philosophy 101 last year, courage that is not controlled by the intellect and the will becomes rashness, not an admirable quality at all. Confidence without humility becomes pride, and a pride so inflamed that one can disregard the good of others and the good of society, the good of the world because of his own ideas, whether those ideas are true or not.

Take a look at some of the great reformists thoughout history: St. Patrick, St. Catherine of Siena, Niccolo Machievelli, King Henry VIII, Martin Luther, Leo XIII, Ghandi, Adolph Hitler, Joseph Stalin, Karl Marx, Mao Tse- Tung, Mother Teresa, John Paul II, Saddam Hussien, the list goes on. All of these people were bold. The difference is that some were humble.

Boldness without humility is worth nothing. Nothing will be done for the right reasons. No good can come out boldness that's not tempered by humility. I think that, second to musicians/performers, reformers may be the most inclined to have inflated egos, because once you take on a cause, it's hard not to caught up in that cause and forget the reason for the cause; the reason becomes the cause itself and not the good that will come from that cause. That's why the oversized "you" bothers me. Changing the world is not about me. It's not about my being bold or not so bold. It's about Truth and Goodness. But in order for Truth and Goodness to triumph, they first have to get over the "me" that is in the way; in order for that to happen, there must be true humilitly.

Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam

A Rant About Creepy Guys

The world is full of them. I've known this since I was 7, when I had my first encounter with one. I'd always kind of hoped that that was the only one that I would really have to deal with. I knew I would run into some every now and then, but I had really hoped that they would all just kind of ignore me and leave me alone forever.

But the creepiest individual at SCC (at least, the creepiest student of last year and the creepiest individual this year- I'm not sure that the old librarian wouldn't give you a run for your money, dear, when it comes to creepiness- he was genuinely creepy, you are creepy by effort, although it is obvious that you are beginning to need to exert less and less effort) had other plans. I now have a log, as per Father's orders, of every time he does something creepy. I bet he does, too, but just because he revels in being a creep. Now there's something I wouldn't want to read...

I really wonder what his problem is. I feel kind of sorry for him. I mean, he's a lonely, miserable, wretched human being. Something was missing from his childhood, and it kind of seems like it was love. (See, girls! Look what happens if we don't be women) He told me enough of his life story that I know that much. Of course, he also has a dead beat dad. Now I just feel sorry for him. No person shouldn't grow up with a mother's love and a father's love. That's just sad.

That said, no person should dwell on their past so much that they cannot cope with the present. Scoffs, and well deserved scoffs, may result from that statement coming out of my brain, but at least I recognize that it is true.

This has ceased to be a rant. I fail at everything. Especially writing papers for philosophy.

Impressing the World

It's a mighty sad thing when an institution that was founded to go against the the societal idea of "normal" for the sake of the Good, is found falling into that very idea of normality.

The Chapel was pretty full today. But it was not filled out of a completely voluntary self-bettering desire, it was filled because the Chancellor of the Archdiocese was here and he needed to be impressed. So the chapel was filled out of an excess of pride, rather than out of humility or even love. Is this pleasing? Is this even halfway good? It almost seems as if it would have been better if it had been filled out of obligation (if it had been made mandatory, which would still have been pride on the part of the school [unless daily Mass was always mandatory]), but it wouldn't have been pride on the part of every individual who came only because the Chancellor was here.

And it doesn't stop there...

The world and what it thinks should not be the standard, and most assuredly not the apex around which we operate. Truth should be the only thing we care about.

So What Does All That Mean?

I suppose that the penultimate post ( I just like the alliteration...) really did leave a lot of room for questions. I guess the most common would be something like, "Ok, so women should act like women... so... how should women act?"

I have heard many people say that it is hard define femininity in the modern world. That especially now, since women are told they and can and should do everything, and are made to feel inferior if they don't, the definition of femininity has changed and we have yet to define it in concrete terms. I do not agree; femininity is femininity whether a woman works or stays at home to watch children- 1000 years ago or now. I think that it's the application of femininity that is hard to figure out. At what point do careers/pleasure/whatever get in the way of true femininity? How should women act like women?

Well, before acting, women should think. How a woman thinks determines how a woman acts; what a woman thinks it means to be a woman is the way in which she lives out - or does not live out- her femininity. A woman should think that she has dignity and worth simply because she is, not because of what she does. If a woman does not think this, she will not be able to act as a woman should. Femininity seems to me to be more a kind of state of mind than an act or series of acts. The state of mind is reflected in the actions. There are some women who are very good at balancing home life and work life, and others who aren't so good at it, and I think this has to do with the way a woman thinks about what it means to be a woman. If a woman thinks that in order to prove her value as a person she must compete against men- that her worth and dignity depend on what she achieves in a male dominated work world- then she must reject her femininity because it will get her in way.

The difference between men and women encompasses both the physical and psychological. It is an essential difference. A woman's essence is different than that of a man's. It follows, then that because of this essential difference, the ultimate purpose of men and women, though the same (to get to heaven) would be achieved in different ways. These differences are not so much that one sex is better than the other, as that one sex is nothing without the other. Men need women (Yes, J.C.) and women need to men in order to reach their full potential as human beings.


