Leaderboard

I love this guy. He certainly tries his best to demystify the process of choosing a vocation. There is no one right way for a person to move through life. EVERY way has its own terrific lessons and opportunities to grow into finding grace and love in ALL that happens. There are no mistakes, just different lessons that eventually end up in the same place. In the end, no matter what life path we decide upon, we begin by first choosing to take a leap of faith into the unknown and trusting that God will support us along the way. It’s the most anyone can hope for as they transition into adulthood. I’ve been married for 46 years and I can still remember walking down the aisle in my beautiful wedding gown, freaking out that I would soon be making a solemn vow to commit to one person for the REST OF MY LIFE and I was only 22! How the heck was I supposed to know how I was going to feel about him when I was 50?!! I remember the moment halfway down the aisle when I stopped my mind from frantically thinking about the unknown abyss of the future and surrendered and thought ‘Well, I guess I will just have to wait and see how it goes’ and put my faith in love. That’s the best anyone can do as we make a choice when there are no guarantees. And that’s one of the major life lessons we all must learn—that we cannot protect ourselves from life by only choosing to move forward when we are ABSOLUTELY certain. Choosing to start a family? What if I’m not good mother material? Saying yes to a new job? What if I fail miserably at it and have to find a new one? Moving across country? What if I hate the new locale? Becoming a sister, nun, consecrated virgin, monk or priest? What if I can’t hack communal life and the vows I must make? No matter WHAT the situation is, our choices are ultimately always predicated on gambling on the unknown, and sometimes it will work out and sometimes it won’t, and some days we’ll be happy with our decision and some days we won’t. But—that doesn’t make our decision wrong or a fatal error. We will still learn something valuable about ourselves that we can use as we move forward. The only thing we have to fear is feeling immobilized by fear itself. And the worst that can happen if someone chooses to try a vocation in the midst of their doubts and uncertainty, is that they might find out it is not the right one for them. And that’s perfectly okay. We each get our whole life to explore the depths and nuances of our heart as we make new choices. The first necessary step, though, is that we take a leap of faith and just choose SOMETHING. Otherwise, we’ll just be stuck in one spot, spinning our wheels. What a monumental waste of time! Be bold; take a chance and see where the game of life (and it IS all a game!) leads you! Vocation or not, it will all be fine. Good luck!

Easliy said from Europe, but I suggest you'd better get a more pluralistic system. In several states it started out with two main parties in the parliaments - mostly one conservative, one more leftist -, then got up to three, which allows the first coalitions, four, five, six. It makes politics way more interesting.

Well, I don't think that women belong only to kitchen. I like cooking, and when I have time I cook more often than my wife. No doubt, in most cases women do all housework, but it happens mostly because their husbands don't want to help them or too lazy. Unfortunately, they take it for granted. As for children, they don't belong to kitchen, but it is ok if they help to cook or wash the dishes, this is a part of the pedagogic process

Just wanted to post how racist and idiotic his comments were today. I've been accused here of being a Democrat because of my criticism of Trump's racism. That I'm only criticising him because he's Republican and I don't criticize Democrats racism. Not the case. I'm not Democrat or Republican. I think both parties are a joke. I've called out Trump continuously because of how latched onto by Catholics and Christians he is. This election will be just as depressing as the last one. No idea how these are the two choices we have to choose from.

For what it's worth, here's some advice from a priest who's experienced at this kind of thing. It might be somewhat helpful to someone. The web page has a series of questions and answers, but then there's a 20-minute video at the bottom of the page, too. https://younan.blog/2020/05/23/discerning-a-vocation/?fbclid=IwAR18msDgQEggFOO9BIbt0_qh60quen5oxPYWqmpjv-W2lAPdH-EhVb0P2Fw

I agree 100%. The way I say it is, "You don't really know what you're getting into until you're INTO it. And that applies to marriage, motherhood, the marines, a career, or anything else." You can ask a lot of questions beforehand, and you can develop some ideas about the topic-under-discussion, but your actual experience may vary.

A friend has observed, honestly, that they think there is some deterioration there which seems worse, or happens more often, than Biden's flubs of yesteryear. They also think Trump is probably on the spectrum, which would not surprise me. But what do I know. The debates are going to be something. Will Joe be able to string it together on national TV, several times in a row? He probably will, but if he really falters, will the Dems sort of just...give up? Some are already, and Bernie with his endorsement of Biden forever lost respect with a lot of his supporters. A large percentage of the population is actually still waiting to decide, I think. Biden just sort of fell into the nomination, winning lots of states he didn't even try to canvass. Not sure if he is the candidate people will go out of their way to get elected. It's all very meh. Once Texas goes blue at some point, it'll be Dem all the time, or we could see some other realignments. Not looking forward to any of it.

