The State of Marriage + the Family

Point:

The Two-Minus One Pregnancy (New York Times)
Meet the Co-Parents: Friends not Lovers & their children (Telegraph)

Counter Point:

This was grace - short film from Andrew Laparra on Vimeo.

Links

I have a huge pile of links I've wanted to share with our readers, but I keep forgetting to post them. So here are seven* of them, just for you. Read, discuss, ignore, what-have-you:

1) A mother gives a frank assessment of "who's to blame" when it comes to body image problems.

2) Interesting look at what young adult Catholics are looking for when it comes to community.

Few young adults make such a swift and seamless switch to a new, vital faith community--which means many feel pangs of panic and loss. It's hard to replicate the built-in, tight-knit community of on-campus Catholics, says Elizabeth Moriarty, 32, who has worked as a pastoral associate and now serves as assistant director of the Gender Relations Center at the University of Notre Dame. "That structure is in place, and when it's not there and they have to do a little more work to get it, people don't know what to do."

That aimlessness is sharpened by a sense of isolation, says Paul Jarzembowski, director of young adult ministry for the diocese of Joliet, Illinois. "Can I find my peers? I don't see them in the office. I don't see them on the train, and they're out there somewhere."

Via OSV.

3) Joe Carter at First Things shares a Big Think article on sexual promiscuity and happiness here.

4) Noelle Daly writes for The American Interest on the Pill and fertility:

But even as the Pill alleviated fear of the unwanted pregnancy that would confine a woman to the home, it also dramatically heightened anxiety about the ticking biological clock. Thus the Pill sparked one revolution that led in turn to another: Infertility born of long-postponed pregnancy found a solution in assisted reproduction technology. The first revolution sped the disconnection of sex and marriage, the second the disconnection of marriage and childrearing. The Pill gave us first the joy of sex without babies, and then, in effect, the freedom and convenience of creating babies without sex.

Read it all here.

5) The Knights of Columbus have a semi-regular series profiling Catholic fathers, called Fathers for Good. I love this. Let us commend the great men we know who live well and serve as a witness to the Christian life for themselves, their colleagues, and most importantly, their families.

6) Pope Benedict XVI discussed the "special contribution" women make to the work of Theology on the feast of the Birth of Mary. via EWTN.

7) Skirts v. Pants. Referee: Simcha Fisher.

* I read once that to-do lists should never have more than seven items. I don't know why exactly, except that seven is an easily graspable number, and gives one a sense of doing something without being insurmountable. So, seven it is.

St. Thomas More + Meg

Today is the feast of one of my very favorite saints and martyrs: St. Thomas More. I wanted to post today this letter to his daughter Meg, with whom he had a remarkable relationship. Meg's husband, Will Roper, ended up writing the first biography of More. This letter was written while More was in Prison

Although I know well, Margaret, that because of my past wickedness I deserve to be abandoned by God, I cannot but trust in his merciful goodness. His grace has strengthened me until now and made me content to lose goods, land, and life as well, rather than to swear against my conscience. God's grace has given the king a gracious frame of mind toward me, so that as yet he has taken from me nothing but my liberty. In doing this His Majesty has done me such great good with respect to spiritual profit that I trust that among all the great benefits he has heaped so abundantly upon me I count my imprisonment the very greatest. I cannot, therefore, mistrust the grace of God.

By the merits of his bitter passion joined to mine and far surpassing in merit for me all that I can suffer myself, his bounteous goodness shall release me from the pains of purgatory and shall increase my reward in heaven besides.

I will not mistrust him, Meg, though I shall feel myself weakening and on the verge of being overcome with fear. I shall remember how Saint Peter at a blast of wind began to sink because of his lack of faith, and I shall do as he did: call upon Christ and pray to him for help. And then I trust he shall place his holy hand on me and in the stormy seas hold me up from drowning.

And finally, Margaret, I know this well: that without my fault he will not let me be lost. I shall, therefore, with good hope commit myself wholly to him. And if he permits me to perish for my faults, then I shall serve as praise for his justice. But in good faith, Meg, I trust that his tender pity shall keep my poor soul safe and make me commend his mercy.


