Morality and Ethical Questions

One of my favorite television shows of all time is Charmed. I grew up with it and even have a tattoo of a triquetra. One episode that has stuck out to me throughout the years (Apocalypse Not) involves Phoebe asking her sisters a question about ethics: If you were in a burning building and had to make a choice between saving one sibling or five strangers, who would you save? At the beginning of the episode, they both answer one sibling, but by the end, due to events of the episode, when all three are asked the question again they change their answer to five strangers.

When I was in college, a professor asked the class the same question. He also followed up by asking similar ethical/moral dilemma questions, including the famous trolley question. I'm sure you've heard of it. You are standing at the lever for a trolley track. The track divides into two separate tracks, one with one person tied to it and one with five people tied to it. As of right now, the trolley is on track to run over and kill five people. If you do nothing, those five people will die. If you pull the lever, they will live, but the other person, who would've otherwise survived, will die. You don't have time to make it down to the track and untie them. There is no possible way to save everyone. What do you do? What are the ethical implications of your choice?

On the one hand, if you don't actually pull the level and make the choice to kill someone yourself, then you didn't really kill anyone. You didn't really kill those five people; someone else tied them to the track. You simply chose not to act at all because you didn't have time to save everyone and you didn't want your action to have the direct result of murdering someone else.

On the other hand, you technically have the opportunity to save four lives. By choosing to kill one person, you let five other people live. Only one life is lost instead of five. You save more lives that way, four more to be exact. However, then you undoubtedly did make the choice to kill someone. You made the choice to flip the lever. That one person who would've survived would now be dead because of you. But five other people who were doomed would survive.

Is it more ethical and more morally correct to let more people live even if it means you have to choose to actively get involved and make the decision to kill one person? Or should you never choose to do anything that would kill someone even if it means more people will die if you don't?

There are variations on this question of course to make it more complicated. One of the more common ones I've seen is that you are standing on a bridge above the track. A fat person is standing next to you. They are fat enough to stop the trolley. If you push them over the bridge, they will land on the track, get hit by the trolley, and die, but it will prevent any of the people tied to the track from dying. Would you push them over? Often, the same people who would flip the lever say they wouldn't go so far as to push someone over the bridge. Why is that? What difference does it make if it's just a matter of "five lives are more important than one?" Is it because pushing someone seems more violent than pulling a lever? What causes the difference in answers?

What if you personally know the one person tied to the track by themselves but you don't know the other five people? If the one lone person tied to the track is a friend, family member, lover, etc. and the five people tied together are strangers, does that make you more likely to let the trolley kill five of them rather than flipping the switch? Often, people who would otherwise say they would pull the lever would suddenly change their minds and not pull it if the one person tied up alone was a loved one.

But what if it were opposite? What if the trolley was headed towards the one person that you knew and cared about and you had to make the choice of whether or not to pull the lever and have it instead kill five strangers? That would involve actively making a choice to kill five people rather than having it go on course to only kill one. This particular scenario is rather similar to the burning building question from Charmed, with the extra moral implication of not only would you not be saving the five strangers, you would actively be pulling the lever to kill them.

Then of course, there's another famous question that I've heard asked a lot: If you could go back in time and kill Hitler when he was just a baby or a small child, would you do it?

I recently heard another one, a rather interesting one at that. Let's say you are a paramedic and you come to the scene of an accident to find that the victims are your spouse and their other lover. You are the only paramedic at the scene. No one else can get there in time. Both are still alive, but your spouse's chances of survival are slim to none even if they receive medical attention right away. Their lover, on the other hand, will definitely survive but only if they receive medical attention right away. You only have time to give medical attention to one, because by the time you get to the second one they will surely be dead. Do you: A. walk away and save neither of them, letting both of the cheaters die because you are hurt and betrayed B. attempt to save your spouse first, knowing that it will almost certainly be a futile effort, and let their lover who would have otherwise survived die or C. save their lover and let your spouse die, since you know their lover will definitely survive with medical attention and that your spouse will almost certainly die anyway?

All of these scenarios are things that the average person would never find themselves in or hopefully would never find themselves in. The most realistic is the original Charmed example I heard of the burning building and the least realistic of course is the time travel. However, they are interesting questions for self-exploration on our views on morality and ethics. What would your answers be?