Humans are composite beings (matter and form- i.e. body and soul). Differences in form -the intellective soul, the part that deals with how a person reasons, thinks, and responds to the world- are expressed in the matter (the body). The differences in the matter are expressed in the form. This does not necessariraly mean that the physical and mental capabilities of one sex are better or superior than the other's, it means that they are different.


A woman's body is potentially capable of carrying a child and giving birth. This is reflected in her intellective soul. The way she thinks is dictated by the fact that she has the potential to be a mother. It is in the nature of a woman to be a mother. This does not mean she must have a child to be a woman, or even that she must actually be physically capable of motherhood. There are women who give up physical motherhood for the good of others and have been for thousands of years. This does not make them less womanly.

So feminity is the embracing of motherhood (whether one is a mother or not). It is realizing that this is why we think the way we do and not fighting against it.

A Response to a Response That I Recieved

I shared the last post with a few people, just for criticism. I don't know why. I don't know.

The world is big and wide, and full of beliefs, with everyone
thinking they have
the 'ideal' way. There is no such thing. When I was
younger, I felt all
famillies were like my own also(thankfully they were
not, as my home life,
though supposidly solid Catholic was far from good).
People choose to live out
their lives like they want to do so. I do not feel
subsurvient to any man. If
you read the works of Austin or woman of her
period, woman were horribly
surpressed. They were thought of brainless
twits. They were stuck in loveless
marriages, while the husband had
countress concubines on the side. Woman, of
course, had no need for a sex
life. Re-read The Doll's House and see how woman
were really treated and
thought of in that era(by Ibsen).Dating is necessary.
How are you going to
know if you have the 'right' man if you don't see whats out
there. It also
teaches you social graces and how to look out for users or
jerks.Keep on
thinking...you have a good mind. Just allow it to open a see the
scope of
the world. You are in school, so see how others do things, and how they
live.When I was younger I did volunteer work in inner city Philadelphia. It
taught me alot, mostly it taught me how little I know. And guess what, I am
still learning. And each day I am challenged not to judge others, but to
accept
them and their ways

Ah, this bliss of arguing.

If there is no ideal way of life, then why bother? Why bother with kindness? Why bother with charity? Why bother with any morality at all? If there is no ideal way of life, why bother with any sort of religion, for is not Heaven a way of life? And would it not be the ideal way of life? And are there not actions that will get us to Heaven and actions that will bar us from Heaven?

Granted, here on earth, we can't really live the ideal life (a life in full communion with Christ), so we must strive live our lives following Him as closely as we can.

People do choose to live their lives as they please. It's a little thing called free will. A blessing and a curse. But just because someone chooses evil (a rejection of God, any size, a mean comment or anything) does not mean that evil is a good thing to choose. Nor does it mean that others must just accept the evil done and say "well that's just the way that so and so chooses to live his life." Again, if that's the case, why bother?

I have read the works of Jane Austen. The women who were thought of as twits generally were. The womenly women were not thought of as twits. When a man's wife was womanly, he didn't cheat on her. My point was not that this didn't happen, but that women should act like women, because look what happens if they don't. I remember reading "The Doll House." Unfortunately, it was a while ago and I don't remember the plot. I do remember that most of Ibsen's works (the ones I have read) were not exactly great representations of every day life. They seemed to be extraordinary circumstances.

Dating, oh dating... Of course dating is necessary. I did not say that it wasn't. I said that it is not something to play around with. Why would you date a guy that you are not attracted to? Especially if that guy really is attraced to you. That's just playing with someone's emotions and isn't fair or kind to them. I'm not going to hook up with some random guy just for the sake of dating. I would most definitely date someone to whom I was attracted. I'm not going to date someone that I don't know. The point of dating is not to get to know someone-that's what friendship is for- but get to know them in a deeper, more intimate way. I don't think that dating anyone who will date you is a very good way to find "the right guy." It actually seems like a disaster waiting to happen. I would have to respect "the right guy" and I expect him to respect me. I think I can tell whether a guy is a jerk without dating him. And, really, why would I want to date a guy to find out if he's a jerk? Seems a bit pointless to me. Seems a bit counterproductive, as well. I think I'll find out if he's a jerk first.

Seeing what others do and doing what others do are two very different things. If I see the results of something are bad, why would I imitate? If I see the results of something are good, why wouldn't I imitate. The point of an open mind is to find something around which to close it (I can't remember who I am paraphrasing- I think it's Chesterton). A consistently open mind is almost synonomous with an empty one. (Which is why I absolutely what that sign in the hallway that says "the point of education is to replace an empty mind with an open one" - it is NOT!- *end random rant). We are called not to judge the state of people's souls. We are not told that we should not judge whether an action is wrong or right, regardless of whether the actor considers it wrong or right. We are not to be pretentious about it, but we are not to accept everything as it comes.

