Faith & Family (September Column)

I’m writing a small monthly column for our school newsletter. I’ll be plagiarizing (and maybe expanding/editing/commenting on) those columns for my blog :) Small changes/edits will look normal. Longer edits will be demarcated for your reading pleasure.

Marriage and family are ordered to the good of the spouses and to the procreation and education of children. (Catechism of the Catholic Church, paragraph 2201)

A basic human experience is that of two people meeting, dating, falling in love, getting engaged, and getting married. It’s the seed from which all families sprout, and, as our Catechism teaches, it is a good thing [sheesh – I sound like Martha Stewart!]. Since marriage is the basis of the family in Catholic teaching, we’ll look at how the Catholic faith approaches marriage in this first column on the family.

Marriage is between one man and one woman. It unites a couple in faithful and mutual love and service [as a lengthy aside, I’d like to pontificate on the fact that love and service go hand-in-hand. “Falling in love,” that rush of emotions that heralds the beginning of a potential relationship, is but the first phase of a life-long relationship. Just as we expect different behaviors from 5th graders and 5  year olds, or 40 year olds and teenagers, we should expect a relationship to grow and change, not stay exactly the same. People who get married and then complain that they have “fallen out of love” probably never took the time to really get to know themselves and their potential spouse. That first blush of overwhelming emotions will settle down, and if that’s all there ever was between a couple they should never have gotten married in the first place.] Husband and wife are called by God to this vocation—this state of graced living—as a way of becoming holy, as a means to bring new life to the world, and as a challenge to be a sign of Christ’s life in and for the world. [Lenghty aside #2: A married couple’s road to sanctity – to holiness – is through the normal ups and downs of married life. Everything we do – from changing diapers, to taking care of each other when one is sick, to doing the laundry, to going on vacation, to simply sitting and watching TV together – everything is a potential vehicle for grace (God’s life, love and creative energy) to enter more fully into each person individually and into the family as a whole]

That’s a pretty big job description! So the Church provides resources to make sure that each married couple can weather the storms that inevitably crop up. During the engagement period, couples are asked to meet with more experienced married couples from their parish to take a pre-marriage relationship inventory and talk about the results. The inventory asks questions related to finances, children, intimacy, family, etc.—the goal is to make sure that a couple has talked openly about all areas of their relationship before deciding to commit to the sacrament. [Personal aside: It was great doing this with my wife. We had done out best to talk about lots of things before beginning this process, but it was still incredibly humbling to find that there were areas where we just didn’t agree, or areas we hadn’t even thought of. Being able to sit down with our great sponsor couple (thanks Lydia and Morris!) and talk over the areas where our results didn’t match up really helped us cement our relationship and more fully prepare us for the great adventure of marriage!]

In order to strengthen the bond between husband and wife after marriage the church encourages participation in retreats, workshops, Mass, and small groups. Date nights, time alone, shared interests and time spent with other adults are also ways to keep a strong marriage bond. [It’s instructive to remember that your spouse is not supposed to be your only point of contact with the outside world. Even for introverts like my wife and I (thank God our son, while not as introverted as us, is still on our side of the field!), there are times when we are apart with friends or extended family. Being able to experience things separately, and then bringing those disparate experiences back into the relationship, helps to strengthen the bonds of love and trust. Time together is great, but time apart is needed as well!]

In keeping that bond strong, a couple gives to their kids and all of their acquaintances a great gift—a strong, Christian example of what a loving, sacrificing, servant-oriented love can look like. [Again I’d stress that a relationship built primarily upon physical attributes, excessive emotions, and/or sexuality is going to quickly burn out. Tempering that “falling in love” euphoria with a selfless, sacrificial, servant-oriented mentality towards your partner is, as far as I can tell, the best way to keep a relationship life-giving over time.] They participate in and reflect the kind of love that Jesus has for us. And in doing so, they provide their kids with an example to follow, and a safe place in which to grow up and explore the wider world.

Blessings & Peace,
Hugo

Happy All Hallow’s Eve

“Hallow” is an old word for “holy” (it’s used that way in the Our Father); “e’en” is a contraction for “evening.” Our word “Halloween” is thus a shortened form of “All Hallow’s Eve.” If you’ve ever wondered if we should “celebrate” Halloween . . . read on! :)

In the mid-4th century a feast for all the martyrs was established to celebrate those untold people who had witnessed to their faith by dying for it (being thrown to hungry lions, set on fire, etc.). This feast was for all of the hallowed (holy) men and women who gave their life for Christ.

Pope Gregory III moved this feast of All Saint’s from May 13 to November 1 to commemorate the dedication of All Saints Chapel in St. Peter’s in Rome in 731. In 835 Pope Gregory IV made it a feast for the entire church [which ended up deciding the date of Halloween (All Hallow’s Eve – the day before All Saints) as October 31]. Thus our day of Halloween comes about because of a historical accident (and a churchy one at that!), rather than as some sort of planned celebration of “the occult” or “paganism” or “insert bad/evil-sounding reason here.” :)

In 998, St. Odilo (in France) added a celebration on November 2 for All Soul’s Day – a day to pray for all those who had died but were not martyrs or saints. This feast spread throughout Europe rather rapidly. All Hallow’s Eve thus became a vigil evening for two celebrations of those who have (hopefully) entered into heavenly glory before us.