My Answers (not based on what I think would be the most ethical option, but what I would really do in the situation)

For me, personally, I would likely flip the trolley switch to kill one person instead of five unless the one person was a loved one. If the one person was a loved one and the other five were not, I would not flip the switch. If the trolley was headed toward the one person originally and they were a loved one and the other five were not, I would make the choice to flip the switch and kill five people while letting my one loved one live. This is assuming that everyone tied to the track was a healthy adult, as the question becomes much more complicated if that's not the case. I would likely never ever think of throwing the fat person onto the track in the first place so it's highly unlikely that I would ever do that. Even if for some reason the thought did cross my mind, I would almost certainly be physically unable to do it. If for some reason the thought did occur to me and I was suddenly strong enough to pull it off, I still almost certainly would not do it. I absolutely would never do it if I knew the fat person personally and/or if all the people on the track were strangers.

As for the burning building, if the five strangers were all healthy adults, I would let them die and save my sister. If they included children, such as a family of five, then I would save the children instead. It's what my sister would want me to do.

For the paramedic example, well, I personally would never be a paramedic so I would never be in the situation. However, let's say for example I was somehow in that scenario. I would try to save my husband first. I would certainly never walk away from them. Even knowing that my husband would almost certainly die anyway and even knowing that his lover would have lived with medical attention, I would still try to save my husband. I would want the last thing he saw in his life before dying to be me trying to save him and being with him. Even though he betrayed me, I would still try. I wouldn't be able to ignore him. I wouldn't have withheld the medical attention from his lover out of jealousy or malice, and certainly if I could've had time to work on her too I would have, but I wouldn't be able to just ignore my husband in his last moments, even if the cost was her life.

The Hitler one is probably one of the most controversial questions. It could never possibly happen, but it's an interesting scenario to think about. This may be an unpopular opinion, but I would not go back in time. However, that's more to do with me being afraid of the butterfly effect than it is of me refusing to kill a child that hadn't done anything evil yet even though I knew they someday would become one of the most evil people to ever live. I wouldn't want to mess with time travel. However, it would be very hard to live with knowing I could have saved millions of people from a horrible death (most of whom would be dead by now anyway from old age though) if I had just been willing to go back in time, murder one child, and then quite possibly cease to exist since both sets of my grandparents may have never gotten together had circumstances surrounding the time period of WWII been different.

I'm interested to hear other people's opinions on these questions! Do you agree with me? Would you do something differently? Let me know what you would do and if you know of any other questions post them in the comments!

Coffee and Contemplation

Good morning, everyone! I don't know about you, but personally, I have a bad habit of getting really into new things and then once the initial excitement wears off, I tend to become lazy and drop them. That's what happened when I first made this blog a few years ago and I fear it will happen again. So I decided to challenge myself to stick with it! So far I've noticed that I tend to think about spirituality the most in the mornings when I first wake up and have time to sit and sip my coffee and therefore that's when I make most of my blog posts. I decided that I will challenge myself to contemplate my spirituality every non-work day morning as I sit and have my coffee (work days are rough for me though...) and to make a new post on this blog on those mornings. To start, I think I'll set the challenge for two weeks. Wish me luck!

P.S. One of my best friends is trying to get into spirituality too, so we're trying to either find a list of questions or make our own list of questions regarding self-exploration on the topic of spirituality. If you know of any, let me know in the comments! Thanks!

CAPEs and CEOs

If you're anything like me, you saw the acronyms in the title and thought "What in the world does that mean? Is she going to talk about superheroes and businessmen?" Unfortunately no, this won't be a fun post about Clark Kent and Lex Luthor. I'm going to be talking about Catholics today. I just saw those acronyms for the first time this morning in the reblogs of a tumblr post and I had to google what they meant. Apparently, CAPE stands for Christmas, Ash Wednesday, Palm Sunday, and Easter and CEO stands for Christmas and Easter Only. The acronyms are used to make fun of, belittle, and complain about "lapsed Catholics" or people who only attend mass a few times a year. You might be saying to yourself, "but I thought Jesus told us NOT to judge others?"...so did I. So did I.

As I was scrolling through all the beautiful seasonal and spiritual posts on my tumblr dashboard this morning I came across this gem of a post. Apparently nothing ticks some people off more than "once a year churchgoers" and some people find "E-and-C Catholics" so "stressful". (No disrespect to the blog I linked to as that person seemed to be sticking up for the people being judged and complained about). I am a little bothered by this because I am probably the exact type of person they are referring to when they say these things and I know many other people like me.

