First Thoughts

Sunday, 10 January 2010
The Baptism of the Lord

Eventually, this will look like something, with photos -- at first of my cats -- and even some art, if I'm able to figure out how to download stuff. That all may be a while. Right now, here are just a few random thoughts.

Much of what I'll post on this blog will be related to 1 of 3 topics: Theology & Religion ~~ including Liberation & Feminist Theologies, religion in general, role of religion in society, Catholic Church, etc.; My own spiritual journey -- conversion, where I've been, where I am now, faith, doubt, questions, prayers; & Celiac Disease & Living Gluten-Free -- resources, frustrations, successes. Other ideas will, no doubt, creep in.

I hope your ideas will more than creep in! Respond, reply, resonate, disagree -- please!!

Thoughts from earlier this week ~~ re: The death of Feminist Thinker & Thealogian Mary Daly: So much of the coverage of Mary Daly's passing frustrated me & I would suspect left Mary spinning at warp speed in her proverbial grave. She had long, long ago rejected the term "theologian" for herself. Words, to Mary, matter, as they do to me and, I imagine, to most readers of this blog. Mary Daly was a thealogian, totally dedicated to women, the lives of women, the minds of women. At the same time, I found it terribly sad that at the time of her death, someone was reading to her from one of her own works (the Wickedary). How isolated & narrow & closed-in that seems to me. It made me very sad. I hope that, as I lay dying, someone reads poetry by Adrienne Rich or Denise Levertov or Muriel Rukeyser, or a passage from Annie Lamott's Traveling Mercies to me.

Thought from today: I seem to be the keeper of memories for many of my friends & companeras / companeros. I'll write more about that in the future. Today, though, I want to note that I posted the following on Facebook earlier: "Patricia Shechter realizes that 30 years ago right now she was taking her first course in Systematic Theology and just getting to know Rev. Dr. Robert McAfee Brown. Bob became her teacher, mentor, and good friend, & she still misses him tremendously."

Early last week, I watched the Paulist film "Romero." I'd seen it when it was first released but not since then. I'd forgotten how much violence, injustice, sorrow, and grief it depicted; watching it flattened me totally for the next 24 hours. And I know that what was shown in the film constituted only a tiny fraction, a fingernail clipping's worth, of the violence and injustice perpetrated by the military and death squads against the poor of El Salvador during the years of civil war. I realized how protected I've become, even living in 2 major cities (Boston & now Hartford) over the past 23+ years. And such changes have occured, not only in El Salvador, but also in Chile & Uruguay. This past December was the 29th anniversary of the murders of our 4 US women religious workers in El Salvador; this March 24 will be the 30th anniversary of the assassination of Archbishop Oscar Romero. Yes, things have changed, but only because so many gave their lives for justice and peace and hope. May the thousands of martyrs of El Salvador rest in the eternal peace of Christ.

I guess this blog will also have some politics in it -- kind of hard to avoid for this unreconstructed radical / leftist / progressive!

That's all for today. Blessings to all.