Theology and Go Karts

It’s back to a Lent-as-usual after the most glorious and splendid feast of St. Joseph, husband of Mary! Here in the residence, we celebrated the feast in most fitting fashion—for dinner, I entered the dining room, only to find an amazing three course dinner! Sitting down at the table, clad with white tablecloth and flower-decorated napkins, I was pleased to find pork roast, potatoes, and olive hors d’oeuvres. Accompanying all of this was a fine French wine. For dessert, we had an amazing coffee and chocolate torte, filled with vanilla crème, peaches, and topped with grapes—quite amazing. All this, of course, was after I had come back from a long and tiring day, making it all the tastier!

Most Mondays are quite busy and tiring. I am trying to check out a few books from the famous Jagiellonian Library, but I am beginning to think that they are not famous for their manuscripts, the medieval collection, and for their building, but for the most possible bureaucracy that there could be in one place at the same time! Last week, my program, the Interdisciplinary Program in the Humanities and Social Sciences, was supposed to send a list of their students to the library, so that we could receive library cards that enable us to check out books and other materials. So, after waiting for half an hour in line, I came to the counter, where I was kindly informed that I couldn’t receive a library card, since I am not on any list that they have. Quite frustrating, considering that I have to check out a few history books and write a paper on them! Unfortunately, I am not surprised by the fact that it is so hard for me to get anything “taken care of.” The word for “taken care of,” zalatwic, probably only exists in the Polish language with the connotation, which it implies: a way of “taking care of things” somehow, though it seems impossible with all of the bureaucracy and obstacles. We use this word to talk about “taking care” of paperwork, or bureaucracy somewhere, or to “take care of someone” (in the negative sense, like getting rid of them, or preventing them from getting in my way). Anyway, the word is probably closely linked to the other Polish saying, “Polak potrawi,” which means that a “Pole is always able to.” This refers, cynically, to something completely absurd that somebody did, or it refers to the often-ingenious ways that people are able to get something done, despite all of the difficulties. Sorry for the slight tangent. What I WAS saying, is that it is not surprising that it is sometimes hard to deal with getting basic things done here, because there are still many remnants of the old communist system. Many public institutions (such as the Jagiellonian Library) have not yet out-grown the old mentality of slow, inefficient, sluggish functioning. The library collection is not yet centrally catalogued (anything before 1990 has to be looked up in an index file), and the efficiency of the workers there is less than admirable. But, hopefully as the new generation grows up in a country and society free from the scourge of communism, the way that things function will slowly change. However, knowing how American bureaucracies function sometimes, I am not too hopeful, and also cannot blame the people here too much. I won’t even get into how “fun” it was to change my major at Notre Dame…

My classes are going well, and I am enjoying them a lot. I have started teaching English, as a private tutor, to two students. One man is a contractor, who will be going to the United States in a month, and has never taken English. He wants to learn the basic skills needed to communicate. My other student is my friend Kasia, a doctoral student and the director of the Tertio Millennio Institute. She is one of the last of the generation that was required to study Russian in schools, so she never learned English formally. I will also be leading a “Native Speaker Discussion” here in the house on Tuesdays, providing an opportunity for those who know English to practice it.

A few classes ago, we had fun in my Polish class by talking about various crazy things in the Polish language. For example, people always complain about how many consonants are found in a row in Polish words. Well, here’s the word that has the most consonants in a row: wszczniesz, which is a way of saying “beginning.” Also, the longest grammatically possible word is: Konstantynopolitanczykiewiczowna, which would be a “young woman whose father’s last name derives its name from the city of Constantinople.” Weird.

I am also enjoying my theology courses a lot. Last week, I was the “highlight” of one of my lectures, and felt like a specimen to be observed and questioned at a freak show. No, seriously now. Father Kupczak, the Dominican professor of my Theology of the Body course had asked me to prepare a short (fifteen minute) presentation on the state of marriage and the family in the United States. He asked me to present my thoughts for the reasons that marriages and families are falling apart, and to also explain why I think that the Theology of the Body is the solution to these problems. Of course, this being one of my favorite topics and my passion, I jumped on the idea, and prepared a short presentation, discussing the problems, as well as presenting some statistics. My presentation went well (ended up being about 20 minutes), but then the floor was opened for questions. Before we knew it, the ENTIRE lecture was over, and I ended up being in front of the class for an hour an a half, answering questions about the United States, the Church in the US, as well as listening to thoughts of the Polish students about the state of the local culture here. The class was very fruitful, and concluded by Fr. Kupczak saying, “Now, I’m not going to hide it from you all. My goal is to begin an institute, or some sort of organization of groups that are devoted to spreading the Theology of the Body throughout Poland.” He praised the United States a lot for the serious discussion and reflection that is being carried out in our country “about what went wrong, and how we can fix it.”

