Let me begin by saying I have always thought Diversity to be over rated. Not real diversity, but the modern concept of diversity for its own sake. Also, the definition of diversity bugs me. It simply means a room full of people who look different. Or in the model of corporate America, a room with more minority faces than white.
I remember a friend once telling me she had always wished to be part of a dinner club where the couples were made up of one white, one black, one Asian and so on. How strange, I thought. How about a dinner club of couples who all had a passion for food or conversation or drinking wine.
Diversity surely plays an important role in relationship. The relationship at the core of our society, the marital relationship, is based on the inherent diversity of the primary players. Men and women are by physical nature, complimentary. I think most will also tell you the differences go beyond mere physicality. We each bring something to the table. Society's survival depends on the diversity of men and women.
But the heart of all relationship is not diversity. It is unity. What creates friendship, teamwork, marriage is not what makes us different, but what we have in common. We belong to a church community because of our shared beliefs, we belong to a team because of our shared love of a sport or hobby, we commit to a marriage because of shared core values. Our friendships also require that we have something in common, something that unifies us. This can be shared values, geographical proximity, the need to get children to the same place at the same time, books, movies, Bunko, Poker.
The beautiful thing is that when we are looking for commonality, we often end up with diversity. We share a space with our neighbors and find unity in our desire to protect, beautify and socialize in that shared space. In doing so we find different values, faiths, hobbies. We carpool with the families of our children's friends. While establishing this pragmatic relationship, we discover people who know of things we do not: art, fishing, origami.
The liberal left knows what I know. Diversity doesn't have anything to do with skin color. To them, Justice Thomas, Condi Rice, Bill Cosby aren't really black. Why? Because while they say they want diversity, what they really want is unity. A unified ideological perspective. That is all well and good, but don't market your desire as a desire for Diversity.
When will the elites stop trying to force the subject. We common folk don't do it. I don't know many people who pick their friends based on physical realities nor do they exclude for a similar reason. We create communities because of what unites us. Sometimes the demographic may look to be homogenous. My school community is primarily Catholic. Well, that is because it is a Catholic School. My adoption community is made up of mostly racially mixed families. Hm, maybe because we all adopted internationally. In both cases, while we may look similar and we do have things in common, the groups are fantastically diverse because they are each made up of human beings.
This may sound heretical coming from a person with an incredibly diverse family. But I can assure you that diversity has never and will never be a goal of mine. I don't want diversity, I want unity. I want to find in those around me what unites us: What passions, goals, values we share. I want to surround myself with people who love something that I love. That does not mean they have to love everything that I love. My Literature Pals do not have to have a passion for the treadmill. My soccer moms do not have to read Shakespeare in their spare time. My dinner club does not have to read the Psalms on Thursday mornings.
But if we love nothing in common, I don't care what color, nationality, height, weight or gender they may be, I don't see a friendship there. And to try and FORCE one simply will not work. It goes against human nature. We are drawn to those who are most like us. And while the social engineers think we are all shallow enough to think in our deepest DNA this means to those who look like us, they are wrong. We are drawn to those who love what we love. Think back to the marriage bond. We are drawn to those who are physically most UNLIKE us.
And when we share a love of something beyond ourselves with another, we naturally love the other. We love them despite our differences. We love them because their difference adds to the relationship. We have a common goal, a unifying principal, and our diversity serves that goal, enriches our lives, shows us something we could not discover on our own.
So to the elites, the corporate watchdogs, the social engineers: Can we quit seeking diversity for its own sake and instead seek to find things to love, things to unite, things to enrich. In the unity we can't help but find diversity. True diversity, not fabricated or physical. The diversity of personality and of a unique soul unlike any other: The diversity that is worth of our love because it has nothing to do with the book cover, but the deep and rich story that is on the inside.
Friday, September 24, 2010
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Images
Images are a recurring topic of conversation in my life. In various debates, my husband has emphasized the strength of our childhood memories. His inparticularly are the images he has of marriage from his own parents. My mother has images of her own mother sitting on the porch, the couch, the bed saying her rubber banded book of daily prayers. But she also recalls an image vivid in her mind of coming out of her room in the early hours of a morning to find her father, not particularly religious, on his knees in the bathroom in prayer. "I don't know if he had ever done it before or if he did it every day. I was not usually up at that time. But it something I will never forget."
Smells, sounds, a song, seasons in the year bring to our mind an image. Sometimes they are wonderful like the smell of baking cookies that fill our hearts with the warm love of our mother. We can see her in the kitchen in her apron, flour on her nose. Sometimes they are painful, like the dull ache that comes with the Monarch Butterfly each fall with the image of the letter written to a friend, returned because he died before he could read it.
We spoke today in Bible study, while discussing the Psalms, of our responsibility to form our children so they are not like chaff in the wind. I couldn't stop thinking about Images. What my children will remember long after they have to listen to what I say is not what I said. It will be images. What will they see?
What do I see?
I see my father's walk. I see it from the back: long even strides, shoulders slightly stooped. He is deep in thought not noticing the passing crowds.
I see my mother in the kitchen singing to herself.
I see my sister with a book.
My brothers riding bikes.
I see Family Dinners in a sunny room. Ping pong tournaments. Indiana Jones on the big screen.
