The Way

When I first heard about the premise of the film "The Way", I thought that the people on the pilgrimage would be living like actual pilgrims. They discussed the concept of true pilgrims a lot in the movie, but they did not live like them. They stayed in hotels and ate large meals and took a lot of breaks along the way. This was a little disappointing but of course the journey was still hard. The film did inspire me. I liked how they each had a goal and sometimes that goal changed along the way. For example, with Yost from Amsterdam, his self-hatred turned into self-acceptance; his original goal was to lose weight, but towards the end it changed to accepting himself for the way he is. The film inspired me that sometimes it is a good thing to escape from your normal daily routine and just spend time reflecting on your life. I liked how the "pilgrims" became friends at the end and put aside their differences. I liked how they all started the journey alone and then ended in a group. They met new friends that would change their lives for the better; that was my favorite part. It inspired me that sometimes it is okay to ask for help from other people because you can't always do everything alone.

Women in the Church

I think there are many positive messages that the Church sends to women.One of these is the sense of equality that the Church honors between men and women. This equality may not always be carried out completely, but it is still a prevalent idea in the Catholic Church. Another positive message is one of sexuality.The Catholic Church teaches about the need for intimacy, mutuality, consent, and respect for the dignity of one’s partner in sexuality, which are all important values. These messages help to balance out the negative messages that are also sent to members of the Church. The Church tells its members to value mutual pleasure and long term commitment in a sexual relationship. This positive message teaches us about healthy relationships, which in turn teaches us about a positive self-concept and seeing ourselves as gifts from God, made in his image and likeness. In a Catholic school environment, especially at an all-girls school, it has been drilled into my mind that women are to be empowered at a young age and can have a bright future if they are educated properly. Our school motto is "On the education of women largely depends the future of society." This has been repeated to me on several occasions and so it is very important to me.I have really only received positive messages from my school but the Church does not always uphold what it says about equality. Women are not allowed to be priests, how is that any different from women not being allowed to vote? In conclusion, there are some contradictory messages being sent about women from the Catholic Church.

IVF

I think that IVF is fine if you really can not get pregnant but you can carry the baby yourself. A surrogate, in my opinion, is weird to me but still morally acceptable. It is even weirder if the baby in the surrogate mother was not made from your husband's sperm and your egg. Why spend all that money if you can just adopt a baby which is basically the same thing in that case? I think that IVF is too expensive. It should not only be available to wealthy people; that is not fair. It should be there for anyone who needs it because they can't get pregnant. Although it is unnatural, I still think it is morally acceptable as long as it is the combination of your egg and your husband's sperm. It can get a tad sketchy too when dealing with which embryos to implant; that scares me. The idea that we can one day pick out the best embryos with the best possible genes is frightening and unnatural; it is like playing God.

Just Not That Into You

I loved this movie before but now, after watching it in class and being able to apply it to things that we have learned, I like it even more. The first character I chose is Jennifer Aniston as Beth. She desperately wants to get married to her live-in boyfriend of 7 years, but he does not believe in marriage and refuses, until the end. The first thing that we can apply this to is cohabitation. We discussed how this usually ends badly for a couple. This movie wants everyone to have a happy ending, so the co-habitating couple do end up together, although this is probably unrealistic. Another thing we can apply this scenario to is the whole idea of marriage in general. Beth tells her boyfriend, Neil, that if he will not marry her then they should not be together. We learned that marriage is committing to someone for you entire life; it is not an isolated event. Neil promises that he loves Beth and will commit to loving her for the rest of his life even though they are not legally married. He believes marriage is just showing-off your relationship and that two best friends do not get a "friend" certificate to prove their friendship or make it valid, so why should two people in love? We talked about how the ceremony of marriage is for the couple to affirm their love for another in the presence of their loved ones and to provide a living example to the rest of the church of what marriage should be. Another character is GiGi. She desperately wants to be in a relationship with someone. She is willing to sacrifice her pride and dignity for a man to like her. She is also willing to get serious with a man almost immediately. After thinking that a man likes her, she is seen in the movie looking up places to have her destination wedding. This is not good dating practices, according to what we learned and discussed in this class. Although, it is good to put yourself out there in a relationship, it is unwise to put yourself out there too much and risk getting hurt by someone who does not want to start a serious relationship after meeting once. She is too set on finding a soulmate; she thinks every guy that she meets could be the man of her dreams. Men do not necessarily think this way; they think more in the short term. Eventually, GiGi does find a good partner who she can possibly share her life with.

