Faith, Tolerance, and a New Pope/Tolerância, fé e um novo papa

A few weeks ago, my mother-in-law sent me an e-mail asking for my thoughts on Pope Benedict XVI's resignation. I thought it was unusual, but interesting, so I laid out my thoughts in the semi-organized manner typical of my longer, subject-treating e-mails. She politely thanked me for my thoughts, and that was the end of it.

Unfortunately, it was also one of the few non-acidic comments I have heard on the Catholic Church and the papacy over the last month.

Being Catholic is not easy, even back home. If you are a practicing Catholic who finds yourself in the unhappy situation of having a religious discussion with an uninformed non-Catholic, it frequently morphs into a simultaneous probe of your personal life and assessment of your common sense. "You're Catholic? How does that, like, affect you?" "Wait, you're Catholic? But you seem like such a logical person!" "So do you not believe in birth control?" "Are you guys gonna have, like, a bunch of kids?" "You know the rhythm method doesn't work, right?" (Side note: Catholics don't even use the rhythm method anymore.) "Do you go to confession and stuff?" "Do you really think people go to hell if they don't do that?" Even better is the unsolicited (and usually inappropriate) commentary. "Those Catholic priests are a bunch of perverts." "I think they're pedophiles because they can't get married, so they're totally repressed." (Side note: This theory has no psychological basis whatsoever.) "The Catholic Church hates women." "Those stupid Catholics don't want us to have birth control." The list goes on...and on...and on.

Here in Korea, it's even more difficult. Out of all of the expats we know here in Gwangju, I don't think we know any other Catholics. There is only one Catholic parish I know of that has an English Mass here, and it is an hour away by bus and then subway, which means that we go to Korean Mass where I can only catch every couple of words. It's not that being around areligious people bothers me - most of our good friends here are not really religious, but we still love them dearly and they respect our faith - but it's not uncommon to walk into a bar or restaurant frequented by expats and hear someone who clearly knows everything ranting entirely too loudly about how they love all people and accept all lifestyles and that Catholics/Christians/Muslims are so narrow-minded/intolerant/hateful/bigoted/judgmental/condescending/insert-negative-adjective-here that it just makes them sick. As if every person who adheres to an Abrahamic faith is exactly the same.

The election of a new pope is no different. I remember in 2005, when John Paul II finally passed on, I got a loving text message from my brother informing me that "Hey your pope died." To be fair, it was a joke, and he was in high school at the time - but frankly, the things I see people my age posting to Facebook now aren't much more enlightened.
"Check out the new pope - same as the old pope!"
"You've gone to hell, Catholic Church...I thought we were saved when the sky didn't fall in December, but apparently the end of the world has finally arrived."
"The new pope is on the front page. Just what the world needs - another lunatic running the masses."
Never mind that he has come to be known for his personal piety and humility. Or that he was especially active in interfaith dialogue and ecumenism as the Archbishop of Buenos Aires. Or that he lived in a small apartment, rather than the bishop's residence, and cooked his own meals and took the bus to work. Or that he has worked for social justice and poverty alleviation for most of his career. The next day after Cardinal Bergoglio (now Pope Francis I) was elected, I saw a headline that read, "Will the new pope derail the [UN] Commission on the Status of Women?" The man hadn't been in office for 24 hours, much less even made a public statement. Guys, really?

To be fair, most of our friends who have discussed this with me have been level-headed and delicate (probably because they could tell I was upset). But it just gets under my skin to see all of these hateful and condescending messages from people who typically preach messages of human rights, justice, acceptance, and equality. The Catholic Church has two millenia of history of Doctors of the Church arguing and squabbling over theology and doctrine. Today it is made up of 1.2 billion people, all with different beliefs, opinions, hopes, and dreams. Some of us are pro-life and some pro-choice; some are conservative and some support same-sex marriage; some are traditionalists and some believe in feminist liberation theology; some practice more and some practice less. We are clergy, laity, rich, poor, professionals, housewives, travelers, vagabonds, scholars, lobbyists, and politicians. But the one thing we all have in common with each other and with every non-Catholic that walks this Earth is that we are human. And frankly, if you believe in love of any kind, then you should respect our right to choose a lifestyle without judgment, just like every woman, homosexual, immigrant, ethnic minority, and overweight person that is so carefully defended.

Yes, we have a new pope. Seriously, people, let's everybody just calm the fuck down.

Bronchitis is a Bitch / Bronquite é um pentelho

Joel and I were supposed to go skiing on the weekend of February 22nd. We had intended to spend that Saturday skiing at Muju resort, which is a ski town about three hours north of us. We were super excited for the trip - I had a hotel room booked for us, and it would have been a great way to unwind before the start of a new teaching session.

And then I got sick with bronchitis.

I don't get sick very often, but (as my former roommate always pointed out) when I do, it is legit. My freshman year of college, I only fell ill once (with what I thought was strep throat) right as final exams started. I was so fatigued that I nearly passed out walking across campus to take my physics final, and my throat was so sore that I couldn't talk for a week and a half. I ate so little that I dropped ten pounds and, at 129 lbs (58.5 kilos) was at the lowest weight of my adult life. My junior year, I caught the flu and ran a fever so high that Joel and my roommate rushed me to the hospital and called my father, who made the drive up from north Houston (normally about an hour and a half trip) in 40 minutes.

So yeah, I don't get bronchitis often, but when I do, I am down for the count.

The first weekend I was sick, I slept nearly the entire day on Saturday - I think I might have been awake for a collective four hours out of the entire day. I coughed and hacked and stumbled through work the next week, but luckily for me it was finals week, so I didn't have to do anything besides administer and grade tests. Unfortunately, being sick means being tired, which means not being able to do anything fun outside of work. I haven't been able to go hiking or do yoga for two weeks now, and I don't really have the energy to go out. I missed two great shows downtown last weekend because I was feeling like crap. Obviously I need to rest, so I let myself sleep in, but when you work from two to ten that pretty much means you only see about half an hour of daylight.

It's starting to get really depressing.

A big part of it has also been that we are all really sick of the persistently cold weather. It is starting to warm up again, so I think the bitter cold may have finally passed for good, at least until next year. In the meantime, I have been playing a lot of Skyrim on the Xbox, which we got last week - around the time I first got sick.

On the bright(er) side, I got one of several new Wake Up! classes this month. Wake Up! is the introductory, absolute beginner course for new young kids that know basically zero English. We get to teach them the alphabet, numbers, basic objects, and greetings, and the best part is that we get to name them. Some of them already have names, but I took my chance and gave the nameless ones names from Game of Thrones. I have Arya, Sansa, and Catlyn, and my day was made complete yesterday when I got two new students, a boy and a girl. The boy already had the name Jamie, so naturally the girl became Cersei. (Too easy, right?) I also got two new boys in my English World (who became Ned and Rikon) and a new girl in my first-year middle school class (Brienne). Speaking of, the new season of GoT starts at the end of this month, on Easter Sunday. Something else to look forward to.

In the meantime, I will continue to recover from bronchitis and play Skyrim.