I see our church, the woven brown and gold material of the pews, my father always on the end.
I see my grandpa's truck, the ashtray filled with coins, the bed filled with fishing gear.
I see my grandmother's drawers, a place for everything and everything in its place.
I see my other grandma's sweet smile.
What images will children have? Mine, yours, the guy over there?
It can give reason to pause, can't it? For it is not reasonable what we remember. It is what it is. My mom saw her dad pray once and only once. She saw her mom pray everyday. She remembers both, one for its rarity the other for its familiarity. I remember going to the movies as a family because it only happened once, but I remember family dinners because they happened every day.
Do I yell more than I smile? Do I nag more than I praise? Am I always in a rush? Will they remember the good things because they were so common or because they weren't? What will they see?
What gives me hope is that while our images do form us, I also think as time passes we form our images. The relationship we have with people determines what we remember most or at all. The kind of people we really think they are effects the kind of images we see. So, while I will surly try and leave my children with beautiful images, perhaps if I try harder to nurture our relationship and to make my own soul beautiful, my children in time will smooth out the edges, crop a few things here and there and see a mom who loved them more than life...with flour on her nose.
Smells, sounds, a song, seasons in the year bring to our mind an image. Sometimes they are wonderful like the smell of baking cookies that fill our hearts with the warm love of our mother. We can see her in the kitchen in her apron, flour on her nose. Sometimes they are painful, like the dull ache that comes with the Monarch Butterfly each fall with the image of the letter written to a friend, returned because he died before he could read it.
We spoke today in Bible study, while discussing the Psalms, of our responsibility to form our children so they are not like chaff in the wind. I couldn't stop thinking about Images. What my children will remember long after they have to listen to what I say is not what I said. It will be images. What will they see?
What do I see?
I see my father's walk. I see it from the back: long even strides, shoulders slightly stooped. He is deep in thought not noticing the passing crowds.
I see my mother in the kitchen singing to herself.
I see my sister with a book.
My brothers riding bikes.
I see Family Dinners in a sunny room. Ping pong tournaments. Indiana Jones on the big screen.
I see our church, the woven brown and gold material of the pews, my father always on the end.
I see my grandpa's truck, the ashtray filled with coins, the bed filled with fishing gear.
I see my grandmother's drawers, a place for everything and everything in its place.
I see my other grandma's sweet smile.
What images will children have? Mine, yours, the guy over there?
It can give reason to pause, can't it? For it is not reasonable what we remember. It is what it is. My mom saw her dad pray once and only once. She saw her mom pray everyday. She remembers both, one for its rarity the other for its familiarity. I remember going to the movies as a family because it only happened once, but I remember family dinners because they happened every day.
Do I yell more than I smile? Do I nag more than I praise? Am I always in a rush? Will they remember the good things because they were so common or because they weren't? What will they see?
What gives me hope is that while our images do form us, I also think as time passes we form our images. The relationship we have with people determines what we remember most or at all. The kind of people we really think they are effects the kind of images we see. So, while I will surly try and leave my children with beautiful images, perhaps if I try harder to nurture our relationship and to make my own soul beautiful, my children in time will smooth out the edges, crop a few things here and there and see a mom who loved them more than life...with flour on her nose.
Friday, September 10, 2010
Viper's Tangle, a Book Review
I remember being taught an important lesson when reading Catcher in the Rye in high school: a narrator is not necessarily honest. A writer may choose to make his main character a liar. He may try and get his reader to find the truths through the lies. I didn't learn the lesson then, I think I liked Holden Caufield as an adolescent because I too wasn't necessarily honest. Neither of us would have admitted as much to ourselves. We simply could not see the hypocrisy in our own lives. I saw Houldon as he saw himself. Neither of us could see how we did not live up to our ideals or even to the images we had of ourselves. I hated him as an adult. Perhaps because I then saw him, and myself, for what we were in those earlier days: Liars.
Vipers' Tangle by Francois Mauriac also has narrator that can not always be trusted. However, he is not the least bit dishonest about his own flaws. In this confession of Monsieur Louis, an old and dying lawyer at the turn of the century. we find a bitter, yet honest portrayal of how he sees himself. He is greedy, vindictive, proud. He is hated by all and returns the hatred with a feeling of justified revenge. He also has a keen eye for seeing the flaws in others. While he admits that his heart has become a tangle of vipers, he rightly sees in his children and wife a nest of vipers outside of himself as well.
What begins as a letter to his wife explaining how and why he has disinherited his children of millions becomes a confession to himself, a means of therapy for a man who has no friends and no one else with whom to talk. While he is accused by his wife of seeing only evil, and admits freely that he has rarely seen good, he is also honest in recognizing beauty in certain souls: the complete lack of hypocrisy and desire to live a life according to his creed of a young seminarian, the carefree spirit and innocent joy of his orphaned nephew, the sweetness of his youngest daughter.
We learn that he can not always be trusted from the narrator himself. As he reflects on his life he begins to question his own honesty. He begins to wonder if he was only seeing half of the people around him, only half of himself. He realizes he acted like a monster, but that he was not a monster. He begins to try and look and see if the things he hates in those around him might also be superficial, if humans can be more than even they themselves can imagine.