Changing Face Of Marriage

The idea of a domestic church is an idea that I can fully identify with. My parents wanted to expose me to Catholicism It was their decision and I am thankful to them for making it. It is the family who allows you to feel connected to God. I go to church with my family, we celebrate all of the sacraments together, and so on. It us through the family where our first encounter with religion and faith is established. My whole family has attended Catholic school since elementary school. There, our faith was further established and we learned more about what it meant to be Catholic. I really enjoyed the years that my siblings and I spent together in the same grade school. My brother went to high school after my 6th grade year and my sister's 3rd grade year. Now, my sister is a freshman at the Mount so we get to experience this together again. I do one day hope to continue the traditions that my parents have started for my siblings and I. I want to establish a domestic church and create a family that is based on Catholic values. I definitely intend to raise my kids as Catholics, to have a Catholic wedding etc.

Hooking Up And Dating

I think the chapter in the textbook and the article accurately sum up today's hook up and dating culture. I think the most accurate part was how the article affirmed that although it may appear as if everyone is participating in casual hook ups, most people are not. The article also states that the people who are participating are simply more vocal about their hook ups because they are seeking to justify their actions and see if they are acceptable to everyone else. This is definitely true in today's culture and I have witnessed it many times. I do not agree with the anti - daters. I do not think that dating is practice for divorce. I understand where they are coming from, because while ending a relationship is much more lax than ending a marriage and sometimes that line gets blurred, you can not enter into a marriage without dating other people first, in my opinion at least. I think you have to see what else is out there before settling down to make sure that this is the person you really want to be with. I totally agree with those who justify dating and I think those are the people we need to listen to as we learn more about dating in our lives.

Love Story Frank And Dana

My parents haven taught me a lot about the importance of relationships and the importance of love. My mom always tells me not to care what other people think about my relationships; it is about me and that other person. My parents always say that they want what is best for me and that if they don’t like the man I want to marry then they will be honest with me because sometimes once can get so caught up in love that they do not always see the bad things in a person. Their love story compares with those in movies and television shows in that theirs is a more real relationship, free of all the drama that is often illustrated in the movies and television shows today. For example, many married couples in shows have a break-up worthy fight every other episode. This is not realistic and it does not occur with my parents. They do not almost get a divorce every other week! I chose the song “We’ve Only Just Begun” to describe their love story because it was their wedding song and they both love the band The Carpenters. Lyrics from this song like: “Sharing horizons that are new to us Watching the signs along the way Talkin' it over, just the two of us Workin' together day to day, together” seem to describe my parents love. They work together in life to raise their children and they also literally work together for my dad’s law firm. My mom is his accountant! They have shared many new horizons, the biggest of which being having three children which is obviously a major life change.

Love Continued

Another thing that makes me believe in soul mates can be illustrated in the song "If Only They Knew" by A Rocket To The Moon. In this song the singer says, "No one knows you like I do. They don't see you like I do, baby. They'll try to but if only they knew, they will never come close to you." This song talks about the feeling that you and your boyfriend/husband/ soul mate etc. are the only two people in the entire world who understand each other perfectly. I have never met anyone like that and I hope that someday I do.

