I know it's teeny-bopper, bubble-gum, middle school pop, but I have had "Call Me, Maybe" stuck in my head for about the last 24 hours. It's an awful song to have stuck in your head, because it's the same thing over and over and over again. But it's a fun song, catchy and relatable. And I graced all of my coworkers with my pathetic rendition for about the entirety of my shift last night. Here are some other musings while the Orkin man does his thing at this God-awful hour in the morning:
It's only a God-awful hour because I was out until about 2am last night. We decided to mix it up from our usual Aurora happy-hour hangout to appease some folks who don't live out that way. You know, the folks who bailed on us anyway. So, we hit up Falling Rock Tap House, which I've been dying to go back to since the Denver Microbrew Tour introduced me last year. A long drive from Fitzsimmons, but so is anything that's open past midnight and isn't seedy. I got really excited browsing their beer menu before I'd even left work. I had five beers picked out, knowing I'd have to narrow it down to two. Good news, they were out of three of them. Problem solved. That's the only scenario in which being out of great beer is good news. Bad news, I was already so tired by the time I pulled up on Blake Street that I totally spaced putting money in the meter. Suddenly, a night of (expensive) beer and snacks added up, what with that $25 parking ticket and all. Oops. And then, there was the getting home just before 2am and having to get up to greet the Orkin man at 8am.
So, on to pest control. The joys of home ownership continue. Snakes, hornet's nest, spiders, and of course, the reason for the visit--mice. I feel a little redeemed by my Tuesday efforts of cleaning up the mice nest and setting my own traps until the pros could come in. One mouse caught, unknown hordes to go. Hopefully the additional traps and sprays work or I could end up with mutinous roommates. And murine roommates. Ha ha.
And now we will play ready, set, word vomit in order to finish the blog post in time to go shopping with Kelly. Because, remember, after last night, spending money is just what I need. I already have a hard enough time making it to Rockies' games, and now they suck so bad, I'm not sure I want to go. It isn't summer in Denver without a trip to Coors Field, and I don't even have a game on the horizon. I hit Canvas and Cocktails for the fourth time last weekend. I'm what you call an "addicted painter." If you need some artwork for your house, let me know. Tickets for Dierks Bentley at Red Rocks go on pre-sale today (well, they went on pre-sale for Dierks fan-club members yesterday, for KYGO folks today), and I'm terrified I won't be able to get tickets. One show that I would want to see no matter where he was playing, and it happens to be at the venue on my 30-before-30 list. It would be just my luck to not get tickets. However, I have the day off for Iron Man at Film on the Rocks, so that's a big plus. Speaking of good movies, I found someone who has never heard of, much less seen, The Princess Bride. Crime against humanity much? I invited her over on Saturday. I think I scared her. Still playing the waiting game on the job front. We'll see if I'm more management material than I am preceptor material. Fingers crossed. Trying to remember to pray.
Until next time...
Thursday, May 24, 2012
Monday, May 14, 2012
Catholic and...
I just got back from my first Theology on Tap in probably over a year. Working evenings doesn't allow me the luxury of participating in the bulk of the Denver Catholic Young Adult event calendar, but having a roommate on the ToT hospitality committee gives me very little excuse to skip when the opportunity presents itself. The topic was "Gay and Catholic: Is there a place in the Church for me?" as presented by Eve Tushnet, a Yale-grad convert who found and joined the Catholic Church years after coming out, a rare progress of events. This isn't a topic that I particularly enjoy spending time with, because there is a lot of animosity and misunderstanding in our culture surrounding it. It isn't the topic that I would have chosen for my one Theology on Tap this year. But I think it's important to continually challenge ourselves in our faith. There is a danger to living in any comfort zone, particularly the one in which I typically reside that says that being Catholic is the logical, comfortable norm. While I don't have the desire or the expertise to go into the Catholic teaching on homosexuality, I did find a few points of Eve's talk relevant to the challenge of living Catholic, regardless of your particular struggles.
The first question that Eve had to answer before joining the Catholic Church was which did she believe more? That homosexuality was morally neutral or that the Catholic Church had the authority to teach on the topic of homosexuality. She phrased it better, but you get the idea. Her conclusion was that she believed the latter more. For anyone struggling with a teaching of the Catholic Church, I think this is a fundamental question. Is __________ (fill in the blank) morally neutral and/or does the Catholic Church have the authority to teach a doctrine on the matter. You can fill in the blank with abortion, premarital sex, contraception, the death penalty, euthanasia, etc. You can talk about the need for confession, Holy Days of Obligation, the primacy of the Eucharistic presence of Christ, or any other hot-button topic that non-Catholics and uneducated Catholics alike can argue to a pulp. Ultimately, it comes down to a matter of faith in the Church that Christ founded and to whom He gave authority. I don't have to understand why the Church says what She does about any of these issues, but I do believe that it is within Her scope to teach the truth about them.
