Make no small plans...

Well, though I made such large plans for the study of Newman, I have yet again daunted myself with the task after recently checking out a few books to read more about him. In addition, to slow things down, I just found a blog where someone considers major points from Newman and I am just going to read them instead. I think, then, that it is time to reconsider how I am using this blog and why I am writing. Good idea for the next post.

Irony?

I think it is sort of ironic in trying to start something, I may have actually stopped something. And that thing is true inner conversation, of which I know very little. It is partially in my relationships and partially in my career as a student that I have been able to find out how I have a lot of trouble having my own point of view. And so I began to use the Catechism as a facade for my own opinion and began to lose myself even more because I didn't need to think if I was getting all of my answers from the Catechism or some Church teaching. I think that I really need to figure out what's going on in my own spirituality and thinking if I'm going to try to lead others in their own spirituality and thinking as a teacher too.

One of the things that really troubled me about how I was getting my spirituality from the Catechism was exactly losing myself... and gaining static answers that could not come to life because I had suffocated my own voice for that of another: the Church. On this topic, similar or equal to the topic of conscience and Church, the Catechism actually has some things to say that might help me find my own voice again. Connected through George Weigel, I would like to read some of Cardinal John Henry Newman to get a better sense of where I can go and what I can do as a result of my interest in the Church. I'm not trying to do something huge this time, like how I approached the first post. Instead, I hope to get some small bits of wisdom here and there reading and writing about some of the information. I'll just see what happens from this intention.

What it means to blog...

There are many sayings with which I could begin the first post of my blog, some about being true to myself, some about the truth of human experience, and others about the truth of God. I will refrain from letting any other voice come to light at the beginning of my online writing for the sake of developing a dialogue with my own true voice that will only come to light through much time and energy that I have put into covering it up, shutting it up, and snuffing it out. There are also many different personal experiences that I could share with you here for the sake of your own understanding of my unique human self-hood: my family upbringing, the experiences I have had with money, friendships, dreams, failures, etc. These, at least for now, however relevant they may be for you, are now irrelevant for me. What is at hand for me before God is my own personal integrity. At this point, the whole lead up to integrity may seem like making a big to do about nothing (which it is and is not). Integrity means the world to me; it means everything. Seeking integrity daily is like my own training to be a judo master. There is something about it that is non-stop learning every waking moment, which brings me to why I am writing this blog in the first place.

Integrity between my embodied self and my virtual self arises as a distinct challenge for me at this time in my life. It is not that I must try to live online, in the virtual world, but that I must somehow express myself accurately through the virtual means of being, that is the commonplace digital expressions of language, photograph, music and video. These dimensions of the realm of virtual being have become my mediums for expression of my virtual being. I have already begun this ongoing process on Facebook and Youtube, but have yet to create a blog. The blog is a unique space, akin to that of the process of creating "Notes" in Facebook, however, a somehow more sophisticated process. I guess at this point you could think, "Well, you're just writing; no big woop." And this brings me to another important point about why I think that it is good for me to be writing this blog in the first place, beyond the mere reason that I just want a blog for the sake of having one and being able to tell others that I have one.

Writing is a creative process, a medium for self-expression. Creativity has many mediums; life itself could be said to be Divine Creativity. But from where I am living and experiencing the world, it seems to me that popular culture has sacrificed great modes of creativity necessary for living a full human life; and I must affirm at the outset by stating my intention to support creativity as a medium for self expression. If my own understanding of the world is true, then by looking at what people create, we can tell something about the people who created. (Inadvertently, I agree with a New Testament saying, "By their fruits you will know them.") And thus, by our own fruits, we will know ourselves.

At this point, I can return to the beginning of the blog and the blog title, the signpost for the origin of the blog itself: "Developing Dialogue with the Deep Voices Within: The Online Journal of a Young Catholic, Currently Engaged to Be Married." Something that I believe to be a lifelong journey quite obviously is the quest to "know myself." This particular something leads me directly to the seeking of religious questions and answers withing the Roman Catholic Christian religious tradition into which I have been born and raised, and also into which I have chosen to live out a very meaningful life with my lifelong companion to be. The past four years, exploring the Roman Catholic faith have been enough to satisfy my Catholic materialist desires for a lifetime and have been enough to ground my Fiance's and mine spiritual learning. The lessons we learned with our community are invaluable and irreplaceable, never to be forgotten. Nevertheless, understanding and experiencing the fact that we can never fully comprehend God, nor grasp, nor hold, nor contain God, we continue faithfully to journey with the people of God to our final end in the arms of Him who always loves us.

Well, that's all for now, but definitely more later. A philosopher-theologian at heart, writing my own honest thoughts has been very enjoyable so far. Thanks be to God.