Fast forward a bit - in the 14 & 15 centuries thousands died of the black plague in Europe. As a way of reminding people that death could come at any moment, people started wearing “spooky” costumes on All Soul’s day as a reminder of their mortality. People also started to dress up for the “dance of death” or “the dance macabre” – a form of morality play that reminded people, once again, that if they were not prepared for death (through prayer, sacramental celebrations, etc.) they could end up in a very scary place indeed! So our current custom of dressing up for Halloween (especially in scary and gory costumes) comes from a very Catholic root – the desire for people to turn away from sin and follow Jesus. But what about trick or treating some might ask?

During the 1500-1700’s English Catholics were treated very badly. Some Catholics hatched a plan to blow up parliament and kill King James I on November 5. The plan didn’t go as well as planned, and a Catholic by the name of Guy Fawkes was caught and killed. This became Guy Fawkes Day in England, a day when Protestants would visit Catholic homes and demand beer and cake – trick or treat! :)

Paired with this was a belief popular in the Middle Ages that those who had died the previous year without being reconciled to you would come back to haunt you. Their spirits were supposed to jar you into praying for them and offering them your forgiveness. A trick or treat from beyond the grave!

Guy Fawkes day arrived with the settlers here in America, and eventually the festival was moved to Oct 31 (to coincide with the day of the Irish-French Dance of Death mentioned above).

Halloween as we know it now thus became a part of our cultural celebrations here in America in the 1800’s, but it’s roots go back to early Church decisions about feast days, morality plays about following Jesus, and even Christian infighting! I’d like to reiterate that the day of Halloween is a historical accident – if All Saints Chapel had been dedicated on another day, if the Dance Macabre was held on a different day, if the settler’s had decided not to move Guy Fawkes day – our celebration of All Hallow’s Eve would be on a totally different day.

As a side note, adults tend to shy away from gory or gruesome costumes, but historically Halloween was partly about our own mortality – hence the skulls, skeletons, jack-o-lanterns and spooky costumes; and witches, demons and devils can remind us that Christ has conquered sin and death – there is nothing for us to be afraid of anymore!

May your celebration of All Hallow’s Eve, All Saints and All Souls be hallowed indeed!

Blessings & Peace,
Hugo

These Are A Few of My Favorite Things

I love watching movies (as you can see here), and a two weeks ago I started a trial Netflix membership. [The post won’t be about Netflix, but I do have to say – I’m loving it. It’s a one month trial, and we can have one DVD at a time. The real win for me, though, is that we can watch tons of movies straight from their site (not all, but quite a bit), and we can also stream the movies through our Wii onto our TV. God is good!] [As a second aside, I’ve rated 685 movies that I’ve seen on Netflix. I may need help :)]

I also just recently found a blog by Robert Gelinas (the Jazz Theologian) – in one of his posts he lists his top 15 favorite movies of all times, so I am blatantly stealing the idea and posting mine. This is a list of movies I’ve seen that I would buy and watch over and over again. If I was stranded on a deserted island (along with a nice big screen, DVD player, and electricity, of course) . . . . these are the movies I would have (in no particular order):

1. The Lord of the Rings Trilogy – I loved reading and re-reading the books, and the movies are ones I can watch over and over again as well. I love the scenery, the fantasy, and the conflict of good and evil.
2. The Star Wars movies – except for the horrible fiasco that was the romance scenes between Anikin and Amidala, these films will always hold a special place in my heart. I loved the originals as a kid, and I loved the newer ones as an adult. And I love the way “May the Force be with you” sounds so, so Catholic :)
3. The Matrix Trilogy – the first film is my favorite. I have wonderful memories of watching this movie with my youngest brother and being blown away by the first scene, then being blown away again with the training sequence fight. Wire-fu at it’s finest :)
4. Oscar – if you’ve never seen this comedy starting Sylvester Stallone and a whole host of other famous faces, go rent it now. One of the few comedies that my wife loves to watch (our humor tends to run in different directions!).
5. The Princess Bride – I fell in love with this movie when I first saw it, and it was one of the first DVD’s I ever purchased. A romantic fantasy/comedy/buddy movie that is intelligent and warm hearted. I love it :)
6. A Knight’s Tale – Fantasy again (see a trend?) with a touch of comedy – I loved the juxtaposition of modern music and sensibilites with the medieval trappings of jousting tournaments and politics. It helps that good triumphs over evil as well :)
7. A Man for All Seasons – an older movie that I first saw in High School. It made an impression on me seeing St. Thomas More standing up for his beliefs with passion, courage and intellect.
8. Romero – same as above. He has been a hero for me ever since I saw the movie and learned more about his life.
9. Luther
10. What Dreams May Come – this movie still evokes deep emotions when I watch it. A tale of love, loss and redemption.
11. Meet Joe Black – I saw this movie around the same time as #10. It tells the tale of Death becoming human to experience what human life is like. It gives an innocent’s take on the everyday blessings we tend to take for granted, and is a reminder to cherish the gift of life while we have it.
12. My Cousin Vinny – I love the courtroom drama, the relationship drama (“And your [stomp, stomp] biological clock is ticking!”), and the relationship between lawyer and judge.
13. Office Space – I recommended this movie to our former Assistant Principal, not knowing that the soundtrack to the movie was so peppered with . . . colorful words :) (I had only ever seen it on network TV before that!) I love the nonchalant way that the main character approaches life for the better part of the movie, and the way it subtly parodies modern life and our preoccupation with status, wealth, and control.
14. Schindler’s List – the conversion and courage of one human is front and center in this drama that makes me remember that one candle is better then cursing the darkness.
15. A Tale of Two Sisters – The only horror/thriller on here, it’s a twisted tale (not for kids or the faint of heart) that will have you watching it again after you see the ending.