What has been the cause of his wasted and monstrous life was a lack of love. He, for only a few months after he was married, believed himself capable of being loved. He found nothing in himself to love and did not believe anyone could ever love him. The three good people in his life were the only three who saw good in him. Because he believed everyone else expected him to be hateful, he was in fact hateful. He molded himself to the image he believed the world had of him.
With this realization he becomes an honest narrator. He searches desperately for the answer. What was it that he missed? An atheist and ruthless critic of the Church during his life, he begins to wonder if he had judged Christianity by its failed members instead of looking deeper. To his mind comes the image of the humble walk of the young pious seminarian, the faraway look on the face of his beloved nephew as he sat on the steps after church, and most painfully, the death of his youngest daughter who offered her death for him:
"In her delirium that she kept on saying-'For Pappa!-For Pappa!'...Do you remember the sound of her voice when she suddenly cried out, "Please God, I am only a child..." and how she stopped, and went on, "No, I can stand it, I can..."
Who then can love those who do not deserve love? Who then can teach man to love after so many years of hate? Louis desperately wants to answer those questions before he dies. "...A few more months, a few more weeks..."
With a narrator that can not be trusted, not because he is a liar, but because he is a man, Mauriac portrays the story of a soul searching without even knowing it for Divine Grace. If we are honest readers, we can see ourselves honestly in him. At the end of the day, we don't deserve love. All of us are in many ways, unlovable. To deny this fact, as Houldon would say, makes us a phony. We can only be loved if we first know we are loved. Divine Grace is at its heart LOVE. Does he find it? (If you don't like to know the endings of books you want to read, stop here.)
No, he does not find it. It finds hIm.
Vipers' Tangle by Francois Mauriac also has narrator that can not always be trusted. However, he is not the least bit dishonest about his own flaws. In this confession of Monsieur Louis, an old and dying lawyer at the turn of the century. we find a bitter, yet honest portrayal of how he sees himself. He is greedy, vindictive, proud. He is hated by all and returns the hatred with a feeling of justified revenge. He also has a keen eye for seeing the flaws in others. While he admits that his heart has become a tangle of vipers, he rightly sees in his children and wife a nest of vipers outside of himself as well.
What begins as a letter to his wife explaining how and why he has disinherited his children of millions becomes a confession to himself, a means of therapy for a man who has no friends and no one else with whom to talk. While he is accused by his wife of seeing only evil, and admits freely that he has rarely seen good, he is also honest in recognizing beauty in certain souls: the complete lack of hypocrisy and desire to live a life according to his creed of a young seminarian, the carefree spirit and innocent joy of his orphaned nephew, the sweetness of his youngest daughter.
We learn that he can not always be trusted from the narrator himself. As he reflects on his life he begins to question his own honesty. He begins to wonder if he was only seeing half of the people around him, only half of himself. He realizes he acted like a monster, but that he was not a monster. He begins to try and look and see if the things he hates in those around him might also be superficial, if humans can be more than even they themselves can imagine.
What has been the cause of his wasted and monstrous life was a lack of love. He, for only a few months after he was married, believed himself capable of being loved. He found nothing in himself to love and did not believe anyone could ever love him. The three good people in his life were the only three who saw good in him. Because he believed everyone else expected him to be hateful, he was in fact hateful. He molded himself to the image he believed the world had of him.
With this realization he becomes an honest narrator. He searches desperately for the answer. What was it that he missed? An atheist and ruthless critic of the Church during his life, he begins to wonder if he had judged Christianity by its failed members instead of looking deeper. To his mind comes the image of the humble walk of the young pious seminarian, the faraway look on the face of his beloved nephew as he sat on the steps after church, and most painfully, the death of his youngest daughter who offered her death for him:
"In her delirium that she kept on saying-'For Pappa!-For Pappa!'...Do you remember the sound of her voice when she suddenly cried out, "Please God, I am only a child..." and how she stopped, and went on, "No, I can stand it, I can..."
Who then can love those who do not deserve love? Who then can teach man to love after so many years of hate? Louis desperately wants to answer those questions before he dies. "...A few more months, a few more weeks..."
With a narrator that can not be trusted, not because he is a liar, but because he is a man, Mauriac portrays the story of a soul searching without even knowing it for Divine Grace. If we are honest readers, we can see ourselves honestly in him. At the end of the day, we don't deserve love. All of us are in many ways, unlovable. To deny this fact, as Houldon would say, makes us a phony. We can only be loved if we first know we are loved. Divine Grace is at its heart LOVE. Does he find it? (If you don't like to know the endings of books you want to read, stop here.)
No, he does not find it. It finds hIm.
Monday, August 30, 2010
Little Bit of This and That
I haven't posted in awhile and I feel guilty. So, true to its name here is a post about just this and that:
I love fall. Everything about it: The clothes, the food, the weather, the sports, the holidays, the smells, the leaves. the memories.
I got the exterior of my house repainted and all the wood rot fixed. I even had the deck replaced. It looks wonderful.
I cling to the notion that when you feel farthest from God is when He is closest to you. I wonder if this is true when you are pushing Him away.
I have two free days a week from 8am until 3pm and two free half days. You would think my house would be cleaner.
I do not miss homeschooling, but I miss teaching. Does this mean I will go back to work? NEVER.
I am sick of politics.
I learned today at the doctor's office that Martha Stewart still has a magazine. I used to love that thing.
