Joe Kainz

January 6, 2008

Junior Theology- Faith

Three Main Things Learned During Junior Faith

1.         The first thing I want to take with me from this first semester of my Junior Year was what it really means to have faith. One can say they have faith in God, but do they really mean what they are saying? Do they take time to consider what a huge commitment that really is? Essentially what they are saying is "I trust and believe this with my entire heart, mind, and soul," and I am not sure they realize this. This definition had a huge impact on me when studying Faith these first two quarters. I think sometimes I just said I believed in God solely for the sake of believing in something. I never really took time to consider the possibility that I could be wrong, or that there were alternate ways to live. This religion, which has been part of my life since I was three months old, was, to me, the only way to live. I did not take time to actually ask myself if I really believed what I saying right after the Gospel. Did I really believe that that bread and wine was the body and blood of Christ, or did I just believe it because I was told to? I did not question these things. In Nietzsche's eyes, I would just be another one of the sheep or slaves. This course has really inspired me to reflect on these aspects of my religion. This reflection I think can only help me in the long run.

2.         The second main thing I want to remember from this course is the Right Speech Experiment. This really opened my eyes to how much humans are willing to fool themselves into thinking they are still good people. This is a huge obstacle in faith. One cannot continue to believe they are leading a good and honest life when, in fact, they are just deceiving themselves and those around them. This really was a small metanoia for me. I realized where I was lying and where I would not tell whole truths. After pin-pointing these problems, I feel like I have made considerable progress in cutting back on the lies and the euphemisms and anything else I would use to protect me from the harsh reality, that not everything is exactly how I want it to be. However, by facing this reality, I feel like there is more room for me to mature, and, hopefully, this leads to a greater capacity for Faith.

3.         The last main thing I want to take from Junior Faith is that being Catholic, or any religion for that matter, is not always going to be easy. Throughout grade school, religion class was a breeze. It was just the memorization of key biblical figures and learning the sacraments. Freshmen and sophomore year were not much different. They were basically a review of everything I learned in grade school. Faith, however, was the first class where I really encountered some deep questions, ones that made me think, question, and reflect. This course was the first one in the Religion/Theology subject where I realized I was not automatically going to get an "A". The course Faith is not the only hard part. Faith outside of school will be difficult too. There will be times where I will have to defend my beliefs, and if I do not have Faith, this will be a very difficult task to accomplish. Many things will test my Faith in the future, especially when I get to college. Will I continue to go to Church without parent encouragement? Will I continue to practice my faith as an adult? These are the types of questions that await me in my future, and I believe this course has prepared me well so that I can make the right decision when it comes time to answer them.