I am going to take this opportunity to discuss some of the reasons that either I personally have for only going to Catholic mass a few times a year or reasons that I know other people have told me they have for only going a few times a year:

• People were raised Catholic and still participate in the same holiday traditions as their family and do so with their family, but personally do NOT consider themselves to be Catholic anymore.
• Families can force or coerce their adult children to go to church even when they don’t believe it anymore and the twice a year a thing can be a compromise or they can be guilted into it.
• The people in their family’s parish, including the priest leading the homily they have to sit and listen to, could be hateful and could be preaching things that the person does not want to subject themselves to. This is a big one for me. I’m tired of listening to homily after homily of homophobic, xenophobic, misogynistic, pro-war and violence propaganda. I think the final straw was when I had to listen to a homily where the priest thought it was appropriate to make fun of a fat woman he saw. I was done. I had to restrain myself from walking out on the spot. And yes, I realize I have the option to go to another church but IF. I. DON’T. WANT. TO. THAT'S. MY. BUSINESS. AS. IT’S. MY. LIFE. AND. MY. FAITH. Whether or not I want to go and how often I want to go is up to me and is a deeply personal decision to make. I know of lgbt people who no longer want to go to mass for the same reason. They feel hated and judged when they go so they give up on going.
• We could have a genuine issue with the Catholic church and prefer to pray on our own. For me, my primary issue is that they won’t ordain women. If I’m not viewed as equal in the eyes of the church because I’m a woman, I DON’T WANT TO BE THERE AT ALL. PERIOD. I DON’T FEEL WELCOME. Just because I MIGHT show up to mass a few times a year or go to the fish fry doesn’t mean anything. I still get something out of mass when I do go, I still get something out of saying some Catholic prayers or saying the Rosary, but the Catholic church as an institution makes me feel unwelcome. Some might take issue with the way the church handled the child abuse cases and don’t feel comfortable going anymore. People might have problems with the church for different reasons and choose to handle them in different ways.
• Going on the holidays with our families could just be a cultural thing, while we personally might be agnostics, Christians but not necessarily Catholics anymore, religious pluralists like I am, we might not agree on the exact theology of the Church anymore, some of us might actually practice a different religion in secret but have to hide it from our parents, etc. 

There are lots of reasons why people might not want to go to mass anymore but might still very occasionally go on important days for their family’s sake. They can judge us for that if they want, but they would be going against Jesus’ commandments if they do. Sorry not sorry that our existence is so “stressful” for you guys. Have you tried minding your own business? Maybe that will solve your stress problem. Spirituality, religion, and faith are deeply personal things. It’s not one size fits all. Some feel comfortable in the Catholic church and some don’t. I personally don’t believe that you HAVE to be a Catholic or any other one single sect of an organized religion to be loved, to be saved, or to be a good person. They all sound hateful, self-righteous, and judgmental, I wouldn’t want to go to a church service with them sitting in the pews with me anyway. I wish people would stop giving Catholics, Christians, and religious followers in general a bad name with this behavior. 

So what do you all think about this? Have you ever felt judged for not regularly going to religious services? Do you have a problem with people who only go to religious services a few times a year? Where do you stand on the issue? Let me know in the comments section so we can have a discussion about it. Maybe you can bring up something I haven't considered yet, but to me it seems unnecessarily judgmental. 

P.S. Something seems to have gotten messed up with the font of this post, so I apologize if it looks weird on your screen.

Angels

When I was little, my Catholic parents taught me five prayers to say every night before going to sleep. Those were:

What can I give him, poor as I am?
If I were a shepherd, I would give him a lamb.
If I were a wise man, I would do my part.
What can I give him? I'll give him my heart.

Angel of God, my guardian dear.
To whom God's love commits thee here.
Ever this night, be at my side.
To light and guard, to rule and guide.

