Life is Good

First, Matt made the experiment from the last blog (rotating leg and drawing the number 6) have spiritual significance. Good stuff! Check it out! Woo-hoo! :D

Second, school went well today. Fabulously well, in fact. Rather like remembering how to swim or ride the proverbial bike. No one seems to be (thus far) fabulously belligerent, which is quite the opposite from how last year started out! The cards seemed to go well - we played a few "let me see your personality while we have fun and I memorize your names" games with the seniors - talked about the Sacraments with the Sophomores - and....

I came up with a metaphor. Yup. Another one.

Right, so we're toodling through our intro to the Sacraments and we hit marriage. Always one of the favorites for a Sophomore class. (Oy - wonder why. ;P) Anywho, so the usual questions come up beginning NOT with promiscuity but with homosexuality, and in the first period I answered and deferred until we actually go over the sacrament of marriage (three whole weeks of it. At least. I've the answers now, but these things are best kept in their place. Really, rather like the conjugal act itself!). With the second class however, I headed them off at the pass and began so:

STUDENT: But aren't "they" trying to make [same-sex "marriage"] legal now?

ME: Yes, there is a movement both for and counter to that. But simply because something is legal, does that make it right?

STUDENTS: (resounding) No! (They're quick learners and can see a trick rhetorical question a mile off.)

ME: Good! Look at slavery. For milennia it has been legal throughout our world. That has never made it right. So too in this situation. Moreover, marriage exists sacramentally as its own entity apart from legal proceedings. It fundamentally cannot be changed.

ME THINKING: Hmmm, heap big words. Try one more time.

ME: It's like this. (I hold up my hand.) This is my hand. I call it a hand. You call it a hand. It has all the properties, functions and rights of a hand. It is a hand. But let's say that I decide to go to the Supreme Court and force them to pass a law that states that my hand is no longer a hand but a fish. Further, the law now states that everyone must call it a fish and accept it as a fish. No one can stop me from bringing my tank with me wherever I go (puts down hand as though it's draping over the side of an exotic fishtank replete with diving bubbly men), filled with purified oxidized water, and with the further right of being fed fishfood twice a day. Further, no one is to mind while I wave my hand around (makes fishy tail motions with hand) because this is not a hand, it is legally a fish. Now, look at me. Is my hand a fish?

STUDENTS: (laughing at their weirdo but at least fun-to-watch-the-antics-of teacher) NO!

ME: ExACTly! No more can congress or any man change marriage. It exists independently of them. It has been, is and will always exist as a sacrament between ONE man and ONE woman! Not a man and a man, not a woman and a man, not a man and his dog, not a man and his potato...

STUDENTS: (shocked laughs at such a ridiculous image-idea)

ME: ...not one woman and five men, not one man and five women....

STUDENT: Like that weird guy down south?

ME: ...you got it. Now, who marries the man and woman.

STUDENTS: (in chorus) The priest!

ME: Wrong!

STUDENTS: (Confused gasps. That'd been a pretty solid answer up until now.)

ME: The man confers the sacrament on the woman, the woman on the man. They give the sacrament to each other. BUT the priest is there in...what ladies and gentlemen?

STUDENTS: (Chorally - more sure here, it's on the board already after all) In persona Christi.

ME: Which means?

STUDENTS: (Rote can be a wonderful thing. If they don't pass the I-am-an-evil-ogre-of-a-teacher-fear-me quiz on Monday, it's not my fault) "In the person of Christ."

ME: Excellent. The priest is in persona Christi, "he is doing his greatest work when he is not even himself," Christ is there and sanctifies and blessed and solidifies the marriage. And so you need five people minimum for a marriage: the priest, two others...

MALE STUDENT: (tentatively) Best man and best woman?

FEMALE STUDENT: (smugly) Maid of honor.

ANOTHER STUDENT: But that's three.

ME: And the couple.

ANOTHER STUDENT: Ah. Right. Sorry.

Yes, mesdames et monsieurs, all is well with the world. Life is good. Students aren't jumping down my throat or attacking me as though I were a missionary in cannibal country. This is good. And we came home and were not exhausted, and this is good. And paternal unit realizes he must leave downstairs by 11 p.m. so insomniac daughter who must be up at unreasonable hours of the morning can sleep so she won't oversleep and this is good. And I am wearing my fun John Lennon hat and just returned from B&N where Pete and I went and bought several Catholic resource books as well as The Case for Christ and this is good. And my new shirt is warm and the house is cold and this is good. And Johnny Depp is going to be in Once Upon a Time in Mexico and this is good. And September 19th is Talk Like a Pirate Day (info courtesy of Matt as well, and this is very good. And we are off to prepare for tomorrow, and while this is good but not quite so good, the end of it holds the promise of curling up with Pointe magazine and looking at pretty ballerina pictures with ideas of movement and gesture for Midsummer Night's Dream...and that is very good!

Mood: Good! Thanks for asking.
Music: The quiet susserations of the computer accompanied by the cricket.
Quiz for the Day: Honestly, can't one enjoy classical flowy things without being "Goth?" Oy. Perhaps one might call it cultured? Silly thing. Here it is though:


You are a.. GOTH! You're sick of the wannabe freaks
ruining the scene and making your angst seem
superficial. You thrive on the darker aspects
of life, have an interest in classic literature
and poetry, and probably get a kick out of
Halloween. ("No.. that's not a costume,
d***it!")


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