Advent, Week Two: What are you giving up?

Did you know that the average person does not give things up for Advent? Well, when a small, uninformed person like myself begins to discover this, what does she do? She promptly tells everyone she knows to give stuff up, of course. Then, they don't.

That's ok, however. She now has material with which to write a blog post. Basically, I am just curious, do you give things up for Lent? Think of this as a survey. No pressure to respond, but if you could respond, I'd love to hear your opinions.

Now the Second Week of Advent.This week has (unfortunately) had a stronger ring: only a few days left until finals. Those pesky little cumulative tests. Ah, the joys of college! Yet, only one week until its all over. So, happy studying and Adieu.

Advent: Week I

Subtitle: How God's Really Good About Telling You What You Need To Hear When You Need To Hear It.

Today I walked into Mass feeling frustrated and disoriented. There's so much in my life that I'm not excelling at, that I want to happen now, events and situations that I want to occur instantly. My perpetual impatience was getting the better of me again. I went in, thinking: "How long, God? Why does everything in this life take forever?"

I was wrapped up in my own self-pitying interior monologue, when the priest started his homily with the sentence: "We are here to engage in subversive activity." I snapped out of my trance and paid rapt attention from then on-I was intrigued. What subversive activity were we engaging in exactly? His answer: Advent. Essentially, his homily was about the absence of Advent in our society. Our American society is in an obesity epidemic, yes, but the real epidemic, the root of all these problems, is the epidemic of perpetual adolescence. We have lost all sense of self-control, of self-denial, of delayed gratification. We have to have whatever we want and whenever we want it-a.k.a. NOW. We have an awful difficulty telling ourselves "no" or even "not now, later."

Clearly, he continued, a culture that has this attitude has no use for Advent. And a culture that lacks the foresight to look to the good in the future, even when the present is glum, lacks hope. When he said that, the sadness of our current cultural situation struck me. How awful and how true-our culture is a culture that lacks hope. We grasp onto whatever immediate pleasure we can because all too soon the moment will pass and we'll be left empty again. Human beings simply can't live hope-it's human nature to always be able to look down to the end of the dark tunnel and see that light. Our culture has lost the light of hope-we're lost in the darkness of the tunnel. What an awful idea-a life void of hope.

As I listened to these words, I realized they were exactly what I needed to hear. My own outlook had been sadly lacking in hope, trust, or any sort of virtue besides adolescent impatience. God's timing is the best timing, and although it may be difficult for me to always follow, He knows best. Thus, my new Advent resolution is to join the subversives, and cultivate an Advent-like attitude of patience, trust, and hope. Engage in subversive activity: celebrate Advent!

Countdown to Christmas Day:

22 days

Reflections on Pizza...

College=pizza.




There is nothing more attractive to a college student than free food. Being a cheapskate in search of free food is part of what it means to be a college student. When I was a senior in high school, I witnessed a friend of mine, who had recently become a college freshman, stuff five packs of Nutter Butters into his pant pockets. I was baffled by his uncharacteristic behavior, and I marveled at the sight. His reply: "Just you wait a year." A year later, I now sneak food out of the dining hall like a champion. It's indisputable and undeniable. College is filled with free food, and more specifically- pizza. Everywhere you turn there are events posters using the magic phrase "FREE PIZZA" to lure students to attend events.
"Come to hall council! FREE PIZZA!" "Come weave baskets with the multicultural club! FRE PIZZA!" "Come to a lecture by Professor Collons on the biological composition of stars! FREE PIZZA!"

But why pizza?

Theory 1:
Pizza is cheap. Thus, the establishment, wishing to provide free food for their students, provides endless amounts of pizza, because it costs next to nothing and is filling.
Theory 2:
College kids love pizza. Thus, groups cater to the tastes of their audiences and provide what they want-pizza.
Sub Theory A) College kids like pizza no better than any other food, but the ready supply of pizza available to them has conditioned them to love pizza.
Sub Theory B) College kids like pizza because it is essentially cheese and bread-two of the most mild, basic, universally-liked foods known to mankind.

This Crazy Thing Called Love

Love is oftentimes thought of as an emotion or feeling that one falls in and out of at one's leisure. However, through my own limited experience I have found this to be untrue. Love is so much more than your fancy's inclination. It is rather a true desire of one's heart in conjunction with an act of one's will. It is often not expressed in the stereotypical manner of sonnets and ballads, but in thousands of little inconsequential ways that go largely unnoticed.

Love hides itself in the small corners of our beings and pervades all that we do. Love is present when we are awakened in the wee hours of the morning to a sister who is suffering from the stomach flu and is in need of assistance. It is in every skinned knee that needs to be kissed. It resides in every friend that needs a sympathetic ear. It rests in every thoughtful deed that is done with no expectation of thanks.

