Words from Madeleine L'Engle and Dorothy Sayers

From A Circle of Quiet

A self is not something static, tied up in a pretty parcel and handed to the child, finished and complete. A self is always becoming. Being does mean becoming, but we run so fast that it is only when we seem to stop – as sitting on the rock at the brook – that we are aware of our own isness, of being. But certainly that is not static, for this awareness of being is always a way of moving from the selfish to the self—the self-image—towards the real.
Who am I, then? Who are you?

- Madeleine L'Engle




From Unpopular Opinions: Twenty-One Essays

Perhaps it is no wonder that the women were first at the Cradle and last at the Cross. They had never known a man like this Man. There never has been such another. A prophet and teacher who never nagged at them, never flattered or coaxed or patronized; who never made arch jokes about them, never treated them either as "The women, God help us!" or "The ladies, God bless them!"; who rebuked without querulousness and praised without condescension; who took their questions and arguments seriously; who never mapped out their sphere for them, never urged them to be feminine or jeered at them for being female; who had no axe to grind and no uneasy male dignity to defend; who took them as He found them and was completely unself-conscious. There is no act, no sermon, no parable in the whole Gospel that borrows its pungency from female perversity; nobody could guess from the words and deeds of Jesus that there was anything "funny" about woman's nature.

-Dorothy Sayers



I came across these excerpts this past quarter and I really like them. I think they really resonate with what I have been learning lately and things I have been discovering about myself and my faith.

Seattle Times Article

Ok, so I guess you have to have an account with the Seattle Times in order to read that article, so I'm cutting and pasting it in my blog instead :)




Watch my kick: The meaning of feminism in the 21st century
Saturday, May 22, 2004 : NEXT

By Julia Ugarte
NEXT team

I hate the term "kicks like a girl." But when I voice my distaste for it, someone inevitably asks me if I am PMS-ing or if I am a feminist.

Some of the topics I've chosen to address in my NEXT columns have also earned me the title in both a complimentary and derogatory way. Funny enough, I have never claimed to be a feminist and until now, have never really explored the possibility that perhaps I am.

But what does it mean to be a feminist in the 21st century?

I believe in equal rights and freedoms. I believe girls can achieve whatever they want. I hate being babied or treated differently because I'm a girl. I believe in being judged on merit instead of gender. I don't wear much makeup, and my hair used to be an inch-and-a-half long.

Do all of these point to the same conclusion, that I am a feminist? They have certainly all been cited at one time or another as characteristics of feminists.

What many don't realize, however, is that there are many different factions of feminism and, often, the stereotypical manifestations are lumped into this one term.

Before I claim ownership of this title, it's important to define in my own terms what it is to be a 20-year-old feminist in society today.

In my experience, "feminist" is a weighted compliment and often a left-handed one at best. When directed at me, it usually means that I demand a level playing field, that I am competitive with boys, and that I have strong opinions — and that somehow these are negative characteristics.

The word has permutated from a title into an accusation, and today conjures up images from bra-burnings to the contradictory and insulting "pop feminism/girl power" campaign.




Women are not infallible and men are not the enemy, at least not to me and the category of feminism I subscribe to. Around the world, women still fight against discrimination and oppression and for their sexual freedom and reproductive rights. Many strive against the pressure to value family over a career and still others endeavor to prove they are the equals of men in every respect.

These fights are not mine. To simply call me a feminist links me to all of these ideas, yet I cannot take credit for these battles. I choose what is relevant to my life and thereby define myself within the broad spectrum.

In the essay she wrote about her own novel, "The Left Hand of Darkness," Ursula K. LeGuin states, "I didn't see how you could be a thinking woman and not be a feminist," and I agree completely. I best describe myself as a "liberal feminist" as I believe in equal rights and freedoms.

Today feminist ideals have become so ingrained in social thought that every confident, discerning woman draws from the plethora of feminist traditions, whether she realizes it or not.

To me, feminism is no longer defined by radical statements; it is more of an intrinsic concept. The toughest battles were won in the past century, and because of the fighting pioneer women who came before me, this century can be devoted to women concentrating on cultivating themselves.

Feminism is about the ability to develop confidence, independence and strength, not as victims or angry women, but as our own beings.

"Kicks like a girl" doesn't mean what it used to. So what do you think of my kick now?