I love boys. I was one of those rare teachers who loved teaching boys, middle school boys at that. But several times over the last few months I have looked at my daughters and gushed with love just because they are girls. A son a son 'til you get him a home, a daughter a daughter when you're all alone.
Confession is still the thing I love and hate the most. I hate going but I love it after I have gone.
I read The Alchemist. Worth reading.
I am a big fan of water color pencils. I have made a couple little projects involving children's fingerprints and water color pencils. Though not an artist, I liked the results.
I think that when it comes to God, there are few fair weather friends. Most of us show up in earnest during the storm.
When you have kids, you take trips not vacations. Vacation evokes images of rest, relaxation. My family had a vacation this year. How do I know? I liked my kids more at the end of the week than at the beginning. I didn't need a vacation when I got home to recover from the trip we had taken.
I used to be a jack of all trades, master of none. Now I am just a master jack ass. Don't ask me why I wrote that, but I like it.
If you are still reading me, I thank you. I wish I had more of worth to say. Maybe someday I will.
I love fall. Everything about it: The clothes, the food, the weather, the sports, the holidays, the smells, the leaves. the memories.
I got the exterior of my house repainted and all the wood rot fixed. I even had the deck replaced. It looks wonderful.
I cling to the notion that when you feel farthest from God is when He is closest to you. I wonder if this is true when you are pushing Him away.
I have two free days a week from 8am until 3pm and two free half days. You would think my house would be cleaner.
I do not miss homeschooling, but I miss teaching. Does this mean I will go back to work? NEVER.
I am sick of politics.
I learned today at the doctor's office that Martha Stewart still has a magazine. I used to love that thing.
I love boys. I was one of those rare teachers who loved teaching boys, middle school boys at that. But several times over the last few months I have looked at my daughters and gushed with love just because they are girls. A son a son 'til you get him a home, a daughter a daughter when you're all alone.
Confession is still the thing I love and hate the most. I hate going but I love it after I have gone.
I read The Alchemist. Worth reading.
I am a big fan of water color pencils. I have made a couple little projects involving children's fingerprints and water color pencils. Though not an artist, I liked the results.
I think that when it comes to God, there are few fair weather friends. Most of us show up in earnest during the storm.
When you have kids, you take trips not vacations. Vacation evokes images of rest, relaxation. My family had a vacation this year. How do I know? I liked my kids more at the end of the week than at the beginning. I didn't need a vacation when I got home to recover from the trip we had taken.
I used to be a jack of all trades, master of none. Now I am just a master jack ass. Don't ask me why I wrote that, but I like it.
If you are still reading me, I thank you. I wish I had more of worth to say. Maybe someday I will.
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Math
My math skills are a running joke in my family. I found an old SRA test from third or fourth grade, and I scored in the 7th percentile. I never learned my times tables. I remember trying to memorize them, a few stuck. But I didn't know what I was memorizing. They were just random numbers to me. I took the college prep math courses in high school and I think I may have even managed a B- one semester. That had to be in geometry which made a bit more sense. The Algebra was like Greek.
The first math course I ever liked was Euclidean and Non-Euclidean Geometry my senior year in college. I had a great professor and the benefit of three and a half years of liberal arts education, you bet I waited until the last possible moment to fulfill that requirement. The professor required no prerequisite knowledge but asked us to use logic to figure out the proofs. I had my first glimpse at the Incredibly wonderful world of math.
When my oldest was five, one morning at the breakfast table he asked, "What is three plus three plus three? Is it nine?"' "Why yes" I answered after quickly using my fingers to check. "What is three plus three plus three plus three? Is it twelve?" "yes, why do you ask?" With a shrug he answered, "I don't know, I just think about it when I go to bed at night."
We were doing kindergarten math, but I decided to skip subtraction for awhile and move on to multiplication since he was interested in it. I quickly learned that if I asked him, "What is Three times Two?" He would answer, "Five." But if I asked him, "What is three two TIMES?" "He would answer, "six." Oh, so that is what the times tables are. I am sure I knew this, but to see how the changing of one word made it clear to a five year old made it clear to me. It became clearer when I would watch him double the answer to four times six to get the answer to eight times six.
Having taught math to a math kid for four years, I have learned a lot. Watching how his mind calculates and figures things out has shown me the incredible order of math. No longer just random numbers, I see patterns, lines stretching infinitely in two directions, parts of wholes and wholes made out of parts. He of course hates math. But because of him, I have come to love it.
I have always believed that because the Universe was created by God, everything in the universe could tell us something about Him. From an ant hill to the genetic make up of a human being to the rotations of the planets, we can catch a glimpse of who He is. I have never believed that anything, not even the Incarnated Word, could teach us everything about Him. Though the human mind is amazing beyond anything else in the Universe, it can never fully grasp the Divine in its entirety. I think if it did, it would explode into a million pieces. Perhaps this is why we enter His presence first as pure spirit.
I have just read an incredible article in this month's edition of First Things titled "The God of Mathematicians." In it, David P. Goldman reviews the work of Kurt Godel. Much of it is over my head, I admit. But one thing struck me as incredibly wonderful. "Godel's incompleteness theorems, critique of the continuum hypothesis, and examination of general relativity all have theological implications...He considered mathematical objects to be real and his research therefore to be empirical. He thought his theology thus to be an empirical one, founded on man's experience of the infinite fecundity of the creator's mind."