Love outpours when we make the decision to put others before ourselves. Love is the unselfish desire for the welling being and happiness of another.

It is in this way that God loves us. God so desires our well being, both physical and spiritual, and our happiness that He sent His only son into the world to die for us. Above all things He wishes us to attain true happiness through sharing in His eternal perfection. His love for us is so great that the only thing He desires from us is our love, as imperfect as it is, in return.

Joy in the Little Things

Barter
by Sara Teasdale

Life has loveliness to sell,
All beautiful and splendid things,
Blue waves whitened on a cliff,
Soaring fire that sways and sings,
And children’s faces looking up,
Holding wonder like a cup.

Life has loveliness to sell,
Music like the curve of gold,
Scent of pine trees in the rain,
Eyes that love you, arms that hold,
And for your spirit’s still delight,
Holy thoughts that star the night.

Spend all you have for loveliness,
Buy it and never count the cost;
For one white singing hour of peace
Count many a year of strife well lost,
And for a breath of ecstasy
Give all you have been, or could be.

Awesome Things

A single rose can be my garden... a single friend, my world.
~Leo Buscaglia

Small things are the awesome things. That's why I love this:

1000 Awesome Things.

Because the small things are the things that make life scintillate with joy.

Things like:

Catching up to a car that passed you.


The Moon
Halloween-Candy-Trading

House Decorations.

Double-Spacing your essays

Clean Underwear!

Ice Cream Trucks

It's the little things in life that make up the beauty. One of my favorite spots at Notre Dame is the single white rose bush on campus. There are red and pink roses all over campus, but only one white rose bush. It's a beautiful singularity.

Eternal Rest Grant Unto Them

Prayer for the Souls in Purgatory

Eternal Father, I offer Thee the Most Precious Blood of Thy Divine Son, Jesus,
in union with the masses said throughout the world today,
for all the holy souls in purgatory,
for sinners everywhere,
for sinners in the universal church,
those in my own home and within my family. Amen.

From the readings for today:

"The souls of the just are in the hand of God, and no torment shall touch them. They seemed, in the view of the foolish, to be dead; and their passing away was thought an affliction and their going forth from us, utter destruction. But they are in peace. For if before men, indeed, they be punished, yet is their hope full of immortality; chastised a little, they shall be greatly blessed, because God tried them and found them worthy of himself. As gold in the furnace, he proved them, and as sacrificial offerings he took them to himself. In the time of their visitation they shall shine, and shall dart about as sparks through stubble; they shall judge nations and rule over peoples, and the Lord shall be their King forever. Those who trust in him shall understand truth, and the faithful shall abide with him in love: because grace and mercy are with his holy ones, and his care is with his elect."
Wisdom 3:1-9

All Saints' Day

"After this I had a vision of a great multitude,
which no one could count,
from every nation, race, people, and tongue.
They stood before the throne and before the Lamb,
wearing white robes and holding palm branches in their hands.
They cried out in a loud voice:

“Salvation comes from our God, who is seated on the throne,
and from the Lamb.”

All the angels stood around the throne
and around the elders and the four living creatures.
They prostrated themselves before the throne,
worshiped God, and exclaimed:

“Amen. Blessing and glory, wisdom and thanksgiving,
honor, power, and might
be to our God forever and ever. Amen.”

Then one of the elders spoke up and said to me,
“Who are these wearing white robes, and where did they come from?”
I said to him, “My lord, you are the one who knows.”
He said to me,
“These are the ones who have survived the time of great distress;
they have washed their robes
and made them white in the Blood of the Lamb.”

Revelation 7:9-14

(And speaking of the future and what it holds...)

"Beloved, we are God’s children now;
what we shall be has not yet been revealed.
We do know that when it is revealed we shall be like him."

1 John 3:2

Both passages are taken from the readings for the Solemnity of All Saints

What's Around the River Bend

(So apparently Desdemona and I think along the same lines -- I started my draft first, but she beat me to the posting punch.)

Sometimes, okay, most of the time, I wish God would be a little more explicit in His life directions. It would make life so much simpler. Instead of little spiritual nudges and feelings of peace, He could send an e-mail with instructions for the days events laid out in great detail. I wouldn't have to worry about discerning or choosing. The questions that I want answers to are both mundane and profound -- as Desdemona put it, "What should I wear today? What should I do with my life? What does God want me to do?" -- everything from the time I should go to bed at night to what on earth I should do after graduating. Maybe it's because I started sophomore year, and graduation (and the real world) just seem that much nearer. Maybe it's because it's autumn, and I always get pensive and melancholic during the autumn. Whatever the reason, I've just been thinking about my life lately -- Where do I want to go? What do I want to do with this life of mine? What does God want me to do with it?

