Ancient Wisdom for a Modern World
In several social studies classes in high school and college, my teachers and professors would inevitably broach the topic of culture: what it means and what role it plays in shaping our individual actions and historical events. The textbook definition of culture is generally unsatisfying. It incorporates elements like beliefs, behaviors, traditions, etc., but I
Judaism is not a proselytizing religion, which means they don’t actively seek converts. You need to be born to a Jewish mother, or go through a rigorous conversion process that will weed out those who aren’t serious about converting. For this reason, I wasn’t sure how welcome I would be to the community. Christianity is
As part of my Judaism month, I am practicing “Daf Yomi” which means I’m studying one one page of Talmud per day. The Talmud is difficult to explain, but basically, it is a group of rabbis debating what pieces of the Torah mean. It’s like a blog post with comments that span a thousand years.
Yesterday, I attended my first Minyan. I arrived at the Synagogue at 6:55 AM. By the time it was 7:15 AM, I realized that Minyan didn’t actually start until 7:30. Other people started rolling in a few minutes later and of course, they were curious about why I was there. I have a few guesses
I’ve never really felt the need to be a part of a group. For example, I’m from the Boston area, which of course, means I’m supposed to be a Red Sox fan. Nominally, I’m a fan, but honestly, I don’t really care about baseball. The thought of going to a baseball game with thousands of
Hail Mary full of grace, my Catholic month is over! To be truthful, I’m actually a little bummed it’s over. I benefited quite a bit from going to Mass and participating in the Ignatian Spiritual Exercises. Here’s my assessment of my Catholic month. Love/Compassion For my Catholic month, my goal was to become a more
Yesterday’s spiritual exercise asked us to read the introduction to the Spiritual Exercises, which is titled the “the first principle and foundation.” It states that humans are meant to “praise, reverence, and serve God our lord” and as a result, “save their souls.” It then goes on to state that everything else in the world
Mass This past week I, unfortunately, wasn’t able to attend Mass everyday as I planned. Georgetown University was on Spring Break and wasn’t holding the 10 PM Mass that I usually go to during the week. This did give me an opportunity to attend a very interesting Mass at another church I’ve been attending. In
During this week’s spiritual exercises, my thoughts keep drifting back to my day job. It’s clear I need to put more effort into sorting this mess out. During my Stoicism month, I did my best to cultivate detachment from everyday work annoyances. That was mostly successful. However, there is this constant, nagging feeling that I’m
Do you have that Facebook friend (or friends) that seem to have their life figured out? They went to an amazing college, got an amazing job, traveled to amazing places, got an amazing boyfriend/girlfriend, and are hitting all of the important life milestones without fail? It seems like they are 100% sure of the path