Bowing Out

My job is a stressful one. I'm at the bottom of the totem pole, working for people who don't grasp how to do their jobs - much of my day is spent hunting them down and explaining to them over and over and over again that if I ask for a client's mailing address, I don't need an email address or the ad agency's address - I need the client's mailing address. Most of the people I work with are in the same boat, fed up with the unwillingness of our superiors to adapt and learn the new skills of a changing industry. This article is clearly satire (hello - The Onion!), but it rings very true to my experiences post-graduation.

Because much of my work life corollates rather closely to my personal life, my workday was punctuated this morning by a conversation with an old college friend, who is still finishing up his degree. He and I and many others struggled with the on-campus parish that was our home during our tenure there; priests, campus ministers, and pushy laypeople (primarily, as is the case with many Catholic churches, women) seemed determined to undermine the efforts of an increasingly-conservative student body to reform the lax practices and teachings of a liberal-town parish, and it has finally come to a head. Open hostility seems to be the modus operandi now, and letters are being sent to the priest (who is elderly, and affably but clearly opposed to doing anything, much less doing anything for the conservatives) and the bishop, in whom I have a lot of faith but also concern for his time and access to resources that might help resolve the matter.

It kills me that the Old Guard - those who came of age around the time of Vatican II and are steadfastly stuck in those times of misinterpretation and uncalled-for reforms - are unwilling to learn new mindsets, new skills, that would foster goodwill among all the different students that walk through the doors of that tiny parish. My superiors only make my job difficult; these "leaders" are beginning to tear down the foundations of many years of catechism and training and general social graces and tolerance. Maybe these "priestesses" should've given up SPEAKING for Lent.