Eve also mentioned that in her journey, many times she felt like Peter, saying "Lord, to whom shall we go?" There were many moments that led her to an edge, a crossroads, and she found herself thinking that if there were anywhere else that she could possibly go, she would choose that instead. But she realized that she didn't have anywhere else to go but straight into the arms of the bride of Christ. That was home. It wasn't an easy home, and if she could have taken another path, with less suffering, less doubt, she would have. But she couldn't. And that's what I find myself thinking when I encounter not just non-Catholics, but those who have no place for religion of any kind in their lives. Where else are you going? I don't have anywhere else to go and I can't imagine that what they've found could possibly be any better.
The final point that I want to process is Eve's distinction between a negative enactment of a vocation and a positive enactment. The negative is "God doesn't want me to have homosexual relations" whereas the positive is "how does God want me to give and receive love within the guidance of His Church?" You can apply this to any vocation, and I certainly see a parallel to how I am living as a single woman. Until I am blessed with the grace of marriage (which is where I believe God is calling me), I can focus on all the things I can't do. I can lament the childbearing years lost. I can wallow in my loneliness of another Saturday night without a date. I can succumb to jealousy of all my friends who are living their vocation of marriage. Or, I can figure out how God is calling me to give and receive love in this moment. He isn't calling me to be a wife and mother tomorrow. But He is calling me to be a woman of God tomorrow. And if I can figure out the best way to embody His love in that way, then when I look back, these won't be years I spent waiting for my vocation, but they will be years spent living my vocation.
I think it's important to recognize that it is difficult to be Catholic and homosexual in the same way that it is difficult to be Catholic and anything. That your sacrifice and your cross are no more or less uniquely difficult than anyone else's. It is difficult to be Catholic and chaste before marriage. It is difficult to be Catholic and a doctor. It is difficult to be Catholic and work weekends. It is difficult to be Catholic in a materialistic, hedonistic society. The lesson that I take from tonight is the importance of offering all our brothers and sisters in Christ compassion, support and love. I don't have any more answers than I did three hours ago. But I do cherish the knowledge that God knows what He is doing and He gives us a way to peace and joy, if we are only willing to accept it.
The first question that Eve had to answer before joining the Catholic Church was which did she believe more? That homosexuality was morally neutral or that the Catholic Church had the authority to teach on the topic of homosexuality. She phrased it better, but you get the idea. Her conclusion was that she believed the latter more. For anyone struggling with a teaching of the Catholic Church, I think this is a fundamental question. Is __________ (fill in the blank) morally neutral and/or does the Catholic Church have the authority to teach a doctrine on the matter. You can fill in the blank with abortion, premarital sex, contraception, the death penalty, euthanasia, etc. You can talk about the need for confession, Holy Days of Obligation, the primacy of the Eucharistic presence of Christ, or any other hot-button topic that non-Catholics and uneducated Catholics alike can argue to a pulp. Ultimately, it comes down to a matter of faith in the Church that Christ founded and to whom He gave authority. I don't have to understand why the Church says what She does about any of these issues, but I do believe that it is within Her scope to teach the truth about them.
Eve also mentioned that in her journey, many times she felt like Peter, saying "Lord, to whom shall we go?" There were many moments that led her to an edge, a crossroads, and she found herself thinking that if there were anywhere else that she could possibly go, she would choose that instead. But she realized that she didn't have anywhere else to go but straight into the arms of the bride of Christ. That was home. It wasn't an easy home, and if she could have taken another path, with less suffering, less doubt, she would have. But she couldn't. And that's what I find myself thinking when I encounter not just non-Catholics, but those who have no place for religion of any kind in their lives. Where else are you going? I don't have anywhere else to go and I can't imagine that what they've found could possibly be any better.
The final point that I want to process is Eve's distinction between a negative enactment of a vocation and a positive enactment. The negative is "God doesn't want me to have homosexual relations" whereas the positive is "how does God want me to give and receive love within the guidance of His Church?" You can apply this to any vocation, and I certainly see a parallel to how I am living as a single woman. Until I am blessed with the grace of marriage (which is where I believe God is calling me), I can focus on all the things I can't do. I can lament the childbearing years lost. I can wallow in my loneliness of another Saturday night without a date. I can succumb to jealousy of all my friends who are living their vocation of marriage. Or, I can figure out how God is calling me to give and receive love in this moment. He isn't calling me to be a wife and mother tomorrow. But He is calling me to be a woman of God tomorrow. And if I can figure out the best way to embody His love in that way, then when I look back, these won't be years I spent waiting for my vocation, but they will be years spent living my vocation.
I think it's important to recognize that it is difficult to be Catholic and homosexual in the same way that it is difficult to be Catholic and anything. That your sacrifice and your cross are no more or less uniquely difficult than anyone else's. It is difficult to be Catholic and chaste before marriage. It is difficult to be Catholic and a doctor. It is difficult to be Catholic and work weekends. It is difficult to be Catholic in a materialistic, hedonistic society. The lesson that I take from tonight is the importance of offering all our brothers and sisters in Christ compassion, support and love. I don't have any more answers than I did three hours ago. But I do cherish the knowledge that God knows what He is doing and He gives us a way to peace and joy, if we are only willing to accept it.
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