Love

In my fantasy world, soul mates do exist. I actually constantly imagine who my soul mate might be, how I will meet him, what he will look like, and so on. I know this sounds foolish, but it makes me happy to think that there is some guy out there that was made to complete me, to be my other half. I am not so foolish to think that your husband should be your "everything" as the article says. I value my friends and family so much and would never be willing to give them up. In my experience, I am used to liking the guys who do not like me back but settling for the guys who like me more than I like them. I want to know what it feels like to love every part of someone, but in my experience with relationships, there have always been parts of the other person that I wish I could change, and I find myself in a constant internal battle of whether or not I should stay in the relationship. I know I have not had much experience with "mature" relationships, but knowing that there is someone out there who I could love every part of makes me wonder: "What is the point of trying to be with anyone until I meet that certain person?" I also have an issue with pining after a certain guy and then once I may "have" him, I do not want him anymore and almost instantly, I start to see all of the bad things about that person once I am in some sort of a relationship. But, if I ever ended it, I would immediately go back to only seeing the good things about him. I am obsessed with the thought of finding my soul mate and staying with that person forever, but in reality I freak out about committing to even a silly high school relationship. One thing that intrigues me about the quest for a soul mate is the thought of staying with that person until you grow old. This is illustrated in the song "Young and Beautiful" by Lana del Rey.The song goes: “Will you still love me / When I’m no longer young and beautiful? / Will you still love me / When I got nothing but my aching soul? / I know you will, I know you will” Another song that touches me is "Accidentally in Love" by the Counting Crows (even though I am not in love!). I recently have began a relationship with a guy who started out as one of my best friends and who I have known since 2nd grade. This song talk about how sometimes relationships happen by accident which is definitely true in this personal scenario. This previous summer I was involved with a different guy and spent a lot of my time being concerned with the relationship while hanging out as friends with the guy I am currently involved with. When the first relationship ended, my friend was so helpful to me and I guess that eventually led to us becoming more than friends. I just thought it was funny how I was so busy thinking about the one guy while right in front of my face, someone else was thinking about me. One thing that does bother me about soul mates is the idea of mutual feelings of love. It is incredibly hard to find someone who loves you as equally as you love them. Somebody always gives more or needs more to/from the other person. I am terrified that I may find someone who is my "idea" of a soul mate but I am not theirs and they might think that they are just "settling" for me. This feeling is evident in the song "All Alone in Love" by Mariah Carey: "You haunt me in my dreams I'm calling out your name I watch you fade away And then your love is not the same I've figured out your style To quickly drift apart You held me for a while Planned it from the start All alone in love" One more song that touched me is "The Gold Standard" by Fall Out Boy. This song talks about being afraid to let your love show. They sing: "I want to scream I love you from the top of my lungs, but I'm afraid that someone else will hear me." I have felt this sometimes in a lesser way. I have felt this about being uncomfortable to show a lot of affection in public, or PDA. I have always wanted to be able to not care at all about what other people think of me and my relationships, but of course, that is much harder than it seems.

Gender Equality

I have been taught that girls are expected to "act like a lady" meaning we are supposed to sit with our legs crossed and be respectful. There is nothing wrong with that, but I feel as if less and less women are actually acting like ladies and less which is causing less men to act like gentlemen. The more that women are allowing themselves to be objectified and sexualized, the more men are going to do it. Another thing that I have been taught is to express my femininity. There is a show on MTV called "Girl Code" where girls discuss a wide range of feminine topics, often in a comedic manner. One of these topics was crying. All of the girls on the show talked about how much they love crying and how they do it almost every day. If boys ever did this, I am sure they would be made fun of for the rest of their life. It is a psychological fact that girls are more in tune with their emotions than boys are. I have two siblings, a younger sister and an older brother. One way that my parents have corrected behavior based on gender is with cursing. My brother has cursed in front of my parents many times and they usually never say anything about it. When my sister and I accidentally let out a much less "severe" curse word, we are reprimanded for it. When we challenge this and say that they allow our brother to curse but not us, they respond:"It's different for girls. It sounds way worse coming out of a girl's mouth than coming out of a boy's mouth." This has always been something that bothers me. Going to an all girls school has taught me that there is much more to your identity than your gender and we can not allow our gender to determine our identity. It is frowned upon for girls at the Mount to wear make up to school (not by the administrators but by the actual students). Everyone says: "Who are you trying to impress by wearing make up to school?" However, I believe that girls are much more judgmental than boys when it comes to appearances, at least girls pay more attention to the details than do the boys. I expect the boys to be gentlemen in a romantic relationship. I have the privelege of associating with boys who are taught to be gentlemen, but not all girls are this lucky. I think it is different depending on where you grow up, but for the most part, my parents and the media have taught me to expect the boy in the relationship to pay for things and hold doors for women etc. This idea has been around for a long time and I do not think it should change. However, what is indeed changing is the stereotypical role of the man to be at work while the women stays home and cooks and cleans. It is becoming more and more socially acceptable for it to be the opposite case, which is a good thing. Women should not be set on the domestic role; they should have the option of doing whatever they want.