Julia Ugarte is a Seattle University junior. E-mail: NEXT@seattletimes.com






Copyright © 2004 The Seattle Times Company

The Seattle Times: Watch my kick: The meaning of feminism in the 21st century

The Seattle Times: Watch my kick: The meaning of feminism in the 21st century


I was reading the Seattle Times and came across this editorial that I thought was very good, and decided to share. So I hope you enjoy it!

(Hmm...I hope this link works...)

Iona, Scotland

I've been meaning to post about my plans for the end of the summer. Camp is done in the middle of August, so from August 29-Sept 10 I will be on a women's discernment pilgrimmage to the island of Iona, off the highlands of Scotland. Our Office of Campus Ministries is organizing it. There's about 18 women going, five of whom are either faculty or staff. Jennifer McKinney, my sociology prof from this past fall, is one of the faculty who's going. Bonnie Brann, the associate pastor at the church on campus is also going, along with two women from campus ministries and two other staff members. The rest of us are juniors and seniors. We meet every Thursday during the cadre hour to discuss our trip, learn more about Iona, etc. Then during the week we break into smaller groups to get to know one another and hang out a bit. We're going to keep in touch over the summer, as well. We have our itinerary and everything, which includes afternoons full of time for reflection, meditation, and solitude. We're also going to be learning more about Celtic Christianity and spirituality while we're there with the Iona Community.
The island of Iona is only about four miles around and there aren't any vehicles on the island, aside from a couple tractors. We'll be walking everywhere, including to and from the Abbey for morning and evening services. The hostel we've rented out for our group is an old white-washed farm house that sits on a cliff overlooking the sea and a sheep pasture. It actually takes 48 hours to get to the island, which in itself is an important part of the pilgrimmage and journey there. We'll be flying from Toronto to Glasgow, then taking a bus, a train, a ferry, another bus, and then another ferry to finally arrive on the small island.
I've promised to bring my flute along (not a difficult promise, seeing as it is attached to my hip) and work on some good Celtic music this summer. I've been visiting Lark in the Morning and Dusty Strings, two Celtic music stores here in Seattle, and have been talking with people there about music to use for leading worship and stuff. It's very interesting and right now is what I am the most excited about.
That's just a little about the end of my summer. There's much more, but I gotta go to bed now, so it will have to wait until another day!
Peace!

I Thought This Was Funny...

Hey, I read this on my friend Rhoda's door and thought I would share. Enjoy!

U.S. Ship: "Please divert your course 0.5 degrees to the south to avoid a collision."

Canadian Reply: "Recommend you divert your course 15 degrees to the south to avoid a collision."

U.S. Ship: "This is the captain of a U.S. Navy ship. I say, divert your course."

Canadian Reply: "No. I say again, you divert YOUR course!"

U.S. Ship: "THIS IS THE AIRCRAFT CARRIER USS CORAL SEA. WE ARE A LARGE WAR SHIP OF THE U.S. NAVY. DIVERT YOUR COURSE NOW!"

Canadian Reply: "This is a lighthouse. Your call."

Wild Times


Emily, Kelly, Sara (Roomie), Megan, Rhoda, and I all piled into Emi's small car and went and saw "Troy" last night. It was quite the evening. First we went to Ballard to see it, where it was all sold out. However, we were able to get advance tickets to the 12:01 showing of "Harry Potter POA", so it wasn't a total loss. So then we drove to Bellevue (across Lake Washington) to see "Troy," all the while discussing how old we were when we got the sex talk and exactly what it consisted of. Talk about a riot! Emi drove and Kelly navigated while we talked = we got really lost and ended up on Mercer Island. Yeah. So now I've been on Mercer Island! We got off the Island and back on 90 and into downtown Bellevue, where the line for the tickets was insanely long and the 9:40 showing of "Troy" was sold out. But dang it, we drove all that way and we were not going to leave without seeing "Troy!" So we went to the 10:35 showing instead. None of us had eaten in ages, so we all chipped in and got the huge combo deal where you get a medium pop, a medium slurpee, a large tub of popcorn, and free Skittles for 12.00. All all of it was refill-able. Haha, I just look back and laugh. It was great! So by the time the movie actually started, the six of us had been hanging out together for a good three hours or so and it had been crazy. At one point during the previews I leaned over to Rhoda and said "What movie are we seeing again?" The movie itself was pretty good. Since most of us has read The Iliad and The Odyssey , we were pretty critical. Some stuff wasn't exactly true to the book and some stuff just plain wasn't even in the book (like the first and last half hours of the movie), but it was pretty good nonetheless. I must say that I am not a huge Brad Pitt fan. However, he did make a pretty good Achilles. And I didn't really like how they portrayed Helen, especially since she was the only blonde woman in the whole stinkin' movie. Helen was supposed to be the most beautiful woman whoever lived and who launched 1,000 ships to sea and started the Trojan war. So "most beautiful" = blonde, eh? Hmm...