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ, I’m a new member of this forum and would be very grateful for your honest feedback on a video I have created. I was kindly pointed in your direction by one of the Mediators of Meh at r/Catholicism due to their SSPX moratorium. It’s about the SSPX and proving their schism (hopefully not a controversial view on this forum! Though I do of course welcome discussion/views to the contrary). I would be very grateful for your thoughts on the video. In part one I have given a brief intro and covered the history at a headline level. In part two I have gone into more detail on what the SSPX believes. Online communities have been so useful to me personally over the years, especially with regards to Traditional Catholicism- the media here has become very saturated with views difficult to discern. As such, I would very much welcome your honest feedback and discussion if there are any points I have missed or got wrong. God bless! Our Lady, pray for us. Part 1: https://youtu.be/-WClN56F30o Part 2: https://youtu.be/RC4DK7R-m_Y Part 3: in progress

I think the crime bill of the '90s was overkill and disproportionately affected the black community, I'm pretty libertarian on such things and especially when it comes to drug crimes I think it's totally misguided and wrong (dealing with violent crimes harshly is another story, and it's possible a harsh stance in the 90's was good in some ways. it's an interesting phenomenon to see the decline of violence in America from its heights, it definitely coincides with harsher prison sentences but it also coincides with socioeconomic improvements and the removal of lead from gasoline, there's definitely a lot of debate about the causes)... HOWEVER, its biggest architects and champions were the leaders of African American communities themselves who were trying to get their neighborhoods cleaned up from crime and demanding that the government do something. re-writing history to claim that white politicians who supported it were racist is clearly something people in the present day are using against their political opponents. if you go back you'll see the biggest champions of that bill were African American community leaders who were saying crack was ruining their neighborhoods and their families. incidentally, that's probably the main reason crack has such a higher prison sentence than cocaine--because there was a movement from African American leaders demanding that it be harshly dealt with. all that said, I do agree that we need criminal justice reform now to reverse some of the excesses of the 90's tough on crime mentality. but there's a balance that needs to be struck, especially being careful not to be too lenient on violent crime. the school busing issue is complicated because while racial segregation enforced by the state was a great evil, you are now starting to touch on the rights of parents to have their children educated when and where they wish--particularly in their own home community. When it comes to Jim Crow policy-based segregation, that needed to be eradicated, but then how far do you go to remove the local-community aspect of a school? And especially in the programs that were two-way busing (not just busing African Americans into white neighborhood schools but also doing it vice-versa), you're talking about forcibly telling parents their children are not allowed to attend their local community school but will be bused to one usually in a poorer neighborhood that's less well funded. there are complicated issues there. I think they definitely needed to fight against school segregation and in favor of integration in a way that was aimed at fair and impartial districting of the public school system where kids still just go to the school that is in their own community (although I would support optional programs allowing kids in poorer communities to go to schools in richer communities). yes, that would leave a bit of a status quo segregation because communities themselves are a bit segregated, but that's a separate issue IMO, you don't necessarily solve that by forcing some parents to have their kids bused to schools outside of their own community. I think a lot of the one-way busing programs were good and important, the two way ones begin to be a bit muddy but maybe in some locations they were valid answers based on an unfair jim crow system of districting that needed to be corrected. Biden argues he was against a federally mandated one size fits all busing program, arguing that the feds should only intervene to stop unfair policy-based segregation, but that if a fair and impartial school district is drawn up, the feds have no business enforcing that people be bused to schools outside their own community. Is he right or wrong about that? Well whether he's right or wrong, it is complicated. there is something to be said for it, because two-way bussing programs are blatantly violating the rights of parents whose kids might be bused out of their community for school against their parents' wishes, but also because one-way busing programs could end up becoming a brain drain on the local community school of a poorer neighborhood, helping some escape the cycle of poverty there while leaving the cycle of poverty in tact. many people have argued that the solution is reforming the way schools are funded so that poorer neighborhoods have access to better education, rather than just sending away a select few to get better opportunities while leaving the broken system in place for the rest. (btw I don't support Biden, just throwing out here that some of these criticisms are a bit more nuanced than people make them out to be. as I said, I think that busing is a complicated issue, no matter what side you're on, but it's a complicated issue many people want to simplify and use as a political tool)

Postulant Audrey will be clothed as a novice at St. Emma Monastery in Greensburg, Pa on 5/23/20 at 4PM EST. You can watch the clothing live on YouTube at StEmmaMonastery. Congratulations Audrey, and God bless you!

Don't forget Biden's other quote today: "I'm going to beat Joe Biden".

I believe the Dominican monastery in Syracuse is also closing. I read - somewhere - that the monastery of Mary Queen (formerly in New York state but moved to Girard, Illinois several years ago) is assuming responsibility for the sisters, most of whom are in a nursing home there in Syracuse. I'll keep looking for my source on that. I know I didn't make it up, but I can't track it down at the moment.

I did not know what “planned parenthood” was. I thought it was about the usage of various contraceptives (which the Orthodox Church allows, only non-abortive and for a good reason). I googled and saw their website. I must say I was stunned to see the first and the most prominent thing, something like “find abortion clinic in my area”. Not contraceptives but abortions.