Hail Mary, full of grace
The lord is with thee
Blessed art thou among women
And blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus
Holy Mary, mother of God
Pray for us sinners
Now and at the hour of our death

Our Father, who art in heaven
Hallowed be thy name
Thy kingdom come, thy will be done
On earth as it is in heaven
Give us this day our daily bread
And forgive us our trespasses
As we forgive those who trespass against us
And lead us not into temptation
But deliver us from evil
For the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours
Now and forever more

Glory be to the father, and to the son, and to the holy spirit
As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be
World without end

Those are the prayers that I have completely memorized to this day. When I got a little older they tried to teach me the Apostle's Creed but I've always had to think about that one when I try to recall it. These five though are etched into my mind permanently. As an adult who has spent a great deal of time contemplating my beliefs, I can't say that I still fully believe every word of every one of these prayers as a religious pluralist. However, when I feel the need to pray, these are still what my mind tends to go to automatically.

Of course, you can see that the prayer "Angel of God" is one of my go-to prayers. Lately I've been thinking a lot about the nature of angels. One of my best friends says that she doesn't believe in ghosts, but she believes that when people die, they go to heaven instead of haunting the earth and they become angels (which reminds me, I'd like to make a post about beliefs in ghosts and the afterlife soon!). When I was little I think I held the same belief. However, as an adult who has done some research, I realize that this particular belief really isn't backed up by much theological evidence (which doesn't necessarily make it less valid). It appears that according to Christianity, angels are something different and separate. I also know quite a few people who don't strictly consider themselves Christian or do consider themselves to be loosely a Christian but don't adhere to any one specific sect of Christianity that still believe in angels. In fact, I know of quite a few neo-pagans, New Age followers, Christian witches, and/or other witches who practice a sort of angel magic which admittedly I don't know much about.

Yesterday, my mother and I were at the Renaissance festival and we stopped at a shop that does tarot card and palm readings. We usually get our tarot cards read every year when we go, but last year I bought my own deck of tarot cards along with a guide book and a mat that teaches you how to lay out the cards for a full reading. I promised myself that I would learn how to read them myself although I haven't been making as much progress as I'd like, I decided to forego the reading this year in the hopes that it would motivate me to keep trying to learn it on my own. However, we still looked at the shop and realized they were selling a pack of angel cards, which to my knowledge are similar to tarot cards but involve specifically asking angels for answers. My mother has always been very interested in angels. She has a picture of Saint Michael the Archangel hanging in her house, she gave me a small statue of Michael for protection against demons, and she fully believes that she has personally seen and has been helped by angels before. She was immediately drawn to this deck and decided to purchase it. Now we'll both be trying to learn how to properly read our cards together. I've decided to look into angel magic and different views on angels a little more deeply now because of my mother's newfound interest in the topic so I'll probably try to spend some time researching it this week and may make another post about it soon.

Do you believe in angels? If so, what exactly do you think angels are? Do you think angel magic is a good thing or do you think it goes against what religion tells us? (Keep in mind for that last question that my mother is a Catholic who has always been completely okay with divination so that question would be different for her than it would be for someone else who has different religious beliefs.)

Maintaining a Balance of Focus in Your Life: Mind, Body, and Soul

I was talking to one of my best friends recently about the importance of maintaining balance in your life. Many people I know get so focused on one aspect of personal development and wellness that they tend to ignore the others. I think we all know someone like this. There's the person who spends all of their time at the gym and checking the nutrition facts on every bite of food they take, but they don't make time for reading, career development, learning new things, or doing hobbies that they enjoy. There's the person who spends all of their time working, doing things for their jobs even when they are at home late at night, and looking for more ways to develop their career, but they hardly spend any time with their family, friends, or partner, often feeling lonely, depressed, and letting their relationships sit on the back burner of their life. I think everyone at one point or another has felt like they were dumped by a friend because their friend got into a new relationship or moved in with their partner and suddenly didn't have time for friends or family anymore, choosing to spend all their free time with their romantic partner. We also all realize that at one point or another we have probably done one of these things ourselves because creating a well balanced life is hard work.

I can't act like an expert here. In fact, I'm often one of the worst offenders. When I did my best studying was when I made sure to spend nearly all my free time studying and barely had any time left over to focus on making sure my house was clean, my errands were done, that I was spending enough time doing things I enjoy with my loved ones, etc. When I focus on giving my all at work, school, and taking care of my household, I tend to realize I've gone weeks at a time without seeing my friends or family. When I focus on eating healthy and working out, I tend to realize that a week or more has gone by without me cracking open a book. There's no doubt about it that I struggle with this, but it's something that I have recently realized I need to work on.

