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'ZOOM IN! ZOOM IN DAMMIT! WHY WON'T YOU ZOOM!??!'
I’m not usually a fence sitter. It’s uncomfortable, and eventually, one side is always going to look more tempting. In this case, I’ve pitched a tent with the anti-world youth day folk. However at night I’ll jump to the other side and party with the best of the pilgrims (not really, but work with the metaphor here).
A lot of my indecision stems from being raised Catholic and then spending a lot of my adolescence hanging around Maronite youth. At high school it was cool to be Catholic. But my all-girls-private-school-Cath olic-upbringing led me to believe that being Catholic was the right way. This way we got the best of both worlds. In touch with the world and reality, our Catholicism was one of social justice. Our founder was a woman who defied the church and was excommunicated as a result. Our Catholicism was wholly feminist and radical. Senior girls handed out Communion to their fellow students. Students read out homilies. Students organised liturgy. In the classrooms we studied women in the Church and women in other religions.
We studied the Bible differently, interpreted things differently so that it made sense to young people today. I watched the most disbelieving come to some sort of compromise in those classrooms. Religion wasn’t mocked or discriminated against. Cynics existed but they debated rationally and there was always room for more debate and questioning. No one had all the answers but that was okay because the overall answer was this hybrid spirituality that embraced other religions and embraced reality.
Enter university. Suddenly, no one gives a toss about your ideologies and beliefs. One professor gives a convincing lecture and the next thing I know I’m telling my radical Christian boyfriend that I’m an Atheist. The shock horror on his face leads me to change this statement to a declaration of Agnosticism.
Three years later. World Youth Day is upon us and I have 20 years of religion behind me. I have lists and lists of friends on Facebook who are excited and eager to meet an old man who is trying to connect with them. I’ve met some foreign pilgrims that I really loved hanging out with. I want to vent my true feelings about why World Youth Day feels like a farce but I can’t bring myself to do so. There are all these people I don’t want to let down, there’s the past gnawing at my conscience and there’s the fact that my ex boyfriend sounded so happy on the phone just now. I could hear people screaming with joy and elation. I told him to have fun.
Not going is my protest and it’s a pretty loud statement too. No one has asked me why I’m not going which is a relief, but I keep expecting someone to pick up on it. Sheree – the greatest defender of religious freedom and practise?
But what I loved most about my Catholic upbringing was the social awareness. Years have passed and little has changed on the social justice front. Condoms and the Catholic Church. Aids in Africa. Women’s rights. Abuse in the Catholic Church. Censorship. These are all important issues that we can’t ignore. The money being poured into World Youth Day could have been used to perform a few Jesus like miracles in the Middle East or in developing nations in Africa and South America. The affluent can celebrate, but who benefits in the long run?
Maybe we’re looking at this the wrong way however. What if World Youth Day was the turning point? Isn’t it plausible that things could change? The trick is not to stop the Catholics embracing their faith. It’s to let them be festive and merry in the hope that such fervour will spread and change old mentalities. If the youth can’t do it, then who can?
A girl raised her hand in class and asked my favourite teacher that if things are so bad with the Catholic Church then why don’t we just leave?
My favourite teacher responded ‘but then who will remain to fix the Catholic Church? If you believe strongly in something, it is better to stay and fight’.
I guess it’s time to swallow my pride, put my cynical hat on the rack, get off the fence and admit that maybe World Youth Day isn’t such a bad thing after all.
Sorry I've been slack in the blogging world this past year. I will try to do better dear readers who still happen upon this blog in my extended absence. Meanwhile, just to fill in the awkward silence, I will post a preview to an article I'm writing.
Cheers my dears!
Sheree
A Thousand Ears that won’t listen
I arrive at the pearly white gates of the New South Wales Parliament House, although come to think of it, the gates may have been more of a golden shade.
I imagine that St Peter or Moses had come to greet me in the form of two security men from the New South Wales Anti-Terror Squad, there to allocate me to either eternal damnation or eternal salvation, depending on which way you look at it.
‘Which party are you here for?’ one asks, the scrawnier of the two.
I respond with,
‘I’m not sure. I guess the one commemorating the Nakba’
I am greeted by blank faces.
The signs on either side are not helpful, although the one marked ‘Jubilee’ has a sense of joy attached to it.
It’s also significant to mention that the Jubilee sign is to the left-hand side of an important political institution.
The two men continue to discern which direction to send me before finally asking in mild exasperation,
‘Are you here for Israel or the other one?’
Palestine. Is what they should have said.
I reply curtly that I am with Palestine and veer to the left, but not without first commenting amicably that separate entries is a taking it a bit too far, with remnants of the apartheid echoing silently, to which they replied with ‘But this is Australia!’
The irony is lost on them.
My name is Sheree and I am here to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the Nakba (‘Catastrophe’), the dispossession and expulsion of the Palestinians from their homeland. I walk in with trepidation but what greets me is a reassurance that I took the right, (Left), path.
TBC.
One of the chant leaders was Eitamar Ben-Gvir, a prominent right-wing activist from Hebron.
"The Government doesn't care about us. They take out Jews from their homes and give them to Arabs," he said. "America is helping the Arabs kill Jews. If America wasn't pressuring us to be gentle, we would kill them all."
But in Jerusalem, Mark Regev, spokesman for the Prime Minister, Ehud Olmert, said: "Tonight's massacre is a defining moment. The people [palestinians] celebrating have exposed themselves for what they really are: hateful extremists."
If it weren't such a frightening example of irony, it might be humourous.
- Taken from two, extraordinarily biased articles from www.smh.com.au
One woman was knocked to the ground as the media pack hurriedly followed Mr Howard as he faced questions over industrial relations, education and this week's interest rate hike.
It is not known whether the women was knocked over physically or by the sheer nerve of John Howard's policies
[ Click here to read more ]
All this talk of flip flopping in the election makes me think of a pair of thongs.
I'm not entirely sure why
[ Click here to read more ]
It was in the 1997 film 'Paradise Road'
I watched it back when I was too young to appreciate her but I fell in love all the same with her heartfelt and strong performance. Then over the years my respect for her increased somewhat when I noticed that out of all the celebrities on the red carpet, she was the one who stood out with classic garments and a flawless appearance excuding grace, elegance and beauty
[ Click here to read more ]
SO WE HAVE AN ELECTION DATE.
Not only will I delay my trip to London to make sure I am in the country for this MONUMENTOUS OCCASION *touch wood!* but I will dance naked on the streets of Bennelong if and when John Howard is unseated by the lovely Maxine and Labor comes back into power
[ Click here to read more ]
Dear Mr President (Prime Minister, whatever),
Can I take a walk with you? Just kidding. We all know how you like to jog. Can I take a jog with you? I'll even don my favourite green and gold trackie for the occasion
[ Click here to read more ]
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Comment by Sheree
on The Gripes of Wrath – World Youth Day
Cliche Murder
I guess you could do a google search. But it's when the Pope comes to town and the pilgrims follow. Oh and it's for young people!