And, therefore, my own good daughter, do not let you mind be troubled over anything that shall happen to me in this world. Nothing can come but what God wills. And I am very sure that whatever that be, however bad it may seem, it shall indeed be the best.

Happy Father's Day!

A big THANK YOU to the fathers of Julian, Edith, and Agatha, whom we all love dearly. And thank you to our priestly fathers, our Holy Father, and our Heavenly Father!

Blessings to all!

broken promises; so read this

I promised J I would post this week about the question she posed to us earlier this week concerning friendship between a man and a woman. But I have to break that promise, because I just don't have the energy tonight (and I've been writing so much today I don't know what I think about anything anymore). I promise. I'll post it on Monday.

Instead let me direct your attention to two fascinating articles:

1) EPPC Fellow Colleen Campbell wrote a great article about teen-idols and marketing to young girls. She dubs the problem the Britney Spears Syndrome:

Call it the Britney Spears Syndrome: A fresh-faced ingénue with a modicum of talent amasses a passionate following of pre-teen female fans. Parents, relieved that their daughters idolize this tame teen queen instead of her older, raunchier show-biz sisters, buy up the budding star's CDs, movies and themed merchandise. Then, just as they have given their daughters the green light to mimic her every move, the star morphs into a sultry vixen infamous for onstage exhibitionism, striptease photos and misadventures with booze and bad boys.

Given how often this syndrome afflicts young stars who get their start with Disney, it should have come as no surprise when 16-year-old Miley Cyrus, of Disney's "Hannah Montana" fame, appeared this month at FOX's Teen Choice Awards pole-dancing atop an ice-cream cart in micro-shorts and black leather boots.

The stunt was the latest in a series that have eaten away at Cyrus' squeaky-clean image, from her topless photo last year in Vanity Fair to risqué pictures posted on her MySpace page. Some parents have expressed astonishment at Cyrus' transformation from schoolgirl to sexpot, but it is a simple matter of economics. Sex sells. And the sexualization of girls -- from cherubic-faced teen idols like Cyrus to their legions of even younger fans -- is big business in America today.

The same marketing ploys that entice grown women to spend millions on anti-wrinkle creams, baby-doll dresses and fashion magazines touting boyish, pre-pubescent figures as a female beauty ideal are used to sell their preschool-aged daughters thong underwear, padded bras and pole-dancing kits. Grown women feel compelled to look like schoolgirls even as schoolgirls feel pressured to look like grown women. This phenomenon, known in marketing circles as "age compression," has been profitable for the fashion and entertainment industries. But it has had devastating effects on young girls.

2) Kay S. Hymowitz (who I've mentioned before) has another great article, this time on low-income fathers in the workforce:

For obvious reasons, poverty policy has concentrated most of its attention on single mothers and their children. ...Low-income men were another story. They became, in the words of social scientists, increasingly “detached” from the workforce—and increasingly poor. Work is key to keeping men out of poverty, just as it is for women, but by 2005, a mere 16 percent of men below the poverty line were working full-time and year-round, and the majority reported no work at all. Making matters worse, a large proportion of low-income men were noncustodial fathers. ...Yet welfare reform’s methods for encouraging moms to work don’t apply to dads, since, for the most part, they aren’t dependent on government benefits in the first place.

(Read the full article here.)

In the meantime, lets' continue to pray for Julian's friend, for his healing and safe return, for the comfort of his soul and for his family. And especially let us pray to Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton patroness of the Navy, who sent two of her sons into the US Navy.

Talitha Koum

When I first wrote the description of this blog on the masthead, I described Julian, Edith and I as "girls." Julian pointed out that it ought to read "women" since most of our questions dance around the question "What does it mean to be a modern, Catholic woman?"

In the 2007 film Juno, Juno MacGuff nervously pacing in front of her parents, finally comes out and tells them "I'm pregnant." Her father, shocked, says "I thought you were the kind of girl who knew when to say when."* She replies, "I don't really know what kind of girl I am." The movie, in a large part, is her finding that out.