Particularly interesting and enlightening was Fr. Kupczak’s discussion of consumerist materialism. Having received his doctorate at the John Paul II Institute for Marriage and Family Life Studies in Washington, D.C., he is quite familiar with our cultural situation. When some of the student’s questioned the real impact of “materialism and consumerism” on the make-up of families and family life, and asked about how it could have such a profound effect, Father explained the huge difference between American consumerism and Polish consumerism. Particularly interesting was his criticism of some clergy in Poland who constantly attack materialism as the source of evil. Sometimes, in Poland, those who are deemed “materialists” are simply those people who want to ensure a decent standard of life for themselves, which, given the cultural climate, is very hard and requires very much work. Thus, always criticizing materialism in Poland may not be the solution to the culture’s problems, since there is maybe about one percent of the population that is actually rich enough to spend freely. Otherwise, most people must struggle very much to make ends meet. The constant spending and “having” mentality of the majority of Americans is hard to understand for many Poles. For example, it often happens (I know this from personal experience), that the poor in the US would rather go without food than a cell phone, trendy clothing, or a nice car. It is a matter of priorities. We live in a culture that is so entrenched in a spending and “acquiring mentality,” that often people are willing to forego basic necessities in order to “fit in.” In Poland, it is a struggle to even make enough money for the basic necessities, and if somebody might have a car or two, a nice apartment, and a comfortable life, then there might be more of a tendency to dub such a person a “materialist,” even though he is simply living a basically comfortable life, below that of American standards of a “comfortable life.” Given his distinction between the “Polish materialism,” and “American consumerism,” I think many of the students were better able to see how American materialism breaks up families—from the very first years of a child’s life.

The presentation was very productive, I think, since man students were able to have questions about the “state of Theology in the United States” answered, as well as basic ideas about the culture, and how it pertains to marriage and the family. One thing that I have noticed is that Poles are much more closed than Americans. When asked about how one can “bring these intellectual concepts to the level of a basic ‘soccer fan’ in the streets,” I explained that many people in the United States give personal testimonies. Many speakers will often appeal to youth by telling their own stories of pain, betrayal, and conversion. This way, people can identify with the person speaking to them, who provides a good example and hope for the future (I am thinking in particular of speakers such as Dave Sloan, or Christopher West). However, the American “openness” seems to be a cultural trait that is lacking here. It would be very rare for somebody to write a book such as “Rome Sweet Home” by Scott Hahn, in the hopes of inspiring people with their personal story. There is a tendency to be more closed here, which is definitely a new concept to me, who am used to being among the “Notre Dame Family,” where everybody seems to know everything about everybody else (which can also not always be a good thing!) Overall, the class day was very encouraging, exciting, and we will have to see what comes of it in the future. Who knows—maybe somehow, I will be involved in the spread of the Theology of the Body in Poland, which is actually less known here than it is in the United States. As George Weigel said in Witness to Hope, “The Theology of the Body is a theological time bomb that will explode sometime in the beginning of the third millennium,” and it will change the way that we look at virtually every aspect of our faith!

As should be apparent by now, my time here is not only filled with classes and intellectual discussions. On Thursday last week, two of my friends from the residence and I went go-carting. It was a lot of fun, though quite scary, since I had never been on a “professional” go-cart. We paid to go for ten minutes, which seemed like a rip-off, and like not a lot of time at all, however, after the ten-minute race, I got up sweaty, tense, and my muscles ached! It is amazing how concentrated one has to be when going forty miles an hour, a few inches off of the ground, and around 180 degree turns. My arms were killing me from all of the vibrations on the steering column. It was very fun, however, and I am now prepared to go next time, with the knowledge of what to expect.

Last Friday evening proved a to be a very nice evening, since I went to the “marathon” of the above-described Lenten devotions at the Franciscan Basilica. Afterwards, a few of my new friends and I went to grab a quick coffee, and then…off to the Krakow Symphony for Schumann and Beethoven. The symphony is located right downtown, and of course, young Karol Wojtyla frequented the building as student. On October 15th, 1938, he took part in his first poetry reading in the building, which was the “Catholic House of Culture” before the war. There, he recited a few of his early poetic works, and won acclaim from many Cracovian families. Immediately after the war, the building also housed classes for the seminary for a few months, which Karol Wojtyla attended as a seminarian. It is amazing to think about all of the places here in Krakow that he visited, frequented, and was a part of. The thing that never ceases to amaze me is to think about all of the history that the buildings, themselves, have been witnesses to! There are entire books written within the stones, the bricks, the walls of these silent stone witnesses, immune to the tides of politics, war, and turmoil. Amazing.

On Saturday, I went to the Tertio Millennio Institute to a discussion on Pope Benedict’s encyclical, Deus Caritas Est. Though I could write a whole essay on my thoughts from the discussion, I won’t, for the sake of time! There were about eleven of us, and the topic of the discussion (which turned into a debate, at times!) was “Love: A gift, or a duty?” It was great to be able to hear the various perspectives and interpretations of the encyclical, from people ranging from theology professors to sociology students.

On Sunday, I attended another event at the Institute (which seems to be sucking me into more and more activities!) It was time for the monthly “papal Mass,” with a guest celebrant, this week, Fr. Nencek, the spokesman for the Metropolitan Curia of Krakow. After Holy Mass, four of us were able to have coffee with him, and informally talk to him about his job, and about diocesan events being planned. When Cardinal Dziwisz was elevated to the office of Cardinal, the Curia received 103 phone calls from world leaders, ambassadors, and others offering words of congratulations and best wishes. Afterwards, he put the phones off the hook! His job must be very stressful, involving constant travel, interviews, and requiring a spotless memory. He told us about the importance of having to remember “what he said where,” so that there could be no contradictory statements, causing controversy. What a job, and in a diocese like Krakow! He also told us about AMAZING plans for the commemoration of the death of our Holy Father, John Paul II, which will be remembered in a very special way here in Krakow. But, as to the details, I will wait to report on them when they happen—let’s just say: city-wide stations of the cross, and a live feed and address from Pope Benedict at 9:37 p.m. I’m excited to be here, and know that I am very blessed to be here during this special time!

Enough for now! I am going, as usual, out to pizza and (no) beer, since it’s Lent. Until next time, I’ll keep my eyes open for interesting and unusual things.