So how do we live a balanced life? My best guess is to create a plan that includes all aspects of our lives: relationships, work/school, fun hobbies, physical and mental health, etc. In that way we are simultaneously focused on everything: mind, body, and soul, but don't go too far off the deep end with any one individual aspect.

So far here's what I've come up with:

• I've created a "study schedule" that tells me exactly what I need to study for every day of the week. When making the schedule, I've taken into account which days I tend to have more time available so I can spend more time on those days but can still get in at least a brief study session to keep the material fresh in my mind on my busy days as well. Sometimes even just fifteen minutes a day can make a difference!
• My dad and I both need to study for our own certification exams and while we are in very different fields, we both use flashcards for studying. We've decided to try to meet up once a week for about an hour or two to quiz each other with our flashcards, getting in some much needed study time to focus on our minds, but also getting in quality father-daughter time in the process. 
• My husband and I have created a "household schedule" where we set aside a certain night of the week for paying bills, a list of weekly chores to do on the weekend, and we know ahead of time which small things we each have to worry about getting done every day. We've created an efficient system for making our shopping lists and even have the designated days of the week for each item listed on the fridge as a reminder so that we don't have to worry about getting stressed out or forgetting to do important things.
• My husband and I have also decided to set aside at least one evening a week for alone time or "date night" (which doesn't have to necessarily mean going out on a date, but could be as simple as watching a movie together or something like that). We also have a few shows that we try to watch together. We don't overdo it letting tv take over our lives, but sometimes having that half hour or an hour here and there where we know we can watch something together and discuss it after is a nice way to bond. The fact that it airs on a schedule outside of our control forces us to actually make the time to watch it together or catch up on it together.
• My husband and I have also bonded quite a bit lately over remodeling our house together. We're not on a strict schedule, but we've been working on it together at least once a week, focusing both on quality time together and improving our home.
• My husband and I have been trying recently to eat healthier meals, especially for dinner. We've discussed the paleo diet with one of my best friends who has been eating paleo for a long time now and have found some ways to make old favorites in a healthier way using less grain and starchy foods. We haven't been very strict about it, but we've started doing smaller things such as using almond flour instead of regular flour, using turnips instead of potatoes, eating more salads and vegetables, learning some smoothie recipes, etc.
• My husband and I are both focusing on making better financial decisions. I've stopped using my credit cards, I cancelled some of my memberships to save money, and we both pack our lunches now for work every day in order to save money so we're not buying our food out anymore.
• My mother and I have decided to set aside one evening a week to go to the gym together, simultaneously getting in a workout for our body wellness and getting to spend some quality mother-daughter time together. It's hard to find time when we're both free, but I have to remind myself that even just a half hour at the gym is better than nothing!
• I worked on getting myself on a new sleep schedule which helps me feel rested and ready for work, simultaneously improving my physical health, mental health, and helps me to be on time for work. 
• My best friend and I work together now and we always eat our lunches together, often doing something special on our lunch breaks like driving a few minutes away from our job and parking near a creek with beautiful fall foliage to have a "lunch break picnic" where we can take in the serene scenery and have the opportunity to catch up with each other privately.
• I make sure to schedule in time to hang out with my friends at least once a week. This often takes the form of "game night" where my husband and I invite two other couples to come to our house and play games together. We're also setting up D&D nights with another group of friends. Sometimes I just spend time with my best friend, his wife, and their children, usually at one of his kid's games or something like that or sometimes I just make plans to hang out with my girl friends at one of our houses or going shopping. One of my best friends lives far away so for her we just try to make time to call each other and talk every day and often play video games together, like WoW, along with some of our other friends because it's a fun hobby and a great way to bond with friends over long distances. 
• I try to make sure I always have time to see my family so I try to go to my sister's house to bond with my niece at least one day a week after work since she her house is less than a five minute drive from my job. I also try to plan to spend time doing something with my family at least once every couple weeks if not more. Sometimes this is doing an actual event, such as today we're going to a festival together, and sometimes it's a more casual and routine affair such as meeting up on Sunday mornings for brunch. 
• One of my new goals is to make some time to do at least a little bit of "for fun reading" every week, even if it's only a chapter or two. I've noticed that one of the most difficult things to do when you're in school is to actually set aside time to read the things you actually enjoy reading because it's easy to get sick of reading after spending so much time reading and studying things for school. I have a Goodreads and make a goal every year of how many books I want to read and it's one of the goals I set for myself that I always manage to reach. It's nice having a challenge that exercises your mind, helps teach you time management, and lets you do something your enjoy. 
• I try to spend at least fifteen minutes a day catching up on recent events and politics so I can stay informed on what's going on in the world. 
• I'm trying to spend time focusing on developing my skills and improving my creativity. I don't have a strict schedule for this, but I do try to make time for it at least once every couple of weeks or as often as I feel stimulated to do so. This can mean writing fiction on my own, working on making a baby blanket for my niece, or doing an arts and crafts project with my friends, such as working on making fall and Halloween wreaths. 
• I'm trying to spend more time in nature. This usually means spending my lunch breaks with my friend outside, taking the time to notice the fall foliage, sunsets, the stars at night, etc. or taking my dog for walks at our local park with one of my best friends. 

