On January 22nd I jumped into a vehicle with 5 other people at 4 AM and headed to DC for the March for Life. I had not been to the march for several years, mostly due to my frustrations with it. I had a mostly good experience with it but my frustrations are definitely still there.
An example of my frustrations: the march is always proceeded by a rally in which various people speak about abortion. The rally started off this year with a brief concert by Matt Maher, a Catholic musician. As he was starting to play he talked about how our country needed to come to a greater respect for life. His solution? We need God.
I didn't stay for the entire rally but every speaker that I heard mentioned God at some point. We even had a statement from Pope Francis. There was plenty of prayer during the rally.
Don't get me wrong, I love God. I love prayer. I love my Catholic faith. But the March for Life should not be a religious event.
Abortion is the greatest Civil Rights issue of the 21st century. It affects more people than any other issue. And yes, we need the grace of God to combat the evil of abortion. Prayer is important when combating evil. But in the political arena we should keep religious arguments out.
Why? I'm glad you asked! Allow me to outline a few points:
1. Religious arguments are not effective in influencing policy.
Our political system does not base decisions on what we as a country believe the will of God is. Some would argue that our nation was founded on Christian principles, but that is certainly up for debate. Regardless of the founding, it is obvious that we do not now base decisions on the will of God. Some individual politicians perhaps believe they are doing that very thing, but as a whole we are a secular country politically. Religious arguments are not effective in influencing policy decisions.
2. Religious arguments do not change hearts and minds.
Let's separate out people into a few groups here: people who are not religious, people who are religious and support the legality of abortion, and people who are religious and do not support the legality of abortion. Religious arguments obviously do not change the hearts and minds of those who are not religious. People who are religious and do not support of the legality of abortion do not need their hearts and minds to be changed. People who are religious and support the legality of abortion do not listen when you make religious arguments. There are many reasons here, one is that we tend to compartmentalize our faith and determine for ourselves what it means and what beliefs we agree with. People who are religious but are pro-choice are very unlikely to listen when someone makes a religious argument.
3. Religious arguments ostracize fellow pro-lifers. The March for Life is probably the only time and place I am ever embarrassed to be Roman Catholic. We Catholics turn a civil protest into a celebration of Catholicism. We talk about which dioceses are there, we read a message from the pope, we have priests and bishops speak, we have little Marian processions, one group even plays "Hail Holy Queen" with their brass band. The March for Life is a Catholic event. How do you feel a pro-life atheist would feel at the rally or during the march? How about a muslim, or a buddhist, or even a jew? Heck, I bet even the other Christian denominations feel somewhat awkward amidst all of the Catholicism present. Before the march I met a lady in my march group who was a buddhist. At the end of the march we were standing in front of the Supreme Court when a group of post-abortive women was beginning to speak. They asked Fr. Frank Pavone of Priests for Life to begin in a prayer. As he started a (beautiful) prayer, the buddhist woman mentioned to me that she did not feel comfortable there and she was going to leave. Anecdotal, I know, but I believe it's indicative of how non-Catholics feel.
4. Non-religious arguments work better.
What is the goal of the March for Life and the pro-life movement in general? To end abortion, which we consider to be an evil killing of human life. To gain this end shouldn't we use the most effective arguments? I am no ethicist, but I believe that killing a human being is wrong. There are many arguments which more philosophically-inclined people can outline better than I, but my personal beliefs boil down to just that: killing a human being is wrong. Unborn children are human beings. The science of embryology tells us that. For that matter, unborn children have some political rights as well: they can inherit property and they can be considered victims in murder cases (killing a pregnant woman and her child is often considered a double-homicide). We consider them human beings except when they inconvenience us.
To me, arguments along those lines of thought are far more compelling than "God loves unborn babies," especially when it comes to atheists, agnostics, and just your average everyday non-religious person. To win the right to life, we need them on board.
(One last thing, if you would like to know more about secular pro-life arguments and the secular pro-life cause, I highly recommend checking out Life Matters Journal. I am, of course, biased in that I am madly in love with the Executive Director, who happens to be my lovely wife. Also the march meet-up group I was a part of that was sponsored by Life Matters Journal was featured in a buzzfeed article that you can read here.)
Friday, January 24, 2014
Sunday, January 5, 2014
Update on life over Christmas break
Let's try this again.
My last post was an attempt to get back into blogging but it had the unfortunate luck to be right at the beginning of Christmas break. Between the work of closing the neighborhood and the traveling over break I just haven't updated here recently. Several good topics have popped up in my mind, but I feel like I need to do a life update to get myself back on track before blogging again in earnest.
