Writer
Grateful to be among the eight Catholics featured on this fabulous list compiled by my friend and fellow blogger Ryan Eggenberger.
From Ryan’s intro:
Ever heard any of these dismal statements?
“Young Catholics are totally disconnected from the faith.”
“There are no young Catholics engaged in the Church anymore.”
“The Church is a dying institution.”
If you ever discuss the faith outside of the four walls of a parish, you probably have.
If you’re like me, though, I prefer to magnify the good that happens when given the opportunity; and I’ve been given that opportunity, lucky you.
Below are eight young Catholics engaged in the New Evangelization in some capacity. Some are writers, others are catechists, teachers, musicians, artists, and parents. Each is diligently working on a cool project for spring and summer; projects which, I sincerely trust, you will want to know about.
Click here to read Ryan’s list of active young Catholics.
Greetings, readers! Quick post to introduce an incoming series. Mondays on the blog (starting tonight!), you’ll find a post called Sex! And other stuff. with snippets of sex and other stuff I concocted, stumbled upon, or am otherwise compelled to shout at you across the interweb.
-Arleen
Humans, it seems, are prone to try to solve problems in every way except for from the root.
Tired? Coffee.
Out of shape? Fad diet (if not diet pill).
Not ready to parent a kid? Contraception.
No sex in your marriage? Erotica, or Viagra.
We are on a mission to live one way without experiencing the reasonable consequences of living that way. We like a certain lifestyle, but we dislike the results of the lifestyle, so we create ways to obliterate the results. We are enabled to refer to symptoms as problems, and to deny that the root of the problem is a problem at all.
Which totally disregards the purpose of symptoms.
A body doesn’t use symptoms to tell you to make the symptoms stop. It uses symptoms to say, “Stop treating me this way.”
A tired body doesn’t need coffee. It needs sleep.
An out of shape body doesn’t need a diet. It needs a lifestyle adjustment.
A person not ready for kids doesn’t need contraception. He or she needs abstinence (and perhaps only periodically).
A sexless marriage doesn’t need erotica (and according to a sex therapist professor of mine, it might not need Viagra, either.). It might just need communication.
In other words: Lack of coffee doesn’t result in tired. Not sleeping does. Lack of diet or diet pill doesn’t result in out of shapeness. An unhealthy lifestyle does. Lack of contraception doesn’t result in babies. Sex does. Lack of erotica doesn’t result in sexless marriage. Lots of circumstances do, including but not limited to absence of communication.
But avoiding the roots of problems doesn’t result in joy.
It just stunts our growth.
Not feelin’ so hot today (and a bit behind on posts, as a result of my busiest [but final] semester of grad school).
So while I rest up (and then write the new posts you’ll see soon), enjoy a photo I took today in my back yard.
How awesome is the sky God gave us?