Semester 4 Week 6

          In the fall of 2011 (last semester) I took REL 320 which is the Sacraments class.  This class was very essential in helping me achieve these objectives of accessing, gathering, organizing, and using information from different sources.  In this class we learned how the Sacraments have changed from before the Second Vatican Council and how they are now and the communal function they serve.  The basis of the class was the students had to write a term paper that had the students doing different writing processes throughout the semester.  The basis of the paper was to focus on one or a few of the Sacraments and discuss how there was a communal aspect to them.  So for example my thesis was: “This symbolization of the sacrament (marriage) emphasizes a communal aspect that is essential for the health of the marriage and the community that surrounds it.  This communal aspect is shown in Christ’s command for us to love our neighbor, the Holy Trinity and the relationship between the three Divine Persons, and procreation which is one of two goods of marriage.”

          This paper had to be around at least 12 pages long.  To achieve this length and to support my thesis I had to be able to do all of those objectives listed above.  The final draft of my paper had 13 sources in the bibliography, but I looked at many more than that for the research of my paper.  To start off we had to do an annotated bibliography at some of the sources we first looked at.  While I personally do not enjoy doing annotated bibliographies because they are tedious and take forever, it was very helpful because it helped me narrow down what types of books and articles to look at more in depth.  Besides all the different drafts of bibliographies we had to do, we also had to make a chart on how all of our evidence connected using a concept map tool.  This was one of the most helpful things we did to organize all of our ideas and small tidbits of information we had gotten from many different sources.  It showed me how in some places my ideas and evidence were very well connected and then how in other places I needed more evidence to make a good connection.

          As I said before my final draft of my paper had 13 sources.  I used the most variety of sources I have ever used before in a paper.  I used papal encyclicals, journal articles, books, textbooks used for some of my other classes, the Catholic Rites book, and the Catechism of the Catholic Church.  The variety of sources, while time consuming to read through, really made my paper dynamic and gave a plethora of viewpoints and connections.

          Something that I think could have been changed to make the class more effective in reaching the objective that majors can access, gather, organize and use information from important primary and credible secondary sources is the peer review process.  In every step of our paper we were peer reviewed and I did not find this very helpful especially for the portions about the sources we were using.  While I like the idea of a peer review, most of the reviews given to me were very generic and there was not a lot of effort or insight put into them.  I know the professor does not have the time to go through each step of the process and grade students on their different steps, but I think there has to be some way to make students do better a better job at peer reviewing.

                  

First Semester After Declaring Major (By Week 11)

I feel like the most educational and rewarding class I have taken in my time at Loras so far would have to be World Religions with Dr. Waldmeir. Now, I could say that it was the amazing people in my class that did it, but it was a lot more than that. I did not really know a lot about many other religions besides Catholicism before taking the class. Yes, I knew all of the obvious stereotypes about the different faith traditions, but that did not mean anything to me. Throughout the entire course I was able to read and discuss different faith traditions, and then after the class was done reading and discussing we actually got to go to the worship spaces of these faith traditions and get hands-on experience about what the tradition is really about. These fieldtrips are where I learned the most during the course. It not only gave me a deeper understanding of the faith tradition but a greater reverence and respect for them as well.

Even though I was learning about other faith traditions during this course, I was able to also come to a greater understanding of my own faith. I was able to learn more about who God is, not only to me but to everyone else around me. I was able to see God in a bigger sense because I was able to take Him out of this “Catholic box” that I have had Him in all of my life. I was able to see God more fully as the God of the universe and the God of ALL peoples around the world. Of course, I still hold my Catholic faith at highest regard, and I know that the Catholic faith is the truest form of worship of God on earth. However, I was able to see that God shows Himself differently to different people in the world. I was even able to see God when we studied the Hindu tradition which has over 300 gods. You see, the Hindus have a belief that there is an overseeing force in the universe that keeps everything together called Braman. This Braman is how the Hindus explain God, and all the other 300 gods are the different attributes and characteristics that our God has. After taking the World Religions J-Term I am able to understand, not only the other traditions that we studied, but God Himself in a greater light.

I do not know if there are a lot of things that need changing about the course. I would say that maybe there should be a bit more structure in the way the fieldtrips are planned out so that we are visiting a place that we are studying at the time we go on them. I think we only had that problem once throughout the course, however. I would also think it would be a good idea to try and fit in another faith tradition to study or alternate which ones are studied throughout the years in order to add some more variety.

My first post!

I'm creating this blog for my religious studies major. I am rather late on creating this blog. Technically it was supposed to be put together in October. Better late than never, right? Right.

Alright, now for my assigned questions:

What do you expect or hope to learn as a Religious Studies major?

I expect to learn about more about my faith. I hope to learn more about people and how to teach them about faith. I really want to be able to bring people closer to Christ through my work in the world.

Where do these expectations come from?

I suppose these expectations come from the whole reason I’m majoring in Religious studies. I want to share my faith with others and bring them closer to Christ. I’m not really sure where that desire came from. When I was in high school I would go to Youth Days and other events. I was blessed to be in a group where the cool thing was to be Catholic. My family is also very Catholic. I guess I can’t imagine life without my faith.

During my first semester at Loras College I took the class Intro to Theology and Religious taught by Dr. Osheim. I loved it, especially the journaling. I already keep a journal, but having to write journal entries about what I was learning in class really helped me connect my life with the themes and ideas I was learning in class. I was really amazing how much I saw my life connect with what I was learning. The second class I took was Bible and Literature taught by Dr. Waldmeir. I also really enjoy that class because it connected the Bible, which I’ve read and heard all it life, with real life situations. Finally, the most recent class I have taken is Catholic Social Teaching with Dr. Shadle. I learned a lot of the recent issues during the Church.

Perhaps one the best aspects I’ve learned so far in this religious studies major is how my life connects with the Church and its teachings. The Catholic faith is so deep and full of beauty. In the future, I hope throughout the rest of my years at Loras I can learn how to show others the beauty I have been blessed to see.

Alright, so that pretty much all I can think of saying at the moment. God bless!