You'll probably notice that while I have a lot on this list focusing on mind and body, there's not much for soul outside of making sure I have time to do the things I enjoy and to spend time with my loved ones. It's because I have a difficult time deciding how I define "soul" and "spirituality" for me. I absolutely believe that making the time to focus on what and who I love falls under "soul" when creating a balanced life, but is that enough of a focus for my spirituality? Would it actually fall under "mind" because it helps with mental health? These are questions that I need to contemplate because I don't feel I have the answers yet. What I do know though is that I want to focus more heavily on my spirituality, but I'm not sure what that means yet for me. Does it mean setting aside time to meditate every day? Perhaps setting aside time once a week to pray on my own, such as saying the Rosary, or go to some sort of service, either Catholic mass, a UU service, perhaps performing some sort of witchcraft-esque private ritual on my own, such as something to honor my loved ones who have died or spending time trying to learn how to read tarot cards? Does spending time in nature count more for "mind" or "soul"? If I spend it walking, would it count more for "body"? I haven't decided what I should do yet but I know I want to spend some time thinking about it because I don't think I focus as much on my spirituality as I used to or as much as I should. What do you do to focus on your spiritual well being?

Book Review: When God Was a Woman by Merlin Stone

This book both changed my life and saved my life! I absolutely cannot have a spirituality based blog without including a review of this book. If you're a woman that has any interest at all in spirituality, faith, religions, mythology, history, archaeology, anthropology, sociology, feminism, etc., especially women's history and goddesses, then I cannot recommend this book enough!

Merlin Stone explores the role of women in ancient societies and mythologies and explores the way that goddesses, female spirituality, and women in general have been erased and had their roles altered by men throughout history. Our history and our power has been taken from us and it's about time we take it back and work to uncover the truth of our ancestors!

I know many women who are raised in religious households find it very difficult to keep in touch with their spiritual side, especially if they start to look into feminism. It's hard to realize your worth as a woman and then have to come to terms with the fact that the religion you were raised with often oppresses you and can't see that worth. For me, I was raised Catholic. Once I got old enough to think critically for myself I started thinking about the way the Catholic Church treats women. They won't even allow women to be priests, let alone hold a position any higher up in the hierarchy, such as bishops, cardinals, or the Pope. When I was little I asked my parents about this and they said, "well, women can't be priests, but they can be nuns! It's like a woman priest. Men can only be priests, they can't be nuns." and in my childish mind this explanation of separate but equal satisfied me. As I got older I realized that men could in fact be something very similar to nuns as they could be friars or monks, but women could not hold a position similar to a priest. Women may be leaders in their parish, they might volunteer for the fish fry, work in the church office, sing in the choir, volunteer at Catholic schools, organize charity and fundraising events, decorate the church for the holidays, etc. and at least in my family's parish it is almost always the women who fulfill these roles and not their husbands, but no matter how dedicated women are, no matter how hard they work, no matter how much they pray, the church will never let them actually lead their parish. They will always have to answer to a man. The church will never let them hold mass. The church will never let them rise in the ranks and hold real authority even if they become nuns. The church will never ordain women. No woman will ever be the Pope.

Now, I say "never" here because the Church itself says never, but I don't think this will actually be the case. I remain hopeful that I will live to see the day the Church changes it's stance and decides to ordain women. However, I don't think I will ever see a female Pope in my lifetime. That would be too much change too soon. But I'm hoping that little by little we'll start to see some progress.