That was my exciting evening. We got home at 2am and I went straight to bed. Now it's a rainy Saturday and I'm feeling a nap coming on...

Dinner Cruise

I went on a dinner cruise of Lake Washington last night. SPU Alumni put it on for graduating seniors. Lael, my roommate, is graduating, and so Emily and I went as her guests. It was kind of a cloudy night, so there wasn't that great of a sunset, but it was still pretty fun. There was a jazz band, which was really cool. We did go past Bill Gates' house. Here are some of the interesting things we learned about it:

Only 40% of the Gates' mansion is visible (and is only visible from the lake). The other 60% of the house is underground. To get to it from the street, one must travel through a tunnel.

The house took 7 years and 109 million dollars to build. To make up for the seven years worth of construction noise, Bill paid off all the mortgages of his surrounding neighbors' homes and sent them all on a year long vacation (mind you, all of his neighbors are also very wealthy and have very impressive homes). His home is currently the most expensive house in America, but not for long. A 120 million dollar house is being built in Santa Cruz (I can't remember by whom), just to top the Gates mansion.

The home includes a 6000-sq ft 30 car garage. The home also has a home theater in it, where Bill can invite 75 of his closest friends to come and watch the latest flick. Oh, and he doesn't have to wait until movies come out on DVD, either. As soon as a movie is in the theaters, it is also in his home theater.

To maintain privacy around the home, Bill bought eleven of the lots around his home, nine of which have homes on them. The Gates' nanny lives in one of these homes.

There is a small beach on the lake front, which is odd, since none of the other homes on Lake Washington have beaches. That's because Mr. Gates has sand from the Caribbean flown in every week to replenish his beach. So a million years from now there will be large deposits of Caribbean sand in what used to be Lake Washington. Great.

The docks in Gates' lake property are made from purple African wood that is the densest wood in the world - so dense that it won't even float.

The home also features an extensive 2,100 sq. ft. library that includes a domed reading room with oculus (light well), fireplace, and two secret pivoting bookcases, one containing a bar. It's the fitting home for Leonardo da Vinci's 16th-century notebook, the Codex Leicester, which Gates bought for $30.8 million.

There are guest houses in the Gates' mansion. Upon arrival, each guest is given a computer chip, in which the guest programs what kind of music, artwork, and lighting they prefer, so when they walk through the door to their "home" all the plasma screen TVs are showcasing their favorite paintings, the stereo systems are playing their favorite music, and the lights are dimmed perfectly.

An artificial stream and wetland were designed in part to solve the problem of runoff caused by the retaining walls behind the house. It is stocked with salmon and sea-run cutthroat trout.

After all those mansions, I've decided that I would still rather live in a hundred year old farmhouse on a dirt road in the middle of nowhere. :)

It was a pretty fun cruise of the Lake. There were lots of other really old and amazing houses in the Gates' Medina neighborhood (I've decided that it would be a good neighborhood to babysit in). We also got to see some great views of houseboats, the University of Washington, crew teams practicing, and the city. We were amazed at just how emerald green everything really is!

Processing through lots of stuff...

My Intro to Women's Studies class has us thinking through lots of controversial stuff. This week we discussed human sexuality and hit on homosexuality. A part of me didn't even want to go there, I'm so tired of hearing all the debates. Yet the other part of me wants to discuss how the church is handling this not-so-black-and-white issue and what direction the church seems to be going with this. My prof made an interesting comment, saying that where you fall on your beliefs about homosexuality affects how you interpret Scripture, and vice versa. I guess what I get so frustrated about is the fact that the issue always ends up being an "us and them" issue. The categorization needs to come to an end, and all of us need to see one another as human beings with histories, intelligent minds, likes and dislikes, dreams, gifts, rather than just some bodies who are floating around and who are either "straight" or "gay." This isn't a black-and-white issue, and contrary to popular belief, the Bible is not completely clear on it. We as brothers and sisters in Christ need to start recognizing and treating one another as brothers and sisters. I guess here I could compare the issue of homosexuality to the issue of women in ministry. There are amazing, amazing Christians on both the most liberal and the most conservative sides of the women in ministry debate. And that cannot be forgotten. The same applies to homosexuality. There are some amazing men and women who are committed to Christ who are also homosexual. They are our brothers and sisters in Christ, they have God-given gifts and talents, and we can learn things from them. This, too, cannot be forgotten.