Godel believed in a personal God. According to Goldman, "Godel's personal God is under no obligation to behave in a predictable orderly fashion...we cannot construct an ontology that makes God dispensable. Secularists can dismiss this as a mere exercise within predefined rules of the game of mathematical logic, but that is sour grapes, for it was the secular side that hoped to substitute logic for God in the first place. Godel's critique of the continuum hypothesis has the same implications as his incompleteness theorems: Mathematics never will create the sort of closed system that sorts reality into neat boxes."
As I worked with my four year old this morning on math, it occurred to me that our's is a ten based system. How ingenious that we also have ten digits. From laying in bed and thinking about threes, to seeing how many different ways we can arrange our fingers, our Good God has given us so much to work with. But in the end, not even math can tell us everything about God. As human beings who can never truly know another human being, how many of us ever even master a decent self-knowledge, can we ever hope to master the Divine?
No, but our God has not left us to be bored. To contemplate the human mind's capacity to search for Him is to me the greatest sign of His existence. We could each spend one hundred life times searching a different part of His Universe and still not find all He has left for us to discover. And sadly, we could spend our one lifetime never looking for Him at all.
The first math course I ever liked was Euclidean and Non-Euclidean Geometry my senior year in college. I had a great professor and the benefit of three and a half years of liberal arts education, you bet I waited until the last possible moment to fulfill that requirement. The professor required no prerequisite knowledge but asked us to use logic to figure out the proofs. I had my first glimpse at the Incredibly wonderful world of math.
When my oldest was five, one morning at the breakfast table he asked, "What is three plus three plus three? Is it nine?"' "Why yes" I answered after quickly using my fingers to check. "What is three plus three plus three plus three? Is it twelve?" "yes, why do you ask?" With a shrug he answered, "I don't know, I just think about it when I go to bed at night."
We were doing kindergarten math, but I decided to skip subtraction for awhile and move on to multiplication since he was interested in it. I quickly learned that if I asked him, "What is Three times Two?" He would answer, "Five." But if I asked him, "What is three two TIMES?" "He would answer, "six." Oh, so that is what the times tables are. I am sure I knew this, but to see how the changing of one word made it clear to a five year old made it clear to me. It became clearer when I would watch him double the answer to four times six to get the answer to eight times six.
Having taught math to a math kid for four years, I have learned a lot. Watching how his mind calculates and figures things out has shown me the incredible order of math. No longer just random numbers, I see patterns, lines stretching infinitely in two directions, parts of wholes and wholes made out of parts. He of course hates math. But because of him, I have come to love it.
I have always believed that because the Universe was created by God, everything in the universe could tell us something about Him. From an ant hill to the genetic make up of a human being to the rotations of the planets, we can catch a glimpse of who He is. I have never believed that anything, not even the Incarnated Word, could teach us everything about Him. Though the human mind is amazing beyond anything else in the Universe, it can never fully grasp the Divine in its entirety. I think if it did, it would explode into a million pieces. Perhaps this is why we enter His presence first as pure spirit.
I have just read an incredible article in this month's edition of First Things titled "The God of Mathematicians." In it, David P. Goldman reviews the work of Kurt Godel. Much of it is over my head, I admit. But one thing struck me as incredibly wonderful. "Godel's incompleteness theorems, critique of the continuum hypothesis, and examination of general relativity all have theological implications...He considered mathematical objects to be real and his research therefore to be empirical. He thought his theology thus to be an empirical one, founded on man's experience of the infinite fecundity of the creator's mind."
Godel believed in a personal God. According to Goldman, "Godel's personal God is under no obligation to behave in a predictable orderly fashion...we cannot construct an ontology that makes God dispensable. Secularists can dismiss this as a mere exercise within predefined rules of the game of mathematical logic, but that is sour grapes, for it was the secular side that hoped to substitute logic for God in the first place. Godel's critique of the continuum hypothesis has the same implications as his incompleteness theorems: Mathematics never will create the sort of closed system that sorts reality into neat boxes."
As I worked with my four year old this morning on math, it occurred to me that our's is a ten based system. How ingenious that we also have ten digits. From laying in bed and thinking about threes, to seeing how many different ways we can arrange our fingers, our Good God has given us so much to work with. But in the end, not even math can tell us everything about God. As human beings who can never truly know another human being, how many of us ever even master a decent self-knowledge, can we ever hope to master the Divine?
No, but our God has not left us to be bored. To contemplate the human mind's capacity to search for Him is to me the greatest sign of His existence. We could each spend one hundred life times searching a different part of His Universe and still not find all He has left for us to discover. And sadly, we could spend our one lifetime never looking for Him at all.
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
A Book Review and So Much More
I needed a miracle. My son’s Godfather just received a year to live. For some reason, the news did not devastate me. Immediately, I had a sense of hope. I don’t know from whence it came or why I reacted such. I just had a feeling we could get a miracle.
I began a google search for a potential saint who needed a miracle for canonization. Several times my search came up with nothing current. I kept changing the words I used and hitting enter. Finally, I came upon an article from Catholic News Services dated March 12, 2010. The title was "Chicago Archdiocese begins sainthood process for first black US Priest". My friend had returned home a few weeks earlier to Chicago for his treatment. This looked promising.