In the meantime though, it's hard to reconcile my views on women with the church's views on women. It makes me not want to even go to mass at all. Not to mention the fact that the more I looked into different religions and mythologies, the more I realized that while most modern religions (at least in the West) hold the idea that god is a man, that wasn't always the case. In the past women were revered as goddesses and women held important roles in the temples to those goddesses. Yet somehow in the centuries since, women's role in religion completely changed to us taking the back seat to men in almost all ways. It started to seem to me like instead of making progress through time, we were actually going backward. That's what led me to pick up this book and it was one of the best decisions I've ever made. I'm serious. Go get this book right now and start reading it! You won't regret it.

Happy Mabon!

So I know I took a long break from this blog, but I'm really trying to get more in touch with my spiritual side and get back into it! This seemed like the perfect opportunity to do so. I didn't get much of a chance to celebrate the autumnal equinox today unfortunately. I did have some pumpkin spice coffee, reblogged some autumn stuff on tumblr and facebook, and had a home cooked meal with my husband. My dad bought me some fresh corn (my favorite food!) from a local farm the other day and tomorrow I'll be going to our local Renaissance festival with my mother. In my mind, buying from local farms and using them in home cooked meals is the best way to celebrate the harvest. There's just something about buying from a local farm stand that just makes it taste better than the grocery store! And to me, pumpkin spice flavored things and the Renaissance festival (which always comes in September where I live) just ushers in the autumn season. In my mind, that marks the beginning of fall. I don't know about where you live, but here we've started to have trees change colors since August and now they're finally starting to be more plentiful and noticeable so it's really starting to feel like autumn has arrived! I hope you all got the chance to celebrate the changing of the seasons and the second harvest festival of the pagan wheel. Happy fall everyone!

Confession

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One of the things that I really like about growing up Catholic (which I know some may find odd) is confession. I've had people who either were never Catholic, were ex-Catholics, or who were not-very-religious Catholics all come to me with the complaint that they didn't understand why they "had" to reveal everything they'd done to the priest or what that would accomplish. Some would say that it wasn't the priest's business or that it was between them and God, which I can understand and can respect. In fact, I briefly was one of these people.

That being said, there's is something about it that makes me feel like a weight has been lifted off of my chest. Confessing feels good. Even if it's not a list of sins being confessed to a priest or a deity, the act of admitting all of the things you've done wrong that you feel bad about, coming clean, asking for forgiveness (and hopefully receiving it), as well as finding out what you can do to make amends just feels good. It's also a good thing for the person you've wronged, whether that person be God or not. Completely outside of religion, I tend to be horrible at keeping it from someone when I know I've hurt them. This has caused me to come clean about certain things, like cheating for example (something I'm not proud of having done), to a significant other because it completely ate away at me. Realizing how badly I'd hurt the other person was awful, but it was the first step towards making things right between us again and though I had to do a lot of work to make it up to him and had to deal with a lot of painful emotions, I still felt very relieved being honest about it. Whenever I don't come clean, like for instance whenever I said something bad about an acquaintance behind their back, I felt guilty about it for weeks. Confession, making amends/doing penance, and hopefully receiving forgiveness is something that's not only good for the person (or deity) you've wronged, but also good for your own soul.

Which brings me to my next point. I haven't gone to confession in a long time. The last time I went to confession I honestly felt as though my priest was judging me (trust me, I do understand where some people's complaints about confessing to a priest are coming from). I really want to go to confession again and I want that cleansed soul feeling again. However, now that I'm a pluralist I have a bit of a dilemma. One, the simple fact that I am a pluralist would be a sin to the Catholic Church, but I'm not sorry for it so I can't confess it. Two, there are other things that I've done that I do not consider to be sinful anymore (some of which I never found sinful even before) such as premarital sex for one example. That being said, there are many things I've done which I do feel are wrong, hurtful to others, hurtful to myself, harmful to the earth, dishonest, cruel, etc. that I do genuinely feel bad about and want to try to make up for, so I still want to do something like confession, even if it's not through the Catholic Church anymore.

So I'm trying to brainstorm some ideas for confession, other than traditional Catholic confession, for people who don't think that would suit them but still want the benefits of confession:

1. If the "sin" was against another person specifically, go to them and admit what you did, apologize for it, and ask them how you can make it up to them. Tell them that you will try not to do it again in the future.