And that’s my list :) There are many other movies that I enjoy watching (the whole genre of stupid parodies [Airplane, Hot Shots, Robin Hood: Men in Tights, Top Secret, etc. comes to mind!], but if I was limited to fifteen, I could live well with this collection here.

What about you?

Blessings & Peace,
Hugo 

Sanctuary III

The third and final installment of the history of my current WOW guild (Sanctuary on Terokkar/US).

A joined the guild Gypsies (which is still active on the realm), and then tried Lightbringers (not sure if they’re still active or not), all the while keeping in touch with several people from the Stormwind Justicars and others who I’d met in game. After a few months of feeling homeless, I started talking to a few people about starting a new guild for those of us who wanted to play together more often. I remember brainstorming names for the guild (which seemed to take forever) and the brainstorming ranks (which seemed to take longer, and with which I still tinker from time to time). Finally, right on New Year’s Eve of 2007 Sanctuary was formed.

I had a few guild signatures that I got right away, and I remember advertising for a few signatures to flesh out our initial roster. I had to field many “how much gold will I get paid” questions, answering them all with “this will be a permanent guild, and if you sign I’d appreciate you staying in and giving us a try.” After a while we had our required signatures and the guild was born.

Initially I envisioned a leveling / social guild, and I spent lots of time talking in guild chat and recruiting for new members. However, being an introvert in real life, this soon got very hard for me to handle alone. Most of the original signers of the charter were made officers, and they helped immensely in organizing the guild at that point. Many of the activities I enjoy doing now were started in that initial period, like naked instance runs, hide and seek, and guild parties (with pictures and give a ways). I just remembered, too, running low level instances for loot to put into out freshly created guild bank :)

Currently I see us as a family-friendly social / casual raiding guild. We have a large population of 80’s that run heroics daily and a raid night or two each week (we just finished the first wing of ICC on our first guild try!). I’ve met many good people in game, and some of those friendships have moved into facebook / email territory. My son is in the guild, and it’s great getting to spend time with him like that. It’s hard to believe that we’ve been around for 2 1/2 years, but I have wonderful memories of the game, and I look forward to creating many more memories as we look forward to the coming Cataclysm.

Blessings & Peace,
Hugo

Sanctuary Part II

My students are looking up homework on my blog (for the Poverty Project unit we’re on) and one of them asked me why I had stopped posting. I truthfully answered laziness :) I figured it was setting a bad example . . . so here I go again with a new post – continuing my history of my WOW Guild, Sanctuary.

A few days after I started playing, I player named Kathorian invited me to join his newly formed guild, The Stormwind Justicars. Not knowing much about how guilds worked, and looking to meet some new people, I accepted his invitation. I had met another player named Cometdraven while we were questing in the same area, and it turned out she was in the guild as well. So my very first WOW friends were made, soon followed by Revelatio, Kennethwc, Kimmie, Nadonii, and more.

(Aside: Cometdraven created several other toons, and had her own guild for a while, but soon moved off server. Kathorian stopped playing for a while, came back, but has now been AFK for about a year. His character, however, is still in my current guild. Kennethwc has his own guild on our server [Myth], Revelatio has his own guild as well [can’t think of the name just now!], Kimmie is no longer playing as far as I know, and Nadonii and her husband Jimthefierce are in the guild but inactive at the moment.)

The guild grew slowly, and we quested together quite a bit. I still remember my very first run through Deadmines – it must have taken about two hours for the five of us to go through. I learned quite a bit that night about aggro, tabbing to target mobs, and the importance of always letting the tank hit first! :) But I remember as well the feelings of companionship and fun as we wiped because three of us in there were brand new to the game. :)

The guild continued to grow. We eventually transferred Term’s toon Searspan to Terokkar, and a real life friend (Milton) joined in as well. It was fun taking turns with Term playing on one account, but it was around this time that we got a separate account so we could both play at once.

All was going well until Kathorian had to distance himself from the game due to real life reasons. At first it wasn’t too bad, but as his absence stretched out, people began leaving the guild. I stuck it out for a while, but by this time many people had hit 70 and were looking to raid and/or run heroics. So it was with a heavy heart that one evening I /gquit The Justicars. :(

To be continued . . .

Blessings & Peace,
Hugo / D / Anarius (depending on who’s reading this and how I know you!) :)