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Friday, August 22, 2008

Five Realizations During the First Week in Collegeville

1. The Catholic Church isn't what it used to be.

And I don't mean that we've left the Inquisition behind. An old professor of Krista's who teaches at the SOT told her recently "The grad students aren't like you." When she passed this along to me, I became more than a little concerned. Apparently even the SOT is attracting more conservative students which is, I think, reflective of the Church as a whole. People from my generation seem to think that Vatican II went a little too far in one direction and we need to swing things back to the way they used to be. This isn't to say that everyone I meet is for Latin Masses, but the overwhelming sense seems to be that we need to readjust ourselves to get back in line with tradition. I'm pro-tradition, to an extent. If it means that we're heading back to the days where I have to wear a chapel veil and am not allowed to speak because of one misunderstood line in Paul (vs 33-36) I might, in my mother's words, pitch a fit. As one of the professors who recommended me to the SOT wrote later: "Be sure to shake them up! I know you will."

2. Theology is hard.

Even without reconciling the aforementioned issue to my faith life, theology, as a discipline, sucks. I love it to bits, don't get me wrong, but it's so hard that I can't even describe it to you. The best analogy that I've been able to come up with so far is the following. Imagine you're a scientist working on a life or death issue. You have a hypothesis you have to test, but there's no real way of testing it. You don't have the equipment you need because the equipment you need is more advanced than anything we have to date. In fact, it's more advanced than anything you can even begin to fathom. So the absolute best thing that you can do is test it against a bunch of other similar hypotheses and argue about which one is better and why without ever knowing (or even having the hope of one day knowing which is right.) Now imagine that you can be graded on this, that we say some theology is good and some theology is bad an we have a whole rubric for evaluating the relative truth of something that we're just assuming exists.

Shit.

3. This ain't your momma's grad program.

Let's face it. I didn't work very hard in college, particularly in my major programs. I didn't work very hard and I got very good grades. My professors seemed to like me (hooray for charm!), I like writing, and read unusually quickly. I wasn't terribly concerned about starting a grad program until I had a conversation with a friend who's a year ahead of me in the exact same program. We chatted about professors, books, standard reading, and what the grade scale was like. He groaned and said: "I didn't get As in any of my classes." Have I mentioned that THIS IS ONE OF THE SMARTEST PEOPLE I KNOW? The guy runs intellectual circles around me and is struggling in his classes (albeit, loves them, but isn't getting the grades he's used to.) In addition to never working very hard in college, I also had a fit whenever I was graded lower than an A (I know, I'm that girl and cringing a little bit) and on one very memorable occasion, cried after getting a B. I had every intention of graduating from the SOT wearing one of those obnoxious red robes that signifies high honors and I'm slowly watching that spin out of sight.

4. I love fundraising.

I mean, I really love fundraising. I began work in Anna Marie's development office and I'm so excited it should be criminal. I love chatting with donors. I love networking. I love writing appeal and thank you letters. I'm excited to dive into grant writing and I can't believe I'm working for a small non profit loaded with radical feminists. I can't believe I don't have to justify things to my health insurance company because I work for the archdiocese (I mean. . .). I love the staff's dedication (many of them have been there 10+ years) to women's issues in central Minnesota.

Pffffft.

5. Stucco Sucks

The new chapel. Stucco, in CENTRAL MINNESOTA? What were they smoking when they decided that one?

In other news, the Brewers are still behind the Cubs and I'm really into the band Big Star lately.