2. If the "sin" was against a larger group or the earth/environment/animals, admit that it was wrong, educate yourself on it, and then do something to make up for it. An example of this would be making an effort to educate yourself on a certain religion, defend people of a certain faith, and taking part in interfaith organizations/events which promote understanding and communication between religions, as well as apologizing for making insensitive comments and quick judgments in the past if you were prejudiced against someone of a certain faith (such as people who've assumed all Muslims are extremists or terrorists without knowing anything about Islam other than what they say on the media). Even if you apologize, don't expect certain groups to trust you right away, whether it be a group of friends, your family, or an entire movement or group of people.

3. If the "sin" is against yourself, admit to yourself what you did and why it was wrong, make a promise to yourself not to do it anymore, and then forgive yourself (such as doing anything where you were too hard on yourself, lacked self respect, integrity, hurt yourself, treated yourself badly by ignoring your physical/mental health, etc.).

4. Type up all your "sins" in a Word document, look at each one and what you can do to make amends and/or avoid doing it again, and then delete the whole document and make a promise to forgive yourself and forget about the "sins" once they're deleted.

5. Write all your "sins" in a list, do the same thing where you decide how to best handle each one (maybe scratch each one off as you apologize and try to make up for it), forgive yourself, and then either rip it up or burn it, and forget about them once they're gone. Address the confession to whatever deity/deities you believe in (if you do) and ask for their forgiveness.

6. If you like the idea of your sins being kept secret, which I can completely understand, (though I still think it's best to come clean to each individual person you've hurt if you're close to them), make your list, forgive yourself and get rid of it however you feel would make you feel the most relieved, and then do some sort of universal penance, such as volunteering to help others or the earth to sort of give back to the universe or make amends to whatever deity/deities you believe in.

7. If you like the idea of confessing to another person and getting feedback from them on how to make up for it as well as their reassurance that you can be forgiven, try either confessing to a friend or family member or if you want anonymity, there are certain places online where you can spill what's on your mind and get responses without anyone ever having to say who they are (some are pretty casual, like confession blogs, but others are based around mental health, emotional support, and getting advice, such as The Quiet Place- Comfort Spot website.

I'm not sure if I'm going to try one of the methods above or give traditional Catholic confession another shot (despite not being a traditional Catholic anymore), or perhaps I might do both. I think I'll start making a list of all my "sins" now!

P.S. If you haven't figured out by now, when I say sin in this post, I don't necessarily mean the Catholic view of what a sin is or what constitutes a sin, I just mean a morally wrong action, word, or thought and I think that's a good word to use.

ETA: I just want to clarify a few things because I'm sure this will be taken in the wrong way if I don't.

1. In no way am I saying that just because you apologize to someone that they will or should forgive you. Forgiveness is something that you have to work at and some things are too terrible to expect others to forgive. If you're truly sorry for what you did, you should be able to understand that, and will leave them alone if they don't want anything to do with you. If what you did to the other person was so bad that it's illegal, consider turning yourself in.

2. Don't apologize to whole groups of people or strangers who don't know or care what you did. I used the example above about prejudice, but that doesn't mean make some public declaration of how you used to have unwarranted negative opinions of or thoughts toward people. Very few people will care and some will be annoyed at you for acting as though you should get rewarded for having changed. Just change for the better and if your prejudice hurt anyone whom you actually know in particular, tell them you realize now that you were wrong, that you're sorry, and that you're trying to change.

3. If you said something nasty about someone and they never found out, it was still wrong to say it, but you probably shouldn't go around to every person you ever betrayed by making fun of them admitting that you called them fat, ugly, annoying etc. in the past and that you're sorry now, because even though admitting it might make you feel better, it will make them feel awful to know that was said about them. In situations like those, admitting it to yourself and making a promise to yourself to never do it again is kinder than admitting it to the person you were talking about.

Basically use common sense. If you're sorry, aren't trying to convince yourself that you were right when you know that you're wrong, and want to try to make amends for it if you can, you should be fine. Use your best judgment when dealing with others. Don't expect forgiveness from other people and don't even ask for it, just apologize because it's the right thing to do. As for whatever deity/deities you believe in (if you do), they can see into your heart and know if you're truly sorry once you confess and do your penance.