JE #7

                I come from a family whose roots have entwined with Catholicism as long as anyone can remember.  I was raised in a Catholic home by two Catholic parents, but the religion of my early childhood was more likely a cultural Catholicism than that of my adolescence when my family became practicing Catholics.  In growing older, I have become more comfortable with contemplating my religion and struggling with the points I don’t see eye to eye with.  The aspects of Catholicism I find empowering are the emphasis on love, understanding, and selflessness.  I embrace the ideas of serving others and aiming for a kind of innate respect for others that is not necessarily one’s first instinct.  I am grateful for the feelings of warmth, community, and - most of all - hope that I have enjoyed of in being Catholic. 
                Over the course of the past few years, I've come to dislike the way that members of the Christian community treat people of the LGBT community and the way people feel the right to judge someone else's love.  And because of this class, I've become a more critically thinking subject of the patriarchal structure that heads the Church.  I disagree with the factions of my religion which insist on judging others for their supposed sinfulness; I feel friction with those who refuse to look upon the wrongs of their own lives before deciding to point fingers.  I cannot stomach the stereotype (from Christians and non-Christians alike) that I do or should implant my religion in other people’s lives when it is unwanted.

                In all likelihood, my distaste for the aforementioned stereotype/expectation surfaces from the fact that, yes, for centuries, Catholicism and Christianity have been used to hurt people by means of oppression.  It deeply saddens me that something that has been so essential to me and my family can be used in such damaging ways.  I cannot say that I do have a concrete method for decolonizing my religion as an institution or its accompanying set of religious beliefs.  My only idea is to aim for a morality that honors my beliefs while respecting those of others.