A lot has happened since I last did a life update. To begin with, I took my last final and graduated with my Master of Business Administration degree from FUS. I managed to get two As in my last semester, which was one of my major goals for the semester. I ended up with a 3.98 GPA (one pesky A-, maybe I'll tell the story of that sometime). I'm very happy that I decided to get my Masters, but even happier that it's over. Having a semester with just work and no classes is going to be so incredible.
Right before I finished up my degree my mother finished her last classes necessary to get her Lay Ministry Certification from the diocese of Cleveland. She's been working at a parish in the diocese while she took classes for her certification. I'm very impressed at her willingness to go back to school and acquire this skill set for her third career (teacher, then mother, now lay minister). The diocese is lucky to have her, as is her parish. I'm looking forward to celebrating her new certification at an official mass later this month at the cathedral.
The wife and I (and the dog) spent a week at my parents' house right before Christmas. It was a great time, very relaxing. We had the dog with us of course, and this was the longest he had been at their house. He actually did very well. My parents are getting used to him, we've never been dog people but he's just so dang lovable. The backyard is big and unfenced so it was a bit of a pain to take him out and walk around with him every time he had to go outside, but on the whole it was easier than I expected to have him there. A couple of times he and I started the morning by running right to the end of the property because he was just so excited to get out and run!
We came back to Steubenville on the 23rd and flew out to California on the 24th to spend some time with the wife's family near Sacramento. Because Domino (the dog) is an Emotional Support Animal he was able to ride with us on our laps during the flights. Our strategy to have him behave was to keep him up all night the night before. We slept in shifts and whoever was up would just make sure he didn't go to sleep. It worked pretty well, he slept all through both flights. The only slight problem we had was misestimating his food consumption. I had to clean up a bit of a mess in the Houston airport, but luckily it was in an unused terminal so no one else was around.
California was beautiful, the weather was incredibly nice. We spent a lot of time with the wife's family, including some of her extended family. We also went to the casino for a bit and wasted $20 on video poker, good times. The wife's father is big into horse racing so we went to the track because I had never been. Can't say that I was that big of a fan, I prefer gambling where my decisions have an impact on the result. Oh well! It was interesting, and I do see why people like it, but just not my thing.
Domino enjoyed his time at the house with the nice fenced-in backyard, and we certainly enjoyed having a doggie door for him to use. My brother-in-law's dog Skippy was not a huge fan of Domino at first, but after a couple of days they got used to each other and had a great time. This was my fourth year visiting near Christmastime out there, and this was the first year that I actually enjoyed spending time with Skippy. Having a dog has certainly changed some things!
One of the most awesome things that has happened recently is that the wife got a job! She is going to be working at IKEA Pittsburgh at the returns counter. She's very excited, and I'm very proud. IKEA tends to hire from within, so it's not easy to get a job there. From everything I've heard (not just recently, I've heard a lot about IKEA) they treat their employees very well. Their retention rates are excellent, which is rare in retail. It seems like there is a decent possibility of her being able to move up in the ranks there if that's something she wants in the future. Her first day is this week, so we'll see how it works out. As always, I am optimistic!
I got my LSAT score back a few days ago and it was 172 (out of 180). I'm definitely satisfied with a 172, but I wouldn't say I'm ecstatic or anything. I knew I could do well and I would've been disappointed with anything below a 170. 172 is excellent, but had I studied harder and longer I'm sure I could've done better. I could probably up the score if I took it again, but I have no desire to. When I was in highschool I upped my ACT from a 31 to a 32, but I don't think that was really worth it. Still, a 172 is in the 99th percentile, so that's cool.
I'm still not sure if I actually want to go to law school. I've been thinking about it and talking to some friends about it. Where I'm at right now boils down to two points. The first is that we want to live in Pittsburgh, and the wife finding a job there just confirms that plan. The second is that the wife's job by itself will not make enough for us to live on. Therefore, if I do go to law school it would have to be in Pittsburgh and I would have to be able to make some sort of an income. I will be applying to the two law schools in Pittsburgh (Pitt and Duquesne) to see what they offer me, but I don't even know if either of them offers some sort of fellowship or living stipend. If so, it's a possibility. If not, then law school is most likely either not going to happen or just be put on hold.
As of right now I have RA training and Orientation over the next week. School starts up again in about a week (though not for me!). I will be applying to law schools and jobs in Human Resources. We are going to look into how much of a mortgage we would be approved for in order to buy a house. There are lots of possibilities, it's an exciting time!
(One last thing, in December I hit my 10,000th page view on the blog! Thanks for reading!)
My last post was an attempt to get back into blogging but it had the unfortunate luck to be right at the beginning of Christmas break. Between the work of closing the neighborhood and the traveling over break I just haven't updated here recently. Several good topics have popped up in my mind, but I feel like I need to do a life update to get myself back on track before blogging again in earnest.