Her words really resonated with me. Juno has the experience of "woman"--sex, pregnancy, childbirth--but then goes back to being a normal teenager, playing the guitar with her slightly dorky boyfriend on the front porch. I haven't had any of those experiences. And I still think of myself as a "girl." Perhaps this really is the question facing me as a young woman: what's the difference (besides experience) between the little girl I feel like, and the woman I ought to be.

This is an incredibly difficult question with regards to sexuality. As modern American mores increasingly define female maturity by her sexual license, being a virgin is thought childish. As our culture projects a more and more sexualized ideal woman (through fashion, film, music, etc.), it is more and more difficult to feel womanly and feminine without feeling immodest.

These sexuality issues are important, but they don't address the whole situation. St. Paul says "When I was a child, I used to talk as a child, think as a child, reason as a child; when I became a man, I put aside childish things." (1 Cor 13:11) Though our culture thinks virginity is childish, it's not; the real question is one of innocence. Though I am a virgin, I am not innocent.

Theoretically, I think innocence can be regained; once lost, it is not lost forever. Practically, I'm not sure how it is done, but paradoxically, I think innocence is fostered and cultivated through the acknowledgment of the father and child relationship between God and his creatures. I am God's child, and I don't see how I could go wrong, sheltered in the arms of my Heavenly Father.

The Gospel reading a few months ago told of the daughter of Jarius, who is dying. Christ comes to her and says, "Talitha Koum," which means "Little Girl, Arise!" I want to take these words to heart in my own search for innocence. I may not know what kind of girl (or woman) I am, but I know that Christ is calling me forward on a path of grace and virtue. I need only heed his call. Arise!

On Fatherhood

So tomorrow is St. Joseph's day, and I've already posted on the person of Joseph, but I wanted to take some time to consider fatherhood. Who better to reveal human fatherhood than St. Joseph? I was just at a lecture given a priest on the gift of child-like faith and how it has been lost in post-modern secular society. He said what we primarily must recover is not just the sense of God as our Creator--but more importantly the sense of God as our Father, our loving Father. We might take for granted the words of Christ when He gave us the prayer the Our Father, but in fact, it was a very radical form of prayer to God. Israel would not even utter the name of God, and yet Christ tells us to invoke Him as our Father.

Why is this fatherhood so important and crucial to our time? Catholic psychologist Paul Vitz contends that nearly 9 times out of 10, those who subscribe to atheism had either absent fathers or bad relationships with their fathers. Our fathers encourage us, they protect us, they educate us, and they discipline us. But most importantly: they reflect God to us--they model His Fatherhood. (Just an aside-I don't know about you ladies, but I am such a daddy's girl and I love it! Yesterday, I picked up a book on Edith Stein that my father gave me and he wrote me a little not inside, telling me to pray to her to ask her intercession in my academic pursuits, as she was herself a doctoral student. It made me so happy to find that note; my father really instilled in me a devotion to her. I think sometimes fathers know their children better than the children know themselves). Our fathers are a blessing to us, and we should really take time to assess our relationship with our fathers and those relationships reflect ours with God.

There is one other event that got me thinking about fatherhood. Recently, Pope Benedict XVI declared June 19, 2009 to June 19, 2010 a year for priests. I rejoiced!! (By the way, have I mentioned yet how much I LOVE THE POPE?) I love priests! It might sound simple, but I really do. I am so grateful for the great gift of our priests. Today, I asked God to increase their love, to give them courage and bravery, and to give them His consolations. Not only has God given us our earthly, biological fathers - but He also has given us spiritual fathers in priests, the ones who stand in the very person of Christ to help us attain our salvation. Our God is Our Father indeed. He is generous, He knows our needs, and He provides everything we need to know Him--especially through our fathers-whether they be our earthly fathers or our priests. When I think about this, it brings to mind the words of the Psalmist in Psalm 8 proclaiming, "O Lord our Lord, how admirable is thy name in the whole earth! For thy magnificence is elevated above the heavens."