I ordered the book of his life, From Slave To Priest by Caroline Hemesath. Following is a summary:
Fr. Augustine Tolton (1854-1879) was the first black American priest. His mother, Martha Jane Chisley, was taken from Kentucky to Missouri as a wedding gift for the youngest daughter of a Catholic Slave owner where she met a fellow Catholic slave of a neighboring farm, Peter Paul Tolton. They were married in Brush Creek, MO at St. Peter’s Church. The couple remained the mutual property of their owners and had three children.
During the Civil War, Peter Paul escaped to St. Louis to join the Union Army. Martha Jane escaped to Illinois a few years later with her three children, Charley, Augustine and Anne. Augustine was only seven years old. The family settled in Quincy where they learned after the end of the war of the death of Peter Paul.
Augustine was raised in Quincy where he began working as a very young child in the tobacco factories to help support his family. His older brother died at the age of ten. His youth was filled with the support of German and Irish clergy who took an interest in his education combined with a bitter resentment and hatred from many of the whites in the Catholic community. The majority of his education was from private tutoring.
At his First Communion at the age of sixteen, he felt a calling to become a priest. Then began his long journey to ordination. Even with the support of the many clergy who had taken him under wing, he was unable to gain acceptance into any American Seminary. His education continued under private tutors as the search for a seminary to accept him continued for eight years.
During this time, Augustine worked in both the Quincy factories and in the church as a custodian and alter server. He continued his education and worked as a lay apostle with his priests to establish a Catholic Mission for the black children. He was a cheerful, faithful and spiritual young man known to many in the community. Though the long wait tried his courage, he persisted in the belief that if God wanted him to be a priest, he would be one.
At the age of twenty five he was accepted into the Congregatio de Propaganda Fide in Rome with the idea that he would be a missionary to Africa. He counted these years as a Seminarian as the happiest in his life. He was ordained in 1886 and sent back to the Diocese of Quincy.
In Quincy, he first was accepted and cherished by both the white and black communities. But as he gained success, he was attacked by both white clergy and black Protestant Ministers. His work suffered and he was unable to see much fruit for his tireless labors on behalf of his people. He requested a transfer and was sent to Chicago to be the Pastor of the first black church there.
In Chicago, he worked to the point of exhaustion for a people who faced poverty, illiteracy, and racism. Through all of his trials, he remained cheerful and faithful. and deeply spiritual. He died of a heat stroke at the age of forty-three.
I have recently adopted an Ethiopian little boy just a bit younger than Fr. Tolton was when his mother stole across the Mississippi River to freedom. The desire for an African American Priest as a saintly role model is more important to me than it would have been just a few months ago.
Everything was just too uncanny: My need for a miracle, the Chicago connection, the black connection. It bothered me, no that isn’t right, it motivated me. I desperately want my miracle. I pray daily for Fr. Tolton’s intercession on behalf of my dear friend. But there was more. I wanted to help Fr. Tolton’s cause. I wanted to increase the devotion to this potential saint who our country could so desperately use; who I could use in my family as an example of holiness, dedication and charity. Thomas Jefferson once said, “In regard to the institution of slavery, indeed, I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just.” But God is also merciful, and He may be giving our country a heavenly advocate in the person of Augustine Tolton.
I have felt a friendship with many a saint. I hope for this kind of friendship for all my children. When I was a high school theology teacher, I had my Juniors do a saint report to prepare them for Confirmation. I told them that their sponsor was their representative on Earth, their Saint their advocate in heaven. I told them not to pick a name they liked, but to look deeper, to find a saint who held their strengths or overcame their weaknesses. I encouraged them to find a Saint to whom they felt a connection.
Why we connect with certain people and not others is hard to say. I know I have an affinity for the Irish and the Polish Saints because of my heritage. I love Joan of Arc because of her femininity (Read Twain’s Joan of Ark) and to St. Joseph because of his deep love of Mary.
My African son does not need Saints that share his skin color. I don’t need Irish and Polish saints either. But it is sure nice to have somewhat tangible things in common with those holy men and women who have gone before us. It just helps to make that connection that we all need with the Heavenly members of Christ’s Mystical Body.
I write this today because I have made a connection with Fr. Tolton. If it is God’s will, I want to do everything in my power to further his cause for Sainthood. I also want my miracle. I know they are not necessarily one in the same. I know my friend’s illness led me to Fr. Tolton. If his cure is not in God’s plan, then I will pray for another divine acknowledgement of Fr. Tolton’s sanctity. And I will ask Fr. Tolton for a different favor. I will ask that he beseech heaven for all the spiritual graces available to shower upon my friend for the remainder of his precious life on earth and that he be there to welcome his fellow Chicagoan into the light.
Fr. Tolton Prayer cards can be requested from Bishop Perry’s office at dragonese@archchicago.org, From Slave to Priest is available at barnesandnobel.com
I began a google search for a potential saint who needed a miracle for canonization. Several times my search came up with nothing current. I kept changing the words I used and hitting enter. Finally, I came upon an article from Catholic News Services dated March 12, 2010. The title was "Chicago Archdiocese begins sainthood process for first black US Priest". My friend had returned home a few weeks earlier to Chicago for his treatment. This looked promising.
