Can I get a Hail Mary? Or not, because that's fine too.

      In the spirit of Easter and this Lenten season, religion has been on the minds of most. I was baptized Catholic  as an infant. From what I'm told, this has saved my soul from damnation and made me a Catholic for life. The thing about that is, I don't think I want that stigma associated with me.

      My experience with the church has never been too positive: in my youth or today. I'm not sure if I've only been blessed enough to only meet the bigots and uncultured sector of the Catholic Church or if the majority of the constituency actually believes the hate that has been spewed at me and about me.

      I was forced to dress up and sit through a Catholic mass every Sunday from my infancy until I was around ten years old. I had to go hang out in Sunday School whilst the adults drank coffee and conversed afterwards. I took communion and believed the majority of what all these adults were telling me that is, until my parents' divorce. For some reason, my father was no longer welcome in the congregation and people weren't being too kind about him. A priest went as far as to tell me that I was a bastard child because of my parents' sins. That was the end of my involvement in the Church. I never went back and refused to become confirmed.

      Since then, I have managed to read the Bible and have formed my own interpretation of it. Something that I encourage everyone to do instead of blindly following a certain religion. I learned that the Bible is not the word of God, but the word of the disciples. The disciples were not God; they were not Jesus. They were common men like the rest of us. The Bible is no primary source. Much of it was written hundreds of years after the death of Christ, so the authors didn't even have a first hand account of his life. When you critically analyze the Bible, you quickly realize that you need to read between the lines and discredit parts that obviously go against Christ's essential teachings because it is riddled with the opinions of the common man. You also need to observe the fact that it is an ancient text; it is over two thousand years old. There is so much of it that does not hold a place in a modern society.

       My takeaways from the Bible were that Jesus died on the cross for me to absolve me of all my sins. He lived a life of kindness to his fellow man. His good works were not governed by hate, but by love. Jesus loved all man. He loved them no matter their flaws. 

      These takeaways are why I so ardently question and challenge the Catholic Church. I question it's refusal to allow women to be ordained. I question the church's reaction in the midst of a sexual abuse scandal. I question it's constituency in their treatment of homosexuals and unwed mothers. 

      I don't want to be associated with an organization that discriminates against others in the name of someone who preached nothing but love and understanding. I don't want to be associated with a group in which it's highest powered members ignored and denied the claims of children that they were being abused by the people from whom they were supposed to be learning of Jesus's love. When I look at these people who claim to be devout in the teachings of Christ, all I see is hypocrisy because that is all that I've ever encountered. 

      I wish that people would take the time to critically analyze their lives if they are going to preach that they are holier than thou. They should educate themselves on what message they are sending. They claim to be following the Bible, but they should critically look at the way they live their life and realize that it is nearly impossible to be following the Bible in any modern society. Instead, they are picking and choosing which parts of the Bible are convenient for them or that credit the hate that fills their hearts at the moment. 

      I believe that you do not need religion to live a morally sound life. Live your life in the ethic of reciprocity and you will generally do well in life. If you really need to drag religion into it, it's right there in the Bible, "And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise." Luke 6:31. 

      Hands down, playing by the Golden Rule will get you far. Denying other people the same things that you expect for yourself, is morally reprehensible. Govern by love, make decisions in empathy, and always question without evidence.

Growing Up Gay

   

      With all this crazy DoMA and Prop. 8 stuff going on in the Supreme Court recently, there has been a lot of debate about gay marriage. It's being discussed on the news, in social media, in my classes; it's everywhere. I, honestly, find it astounding that people are still of the opinion that marriage should only be between a man and a woman. They obviously grew up on some other planet than I did. In class today, a kid tried to argue that a marriage was only for the intent of making children. He said there was no point in two men or two women marrying because they cannot procreate. He went on to say that children raised by gay and lesbian couples were at a disadvantage to those raised by straight ones. I am not even to get into the flaws in his argument that marriages now are only for making babies. Instead, I'd like to address his claim that children raised by gay and lesbian couples are somehow disadvantaged in approximately the same way I addressed it in class.

      I have lived both sides of the spectrum. I have one heterosexual parent and had one that was homosexual. I have grown up in the same house as a transgender individual. I have been raised by a couple united in marriage. I have been raised by two people who were later divorced. I have been taken care of by two men and by a man and a woman. I can honestly say, no matter which side of the coin you analyze: I have and had two excellent parents. They brought me up to respect others and to respect myself. They taught me to take pride in myself and help any other person in need. I learned from them that no matter what you always stand up for what you believe and support the people you love. They instilled the humility to know my weaknesses and to ask for help. They molded me into the person that I am today. Someone who graduated high school with a 4.0 GPA. Someone who is actively involved at her university and performs around 100 hours of community service a semester. Someone who is happy, healthy, and makes the effort to succeed in anything that they put there mind to.

      It doesn't matter if the person that raised you is gay, straight, or transgender. It doesn't matter if you are raised by a single parent or a happily married couple. What matters are the morals they teach you and the strengths that they instill in you. A parent's job is to mold their offspring into a productive member of society and if they can accomplish that, they have succeeded. Anyone can be a parent if they are willing to put in the time and energy required to care for another human being.