Falcon Duplex

That's right, next year Kari, Meagan, Sara, and I will all be living in the upstairs half of the Falcon Duplex, the number one 4-person apt on campus! Woot! It's actually the top half of a house, so it's much bigger than an apt: spacious kitchen and living room, 1.5 bathrooms, laundry room with washer and dryer (FREE laundry next year!), large pantry, three hall closets, and THREE bedrooms with closets. There's also a front and back door, a front porch, and a yard with flowering trees in it. Yeah. We're psyched. It's really exciting! We're going to need to get more couches next year so we can fill up all the space in our living room. Our living room has lots of windows in it, too, so that's really exciting. It's going to be nice and spacious and cheery next year. Yay!!

Well, I gotta go clean the bathroom and then I am going to watch a movie and do some homework. This week is just dragging on and on! Four weeks from today I will be packing up the last of my stuff and getting on a plane to Michigan for the summer. And four weeks from Friday I will be moving into my trailer at Cran-Hill Ranch for three months. Oh Lord, let it come quickly!!!

Back Into the Swing of Things

I'm back into Seattle and getting back into the swing of classes. Actually, I've been getting into the swing of four midterms and a paper this week. Sometimes I really don't like school! I took my women's studies midterm this afternoon, though. Priscilla (my prof) warned me that the rest of the class took a really long time on it and that she should have made the test shorter, so I thought I was prepared. Boy was I wrong. It took me a little over two stinking hours to complete! And complete it, I did! At least I think I know what she is looking for in regards to short answer/essay questions. I should know, considering this is the third class I've had with her. I think I did pretty well on it, though, with the exception of the short answer question on patriarchy. I defined it brilliantly, but then couldn't remember for the life of me what we read that discussed it. It completely escaped me. Ok, done thinking about the exam for now...

So last week I was in Michigan, helping my dear best-friend-who-is-closer-than-a-sister get ready for her wedding. She married Troy Galloway on Saturday and is now Kimberly Jean Galloway. It was seriously the greatest wedding that I have ever been to and in and I stood there with a huge grin on my face. I was beaming, I was so happy for them. Their wedding was the first wedding I have been to where I wasn't standing there thinking "Do you even know what you are getting yourselves into?!" It's so great and I am completely ecstatic for them. I feel like I have gained a brother-in-law, which is amazing. I told Troy at the rehearsal dinner that I've always wanted a bro. He thought it was great. The week was spent fighting the extreme cold and wind while tying sage green bows around vases, mason jars, and mini bottles of bubbles, shopping for food for the reception, setting up the reception site, the bachelorette party I threw for her, practicing the music I performed with Kim's sis, and just hanging out with my dearest friend. Kim and I had some really awesome conversations about life, love, marriage, sex, friendship, and family. I was constantly reminded of how very blessed I am that God has brought her into my life. We both were talking about how sometimes we wonder what God was thinking when God planned for us to be friends. Man, would I have liked to be there when that planning was under way!
I also had some really awesome time with Kristen, Andrea, and Holly. All of my closest friends in MI were at the wedding and reception, and it was so good to see them and catch up with them. I love them all so much. I had been needing a break from life out in Seattle and this break came at just the right time. It was good to see some wide open spaces, bright stars, the front lake, Great Blue Herons, swans, baby horses. Being serenaded to sleep by crickets and frogs was so awesome. And then there was the squirrel that was living in the walls of the cottage that woke me up at 5:45am and freaked me out. Yeah, that was interesting. Then there was this really pungent smell on Saturday after the wedding, I am wondering if that little guy croaked in the ceiling. Not good.

I should get going and do some more homework. I have a math test tomorrow and then my child lang. development midterm on Friday. And somewhere in there I need to write a paper!

Peace.