Spirituality

As someone who is Roman Catholic, born and raised, I find that all of the readings play a part in my everyday life. After I read Brother Hayes’s account of his own spirituality and call to the brotherhood, it made me kind of jealous. Not jealous because he’s a brother, but because of his closeness with his faith. Brother Hayes said that “something was happening that was far beyond what [he] could understand at that point, but [he] no longer felt quite as frightened. God was in control.” I believe that all Christians aspire to not only live a life of faith, but to have that feeling that God is guiding them in some way. The lack of these experiences among lay people, I think, is the reason that religious autobiographies aren’t popular. People feel either feel like bad Christians or jealous over the fact that someone else had the experience that they desire. On the other hand, spiritual self-help books lay out the foundations for these people so that they can work on themselves, become better people of faith, and essentially feel that closeness with their religion and God.

Each person has their own desires within their religion, such as Brother Hayes, but when a person feels slighted by their religion what are their options? This question was brought up in the blog Courage and the Church. I am a very spiritual person and I will be the first to admit that I ask controversial faith based questions to better understand my faith. However, I think that Julia, the young woman who wrote this piece, isn’t trying to better understand Catholicism, rather she seems to want to tear it down a little bit. She asks fellows Catholics to question the validity of certain religious political positions, and if they should walk away because they don’t agree. To me, a person who’s been going to private school since Kindergarten, it seems to be something that someone who doesn’t know all the facts would write. There are options within the Church but she doesn’t acknowledge them. It’s scary because the power that this blog has is immense, primarily because it’s on the internet.

 Religion can be a very personal thing, while the internet is a very public thing. In the post New Models for the Church in a New Media World by Jim Rice, he says that “in our globally connected time, our very metaphors are changing, and this could be an opportunity for deeper insights that draw us closer to God and to one another.” Being able to connect with a fellow Christian half way around is a powerful thing and I understand Rice’s examples, but the meaning of the word “Catholic” is universal. In my religion, we believe that our faith connects us and transcendent these types of mediums (the internet). Like I said, I understand Rice’s examples but I don’t need a Facebook status or Tweet to make me feel connected to or empathy for my brothers and sisters in Christ around the world.

These three examples, autobiographies, blogs, and the use of the internet, are all ways that can foster growth in people’s spirituality. I firmly believe that there is a place on the internet for writing about spirituality. Today more than ever people are turning their back on the concept of organized religion and focusing on their personal relationship with God and the growth of their own spirituality. The internet provides that outlet for people seeking these desires and in turn, gives them a place to educate others on their own journey.

Movie Review: The Iron Lady

I don't talk about details in the movie, just an overview. I don't want to spoil the movie for those of you who wanted to see it but haven't yet.

The Iron Lady, which came out in January 2012, was one of the highest anticipated movies of the year. Meryl Streep, who plays Margaret Thatcher the first female Prime Minister of England, embodied the former Prime Minister flawlessly. Although Streep would go on to win an Oscar for her performance, it is too bad that her amazing portrayal could not upgrade the movie as a whole. Feeling duped by the trailers, the movie portrays a different side of Thatcher’s life. Most thought that the movie would be about how Thatcher became Prime Minister and the importance of her being the first female to hold that position in England. No one could have foreseen the direction that director Phyllida Lloyd was going to take.

The movie starts with a scene in a small English convenient store where an old woman is buying a carton of milk. Underneath all the make-up you can slightly notice that the old woman is Meryl Streep, but if you could not notice it, you might think that you walked into the wrong movie. It takes about 5 or 10 minutes for you to realize that one, you’re in the right movie theater, and two, that the movie is going to be very different than you might have thought. The movie portrays a Margaret Thatcher that is old, frail, and senile; bouncing back and forth from the present to the past with hallucinations thrown in here and there.  As the movie progresses you can kind of understand how the movie will play out because most of the flashbacks involve Thatcher’s time as Prime Minister.

However, the main focus of the movie is more about Thatcher dealing with the death of her husband, who makes frequent visits to her during the movie, and the lack of control that she has over her life as an old woman. I didn’t see that portrayed in the movie trailer, nor did I expect that to be the main focus of the movie. Although her flashbacks mainly involve her time in Parliament, even they were connected to her husband in some way. Yes you learn a little about her life but it focuses on the love and loss that being Prime Minister brought to her family. What made her husband fall in love with her was also the thing that tore them apart, her political ambitions.

This movie makes you want to travel to England and give Margret Thatcher a big hug. The movie wasn’t what I thought it was going to be and although I think it would have been better as a movie about her becoming Prime Minister, the movie was not as bad as most people think it might be. It shows the very personal side of a once very powerful and influential woman.

Being a history major I had to write a review about the Iron Lady. The readings this week stressed the importance of honesty and allowing one’s thoughts about a movie not overshadow the movie itself. It is important when critiquing to explain how you feel about something, just saying that you didn’t like something doesn’t suffice. As a person who doesn’t really look at reviews for movies, the website Rotten Tomatoes, just like the websites we dealt with about music reviews, allow people to see multiple views on a movie instead of focusing on big name critics, who, with The Iron Lady, didn’t enjoy the movie for what it was.