A Conglomeration of Thoughts from this Summer and This Month

Most people who read this already know that my summer job was ironing clothes for a family of eight. This summer, I also read Home Comforts: the Art and Science of Keeping House (interestingly enough, written by a philosophy professor at Columbia) and Orthodoxy. So having read this, having been brought up in the Catholic faith, having been taught that women's roles differ from men's yet are both equal in dignity, observing the ways in which my employer family interacted with each other, and standing solitarily in a laundry room for hours upon hours (ten or more hours a day sometimes), being paid to play with children and teach other women how to bake, my head was left in a mess of thoughts which have been bubbling around in my brain which has been too busy to give them enough time yet.




When I came back to school, I was met with happy faces and lovely people who knew "the perfect guy" (who turned out NOT to be so) to set me up with! Yay! NOOOOOOOO!!!! As much as I am unopposed to the idea being dated and eventually married, I am dreadfully opposed to the idea of hooking up with someone just because no one is dating me now. Dating is not a game or an experiment; I am not a toy or an object (neither is any man). As I said in discussion with someone who said that dating is overrated, quite the opposite is true: dating is horrridly under-rated. Dating should not be thought of as a social activity, but as a step on the road to holiness- one that should be tread carefully and willfully, not playfully and at whim. SO, with this added to the last paragraph, my head has been absolutely full of thoughts to the point of explosion, I think- to the point of forgetting that I have paper for which I have yet to read due, anyway. For all of my loudness, quite a bit of my thoughts never come out audibly.


I have read a lot of 19th century American literature written by women (Alcott, Montgomery, Lovelace...) and I have been reading it since I was ten. Every girl should read this stuff. The role of a woman was clearly and intellectually defined- in no way was she ruled or lorded over by her husband; she was his helper and he was her support. She wasn't supressed or uneducated- even women who had never been to school had common sense and wit. Mrs Baehr (my hero- Jo March from Little Women - she married professor Baehr) ran a school, wrote books, and founded a college all while raising 10 boys and 2 girls and running her household. Of course, her household did include a couple of maids, but she ran the household and she did most of the work. A woman's role was not only clearly defined, but unquestionably held in high esteem. Especially (and I see this now, looking back; it wasn't quite so clear when reading it before I knew that I was looking for role models) the role of a married woman- of a wife and a mother.


This was only the foundation (not even really foundation, but it was indeed a big help for me) of my understanding of womanhood. What really set this in stone was watching my own mother. Well, being apprenticed to my mother... By the time I was ten, my mother had taught me enough that I could cook dinner, clean it up, do laundry, mop floors, clean bathrooms, and take care of babies (now I was ten, so I couldn't take care of babies like I can now, but I knew enough to be a "second mother" when Daniel was born). By the time I was twelve, I was cooking dinner regularly and by the time I was fourteen, I was pretty much in charge of dinner. I was a lucky little girl. I came to this conclusion over the summer while giving a "bread making seminar" and being asked by an eight year old (or maybe it was the six year old) "you mean, you can make bread?"



Going from my family to my employer family was a huge shock. I knew that women do not all care for their homes the same way and that some don't even care for them, but I had never lived in a household where just common sense housekeeping was absent. The woman fed her animals (of which she had plenty, something like 8 dogs and 4 cats) a raw diet. She would take the meat out of the freezer, leave it on the cutting board while she prepared dinner (so it was there a few hours), after chopping the meat, she would rinse the cutting board off and cut vegetables on it. I realized that most of the things that I took for granted that everyone just sort of knew were apparently not so well known: things like not leaving a sippee cup full of milk in the sink overnight because it will sour and smell bad and if it gets in the plug thingy can make baby sick; things like how to wash dishes (not with cold water...); how to hold a spatula while stirring batter; the simple fact that bread can be made at home; how to creatively make an entirely different meal out of leftovers instead of serving the same thing two or three times a week.



I was hired to iron clothes. The family consists of of the parents, a 16 year old girl, 15 year old boy, and 8 year old boy, and little girls aged 6, 4, and 2. The 16 year old girl was completely lost when it came to housework. She had never been taught to do laundry, wash dishes, or cook, and despite having four young siblings, she had no clue how to interact with little kids. I never once saw her hug her little siblings- only reprimand them.

As I stood in the laundry room amidst piles of clothes day after day after day, I remembered my old friends with worn covers. I remembered how the women would teach thier daughters that the mundane work (which was a lot more mundane in the 1800's) was a labor of love, beneficial to to the lover and the loved (whether this be son or husband, daughter or mother, sibling or friend). All of this was reaffirmed by reading Home Comforts in which Mrs. Mendelson not only explains the technical and practical things about housekeeping, but the reason why: out of love; love for yourself, and your spouse and your kids (if you have those things...).


John Paul II wrote that God has entrusted the world to women in a very special way because our femininity. Women are the nuturers of the moral and physical well being of society (so are men but in a very different- women are responsible for making the men responsible...). The old and over-used but very true saying that "behind every good man is a good woman" demonstrates the need for women to be women. I hear women complain about how guys act all the time. Perhaps if more women acted like women should (which does NOT mean a bare-foot and pregnant houswife), then more men would act like men should.


Perhaps this makes a little bit of sense. Perhaps I'm just rambling and confused and tired. Perhaps Dr. Hartmann is right and my biggest aspiration in life is to be a charwoman.