Miss Representation

The movie and article did not surprise me that much. I watch enough television and absorb enough social media content to know that women are consistently being objectified and sexualized. I think this is going to be an extremely difficult endeavor to change the representation of women, especially in the media. It took a long time and a lot of work for women to get equal rights and I believe that we will have to endure a similar struggle if we want to be treated appropriately. There is a stigma against women in the workplace and I anticipate this will be another hard thing to change. I hate to admit it, but one of the things my brother said to me to get me to apply to a more competitive school Early Decision was, "You will meet boys here who will be smarter and more successful ." This definitely appealed to me, as sad as it is. I wanted to go to a college where I could meet a rich boy who I could eventually marry. I did get accepted into this college, but now I intend to go there and learn, not to meet my future husband. I want to be just as smart so that I could, if I wanted to, support myself alone. The workplace has definitely become more accessible to women over the years, but it is still not completely fair and equal, and I do not think we should stop until it is. My experience at the Mount has deeply ingrained in my brain the idea of female empowerment. I sometimes do not realize this until I talk to other girls from other schools. The Mount has taught me that I can be just as successful as any man can because it is my choice to be educated and it my choice of what I do with that education. I have realized over the years that it is not about your gender that makes your identity; it is solely about the type of person you are.

Mission Statement

I am and always have been very passionate about dance. The most important part of my life is my family. I do not know where I would be without them. My friends are also a huge part of my life because I have known them for so long. I have many goals and dreams for myself, but I do not know exactly what I want to do with the rest of my life. My main goal is to be happy and hopefully, success will be a part of that. I intend to travel and see many different parts of the world. I think that everyone was put on this Earth for a reason, and I have yet to figure out that reason. Sometimes I feel as if I was destined for something more than just a normal daily routine. I want to keep my friends and family close to me for the rest of my life because without them, I could never truly achieve happiness. I hope to keep my passion for dance integrated into my life as well.

My Identity

For the many years of elementary school and the first few years of middle school, most kids try out a bunch of different sports and activities to see what interests them the most. Only a select few dedicate their pre-teen years to a certain sport or activity. When I was in 7th grade, I was one of those kids who had tried everything. I played a variety of sports and participated in different clubs and activities. I soon began to realize, however, that everyone around me was discovering their niche. I was not especially good at any of the sports I had played so I felt a little discouraged. However, it did not take long for me to realize that my true talent was in dance. I had taken dance classes just for fun almost every year with my friends. I was a cheerleader for 9 years with my best friend as well. By the time we got older, most of my friends stopped taking classes for fun and focused more on the sports that they excelled in. I had a mini-epiphany and realized that I did not want to stop! I kept taking a class in 7th grade even though all my friends had quit, and in 8th grade I went to a new dance studio and signed up for a bunch of new classes. Almost immediately, I knew I had made a great choice. Everyone at the new dance studio had been dancing since they were 3 years old, and I was just getting started. It took a lot of commitment and dedication, but from where I stand today, it was definitely worth it. I spent the past four years of high school dancing almost every day, and taking more and more classes each year.I went from being super intimidated as a 13 year old girl with practically no intense dance experience, to being on the same competition team as the girls who have been dancing forever. The persistence it took for me to become the dancer I am today is part of my identity and I am sure that it will remain with me for my entire life as I continue to dance. Another part of my life that has affected my identity is my group of friends. I switched elementary schools when I was in 2nd grade and the friends that I made there are still my best friends today. It truly amazes me everyday that my friends have been able to stick together all this time. Each one of us participates in a different sport/activity so it would have been very easy for us to drift apart and not stay as close. We did not choose the easy option. We fought for our friendship and we will continue to fight for it forever. The love and care my friends and I share will always be a part of my identity. Another crucial part of my identity is the love I share with my family. My parents give me a speech every year before the first day of school telling me that no matter whhat happens at school, I will always be loved unconditionally at home. This exemplifies how much they care about me. My siblings have been my best friends for my whole life. Our fights never last more than an hour before we are back to laughing and having fun. My brother could have been mistaken for my parent during my junior year of high school as he cared so much about the college process and my SATs. When I asked him why he cared so much he replied simply, "I just want you to be happy." I tell my sister everything and we can act completely ridiculous around each other without a problem. My family is a part of me that I will never let go.