I ordered the book of his life, From Slave To Priest by Caroline Hemesath. Following is a summary:
Fr. Augustine Tolton (1854-1879) was the first black American priest. His mother, Martha Jane Chisley, was taken from Kentucky to Missouri as a wedding gift for the youngest daughter of a Catholic Slave owner where she met a fellow Catholic slave of a neighboring farm, Peter Paul Tolton. They were married in Brush Creek, MO at St. Peter’s Church. The couple remained the mutual property of their owners and had three children.
During the Civil War, Peter Paul escaped to St. Louis to join the Union Army. Martha Jane escaped to Illinois a few years later with her three children, Charley, Augustine and Anne. Augustine was only seven years old. The family settled in Quincy where they learned after the end of the war of the death of Peter Paul.
Augustine was raised in Quincy where he began working as a very young child in the tobacco factories to help support his family. His older brother died at the age of ten. His youth was filled with the support of German and Irish clergy who took an interest in his education combined with a bitter resentment and hatred from many of the whites in the Catholic community. The majority of his education was from private tutoring.
At his First Communion at the age of sixteen, he felt a calling to become a priest. Then began his long journey to ordination. Even with the support of the many clergy who had taken him under wing, he was unable to gain acceptance into any American Seminary. His education continued under private tutors as the search for a seminary to accept him continued for eight years.
During this time, Augustine worked in both the Quincy factories and in the church as a custodian and alter server. He continued his education and worked as a lay apostle with his priests to establish a Catholic Mission for the black children. He was a cheerful, faithful and spiritual young man known to many in the community. Though the long wait tried his courage, he persisted in the belief that if God wanted him to be a priest, he would be one.
At the age of twenty five he was accepted into the Congregatio de Propaganda Fide in Rome with the idea that he would be a missionary to Africa. He counted these years as a Seminarian as the happiest in his life. He was ordained in 1886 and sent back to the Diocese of Quincy.
In Quincy, he first was accepted and cherished by both the white and black communities. But as he gained success, he was attacked by both white clergy and black Protestant Ministers. His work suffered and he was unable to see much fruit for his tireless labors on behalf of his people. He requested a transfer and was sent to Chicago to be the Pastor of the first black church there.
In Chicago, he worked to the point of exhaustion for a people who faced poverty, illiteracy, and racism. Through all of his trials, he remained cheerful and faithful. and deeply spiritual. He died of a heat stroke at the age of forty-three.
I have recently adopted an Ethiopian little boy just a bit younger than Fr. Tolton was when his mother stole across the Mississippi River to freedom. The desire for an African American Priest as a saintly role model is more important to me than it would have been just a few months ago.
Everything was just too uncanny: My need for a miracle, the Chicago connection, the black connection. It bothered me, no that isn’t right, it motivated me. I desperately want my miracle. I pray daily for Fr. Tolton’s intercession on behalf of my dear friend. But there was more. I wanted to help Fr. Tolton’s cause. I wanted to increase the devotion to this potential saint who our country could so desperately use; who I could use in my family as an example of holiness, dedication and charity. Thomas Jefferson once said, “In regard to the institution of slavery, indeed, I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just.” But God is also merciful, and He may be giving our country a heavenly advocate in the person of Augustine Tolton.
I have felt a friendship with many a saint. I hope for this kind of friendship for all my children. When I was a high school theology teacher, I had my Juniors do a saint report to prepare them for Confirmation. I told them that their sponsor was their representative on Earth, their Saint their advocate in heaven. I told them not to pick a name they liked, but to look deeper, to find a saint who held their strengths or overcame their weaknesses. I encouraged them to find a Saint to whom they felt a connection.
Why we connect with certain people and not others is hard to say. I know I have an affinity for the Irish and the Polish Saints because of my heritage. I love Joan of Arc because of her femininity (Read Twain’s Joan of Ark) and to St. Joseph because of his deep love of Mary.
My African son does not need Saints that share his skin color. I don’t need Irish and Polish saints either. But it is sure nice to have somewhat tangible things in common with those holy men and women who have gone before us. It just helps to make that connection that we all need with the Heavenly members of Christ’s Mystical Body.
I write this today because I have made a connection with Fr. Tolton. If it is God’s will, I want to do everything in my power to further his cause for Sainthood. I also want my miracle. I know they are not necessarily one in the same. I know my friend’s illness led me to Fr. Tolton. If his cure is not in God’s plan, then I will pray for another divine acknowledgement of Fr. Tolton’s sanctity. And I will ask Fr. Tolton for a different favor. I will ask that he beseech heaven for all the spiritual graces available to shower upon my friend for the remainder of his precious life on earth and that he be there to welcome his fellow Chicagoan into the light.
Fr. Tolton Prayer cards can be requested from Bishop Perry’s office at dragonese@archchicago.org, From Slave to Priest is available at barnesandnobel.com
Monday, June 14, 2010
To be loved...
I had great teachers in my life. When I became a teacher I had to make a choice. Well, actually, i didn't have a choice, I just had to come to terms. I realized that there were two kinds of great teachers: the ones you loved and the ones you respected. Think back. How many of you can name a teacher that you hated at the time, but what you gained from them you wouldn't trade for anything? They had discipline and knowledge. There was no messing around on their watch. They had something to teach and you were going to learn. Think back. How many of you can name a teacher you loved? Teachers who you would stay up late for to do an assignment. Teachers who you wouldn't think of messing around on their watch because you wanted them to like you as much as you liked them. They had something they loved to teach that you wanted to love too, and so you learned.