A lot has happened since I last did a life update. To begin with, I took my last final and graduated with my Master of Business Administration degree from FUS. I managed to get two As in my last semester, which was one of my major goals for the semester. I ended up with a 3.98 GPA (one pesky A-, maybe I'll tell the story of that sometime). I'm very happy that I decided to get my Masters, but even happier that it's over. Having a semester with just work and no classes is going to be so incredible.
Right before I finished up my degree my mother finished her last classes necessary to get her Lay Ministry Certification from the diocese of Cleveland. She's been working at a parish in the diocese while she took classes for her certification. I'm very impressed at her willingness to go back to school and acquire this skill set for her third career (teacher, then mother, now lay minister). The diocese is lucky to have her, as is her parish. I'm looking forward to celebrating her new certification at an official mass later this month at the cathedral.
The wife and I (and the dog) spent a week at my parents' house right before Christmas. It was a great time, very relaxing. We had the dog with us of course, and this was the longest he had been at their house. He actually did very well. My parents are getting used to him, we've never been dog people but he's just so dang lovable. The backyard is big and unfenced so it was a bit of a pain to take him out and walk around with him every time he had to go outside, but on the whole it was easier than I expected to have him there. A couple of times he and I started the morning by running right to the end of the property because he was just so excited to get out and run!
We came back to Steubenville on the 23rd and flew out to California on the 24th to spend some time with the wife's family near Sacramento. Because Domino (the dog) is an Emotional Support Animal he was able to ride with us on our laps during the flights. Our strategy to have him behave was to keep him up all night the night before. We slept in shifts and whoever was up would just make sure he didn't go to sleep. It worked pretty well, he slept all through both flights. The only slight problem we had was misestimating his food consumption. I had to clean up a bit of a mess in the Houston airport, but luckily it was in an unused terminal so no one else was around.
California was beautiful, the weather was incredibly nice. We spent a lot of time with the wife's family, including some of her extended family. We also went to the casino for a bit and wasted $20 on video poker, good times. The wife's father is big into horse racing so we went to the track because I had never been. Can't say that I was that big of a fan, I prefer gambling where my decisions have an impact on the result. Oh well! It was interesting, and I do see why people like it, but just not my thing.
Domino enjoyed his time at the house with the nice fenced-in backyard, and we certainly enjoyed having a doggie door for him to use. My brother-in-law's dog Skippy was not a huge fan of Domino at first, but after a couple of days they got used to each other and had a great time. This was my fourth year visiting near Christmastime out there, and this was the first year that I actually enjoyed spending time with Skippy. Having a dog has certainly changed some things!
One of the most awesome things that has happened recently is that the wife got a job! She is going to be working at IKEA Pittsburgh at the returns counter. She's very excited, and I'm very proud. IKEA tends to hire from within, so it's not easy to get a job there. From everything I've heard (not just recently, I've heard a lot about IKEA) they treat their employees very well. Their retention rates are excellent, which is rare in retail. It seems like there is a decent possibility of her being able to move up in the ranks there if that's something she wants in the future. Her first day is this week, so we'll see how it works out. As always, I am optimistic!
I got my LSAT score back a few days ago and it was 172 (out of 180). I'm definitely satisfied with a 172, but I wouldn't say I'm ecstatic or anything. I knew I could do well and I would've been disappointed with anything below a 170. 172 is excellent, but had I studied harder and longer I'm sure I could've done better. I could probably up the score if I took it again, but I have no desire to. When I was in highschool I upped my ACT from a 31 to a 32, but I don't think that was really worth it. Still, a 172 is in the 99th percentile, so that's cool.
I'm still not sure if I actually want to go to law school. I've been thinking about it and talking to some friends about it. Where I'm at right now boils down to two points. The first is that we want to live in Pittsburgh, and the wife finding a job there just confirms that plan. The second is that the wife's job by itself will not make enough for us to live on. Therefore, if I do go to law school it would have to be in Pittsburgh and I would have to be able to make some sort of an income. I will be applying to the two law schools in Pittsburgh (Pitt and Duquesne) to see what they offer me, but I don't even know if either of them offers some sort of fellowship or living stipend. If so, it's a possibility. If not, then law school is most likely either not going to happen or just be put on hold.
As of right now I have RA training and Orientation over the next week. School starts up again in about a week (though not for me!). I will be applying to law schools and jobs in Human Resources. We are going to look into how much of a mortgage we would be approved for in order to buy a house. There are lots of possibilities, it's an exciting time!
(One last thing, in December I hit my 10,000th page view on the blog! Thanks for reading!)
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