Of course I have dreams and aspirations. I want to be a writer, a wife, a mother. I want to live in San Francisco/New York/Washington D.C./some other big city (but not LA) for a couple years after graduating. I want to go to grad school. I want to travel in Europe. I want to own a house with a dining room, second story, and attached garage. I have a bucket list. There are a million and one things that I'd like to do before I die.

But what do I actually see myself doing? My realism is warring with my idealism. Whenever I look at the glossy magazine spreads of chic downtown lofts or impeccably arrayed women, my idealistic self nods in agreement and immediately begins building air castles about my future as that impeccably arrayed woman living in that chic downtown loft. If God were to reach down into my world and speak to me right now, at this particular moment of my life, what would He say about that downtown apartment? About the dreams that I have for my life?

I know that, right now, I have a vocation to be a student, and I try to live that vocation every day to the greater glory of God. Sometimes I succeed and sometimes I fail, but it's a very real vocation to me, in the here and now of my very hectic, very crowded existence. But once I look to the future...? Everything is murky, and I can't help dreaming about all the possibilities that the future holds. It's very natural to plan and prepare, I guess, but I can't help thinking that, given the fact that I have zero control over what will happen tomorrow, let alone next year, it might be better if I just gave it all to God -- grad school, that potential future spouse, the dream job -- and just lived from day to day.

At the same time, I firmly believe that God designed me exactly the way I am. He give me my love of writing, my desires to travel, go to grad school, and get married. Somehow, I don't think He'll totally ignore these deepest longings when it comes to my future. But I also believe that He has an amazing adventure (called life) planned for me, one that surpasses all the wonderment and joy of my most carefully laid plans.

In summary, the future will be awesome, because God is boss, and He controls the future. Don't worry about it too much, but you have to plan for it a little, i.e. you won't get into college (which falls under the "future" category) unless you take the SAT ("present" category). And pray a lot, because God will speak to you, if you take the time to listen to Him.

Questions and Answers

"Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer."~Rainer Maria Rilke

So. Despite my best intentions, I didn't pen a line of a blog post in the past three months, because, (drumroll) I've begun my freshman year at university!! Transitioning from high school to college has been a highly rewarding, exponentially beautiful, and occasionally distressing journey. Thus, my days(and nights) have been consumed with study and homework (and Sporcle. And talking. And procrastinating. *guilty face*) College may be an overused, unsatisfactory excuse to neglect writing here for so long, but it conveniently segues into my topic.

I think one of the greatest sources of stress and soul-searching these past months has been the desire to live life to the fullest. Let me explain. Frosh-O weekend, (that's freshman orientation weekend in Notre Dame lingo), we were constantly encouraged to find our full potential and to take advantage of every opportunity. However, at the time, I was overwhelmed by the sheer magnitude of possibilities and opportunities that had been opened up to me. I was afraid that I would miss wonderful opportunities, and I guess I assumed that meant that dire consequences would ensue. It seems like a silly fear now that I realize I have four years here to take advantage of every marvelous opportunity, but at the time, it was stressing me out.

However, that stage passed (hallelujah) but, more questions arise. What activities should I do? What clubs should I join? What service opportunities should I participate in? What shows should I do? What shows shouldn't I do? What classes should I take? Should I get coffee or tea? (answer: coffee) When should I go to Mass? What should I wear today? What should I do with my life? What does God want me to do?

That's a lot of questions. And I didn't have the answers.

Thankfully, God has put two amazing people in my life. One is Mother Teresa, the other is a friend/mentor/director/rolemodel who sent me the above Rainer Maria Rilke quote. That quote made me realize that God doesn't expect me to have all the answers. In fact, He doesn't need me to have all the answers. What He needs is for me to trust Him. If I had all the answers, then I'd never have to trust Him. And what fun would that be? No fun, that's what. Life would be insanely boring if we had all the answers to the million questions that we encounter. We just have to keep asking the questions and God will send us answers.

But what are we to do in the meantime? We can't just pray for answers and then sit back and wait for God to send them. We have to act. Move forward. Live. But what do you do when you don't know what you're supposed to be doing? The answer is simple. Love. Live each day focusing on others. Mother Teresa's writings are a constant inspiration and reminder of that. Her simple yet profound example of love and complete giving of herself is rousing-I feel like dashing off into the Great Unknown and single-handedly change the world. I may not know what I'm supposed to do after I graduate, what my vocation is, or what I should wear to the dance, but I do know that I can offer a prayer for someone I pass by, or hold open the door for someone, or help someone with their laundry, or bake them brownies when they're feeling blue or just smile. These simple acts of love are what life's all about. A life lived in love is a life lived in God. And God's got the answers. He is the answer.

"I know now, Lord, why you utter no answer. You are yourself the answer. Before your face questions die away. What other answer would suffice?"

— Til We Have Faces, C.S. Lewis