I had to make my students love me. I didn't have a choice. I tried yelling, dirty looks, never smiling for the first three months, all the things you think will inspire good behavior and respect. Nope. Not for me. I remember when I made the choice. I quit acting like the teacher who had the period before me. It was in school suspension. She would sit at her desk and yell. The kids would immediately snap into shape. I tried it for a few weeks. I didn't like it and it wasn't working. I changed tactics. I started moving around the room and sitting with each kid for awhile to see what they were working on, ask them what was up and help them with something. I got to know them and could make assignments suited to their tastes when they ran out of work.
I will never forget one boy. He needed help with math. Okay, not my strong point. He was doing percentages and I kept drawing pictures and coloring things in. He told me I was a really good teacher. I didn't have the heart to tell him I couldn't figure it out without the pictures.
Two weeks later I walked in for my shift. The teacher before me was trying to physically drag this boy back into the classroom. I asked what was up and she said, "The principal is on her way, he is out of here." I went and put my stuff at the desk and then walked back to the doorway that he was clinging to. I looked him in the eye and said, "go sit at my desk." He immediately released his grip on the door and walked back to my desk. I followed and pulled out his folder. I found a Social Studies Test that had a grade of 7%. I asked him what it was? He just shrugged. I told him to get out his social studies book and write in all the correct answers. He said, "But I won't get any credit for that." I said, "I don't care, you should have done it right the first time." He said, "okay."
I met the principal at the door and said everything was fine. She left. He spent the entire period correcting his test without a peep. I will never forget him. I have no idea what happened to him. But he taught me a great lesson. Something about kids. Something about myself.
My oldest son has become a Tween overnight. I realize I am in the same position again. I need to be obeyed. It is my job to teach some lessons. Discipline is a must. But you know what, it is the same story again. What is it they say about the insane that try the same thing over and over hoping for a different result.
I do not inspire fear. I have learned I don't have the muscle to back up my threats anyway. I am not the only one who learned that lesson. I must be loved. They must think of me and say, "I want to love what she loves. I want her to love me as much as I love her." And so I get out from behind the desk and move around and spend some time finding out what they need and what they are working on and help where I can. Every day. Every day for the next ten years, so that if the time comes and they are stuck between a rock and a hard place and I say, "Come sit by me." They will drop their fighting stance and come.
It is not the only way. But like it or not, I think it is my way. So it may sound easy. I am not so sure. How does one accomplish to be loved? Ask me in twenty or twenty five years. Maybe I will have the answer.
I had to make my students love me. I didn't have a choice. I tried yelling, dirty looks, never smiling for the first three months, all the things you think will inspire good behavior and respect. Nope. Not for me. I remember when I made the choice. I quit acting like the teacher who had the period before me. It was in school suspension. She would sit at her desk and yell. The kids would immediately snap into shape. I tried it for a few weeks. I didn't like it and it wasn't working. I changed tactics. I started moving around the room and sitting with each kid for awhile to see what they were working on, ask them what was up and help them with something. I got to know them and could make assignments suited to their tastes when they ran out of work.
I will never forget one boy. He needed help with math. Okay, not my strong point. He was doing percentages and I kept drawing pictures and coloring things in. He told me I was a really good teacher. I didn't have the heart to tell him I couldn't figure it out without the pictures.
Two weeks later I walked in for my shift. The teacher before me was trying to physically drag this boy back into the classroom. I asked what was up and she said, "The principal is on her way, he is out of here." I went and put my stuff at the desk and then walked back to the doorway that he was clinging to. I looked him in the eye and said, "go sit at my desk." He immediately released his grip on the door and walked back to my desk. I followed and pulled out his folder. I found a Social Studies Test that had a grade of 7%. I asked him what it was? He just shrugged. I told him to get out his social studies book and write in all the correct answers. He said, "But I won't get any credit for that." I said, "I don't care, you should have done it right the first time." He said, "okay."
I met the principal at the door and said everything was fine. She left. He spent the entire period correcting his test without a peep. I will never forget him. I have no idea what happened to him. But he taught me a great lesson. Something about kids. Something about myself.
My oldest son has become a Tween overnight. I realize I am in the same position again. I need to be obeyed. It is my job to teach some lessons. Discipline is a must. But you know what, it is the same story again. What is it they say about the insane that try the same thing over and over hoping for a different result.
I do not inspire fear. I have learned I don't have the muscle to back up my threats anyway. I am not the only one who learned that lesson. I must be loved. They must think of me and say, "I want to love what she loves. I want her to love me as much as I love her." And so I get out from behind the desk and move around and spend some time finding out what they need and what they are working on and help where I can. Every day. Every day for the next ten years, so that if the time comes and they are stuck between a rock and a hard place and I say, "Come sit by me." They will drop their fighting stance and come.
It is not the only way. But like it or not, I think it is my way. So it may sound easy. I am not so sure. How does one accomplish to be loved? Ask me in twenty or twenty five years. Maybe I will have the answer.
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