Linking up with This Ain't the Lyceum for 7 Quick Takes.
Next week is another round of NFP Awareness Week!
Next week is another round of NFP Awareness Week!
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| I'm totally on theme this year, Yeah! |
So often it can feel like you are the only couple in your parish/town/state/world trying to get NFP to work for you. It's tough - but it really doesn't have to be.
I've got some new NFP couples for you to meet. Real people walking this walk.
I've got some new NFP couples for you to meet. Real people walking this walk.
Check back next week to read their full stories!
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| photographer: Maria Kanevskaya Garcia |
Josh: I am a newlywed, mechatronic engineer, and looking forward to starting a family. I am not Catholic, and don't consider myself religious, but I am supportive of wife's faith. We recently transplanted from Berkeley, CA to Portland, OR, and are exploring all that our new city has to offer.
Amanda: I am a new wife, visual artist, and recently "reverted" Catholic, returning to the Church in 2015. I'm able to be a homemaker and focus full-time in the studio making drawings that merge the fascination I discover from drawing dead insects and the beauty I encounter within the Mass. I'm inspired by the "way of beauty" and I want to bring Christ to the culture and to our home.
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We met at a teacher training six years ago with each a son from a broken past. He taught Phenomenology and Biodynamic Agriculture at Rudolf Steiner College where I came to study Waldorf education. David stayed 20 years prior at a Zen Buddhist monastery, then studied sustainable agriculture and beekeeping, and had high dreams of becoming a monk. I grew up in Louisiana and was a very happy Montessori preschool teacher who went on a quest to expand her early childhood knowledge and turn it into mission work for impoverished families. We both grew up in Christian homes, David Catholic and I protestant. We both were still searching for more. Catholicism felt like coming home for both of us- it literally swept us off our feet. David is now a religion teacher at a Salesian High School and I am home with our two new little ones :)
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I am a 26 year old Catholic wife and mother (little girl, 15 months). My husband and I got married the summer after we graduated college and then moved across the country to start our lives together. Since then we have experienced many adventures such as living in Germany and having our first child. Like any other couple we have also experienced sadness. During our first year of marriage We experienced the loss of a child (my first pregnancy).
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If you're just dying to read an NFP story RIGHT NOW, go over and get to know Erin and Alex who were awesome enough to let me tell their story when I had only been blogging about a week.
Like 8 days. Thanks y'all!
Like 8 days. Thanks y'all!
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Here's what is happening with Erin and Alex now:
Our lives have changed quite a bit in the last year! Erin finished her Ph.D. and we moved to Southeastern Idaho for Erin to start her post-doc. This shift in employment for her meant that we could officially change our status from "trying to avoid" to "trying to whatever" (although Erin continues to chart because she loves data)! We hope to finally start a family soon but are patiently waiting on God's timing.
In the meantime,we're also listening for any word on how to use our spiritual gifts (or develop new ones!) during our time here in Idaho. There are not many Catholics in this part of Idaho and there's just one parish in our town. There also seems to be a shortage of NFP instructors according to our cursory research, which has definitely caused us to reflect on whether we can help with that. Whatever the next year holds for us, we plan to keep telling others about the many benefits of NFP!
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Erin and I were reminiscing this week about how we came to realize we both did NFP.
Even in our safe, supportive, Catholic circles the subject did not come up. We only figured it out when one of us brought up an article from the Family Foundations magazine the Couple to Couple League publishes.
Here's some thoughts on why we need to get more comfortable about getting personal.
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All of these couples are people I met through either the young adult group at our parish or through Endow.
We will be starting up our newest study in September on the Dignity and Vocation of Women (Mulieris Dignitatum). It focuses on the Anthropological and Theological foundations for women in the Church in a very approachable way.
AKA. right up my alley!
These groups have been some of the best faith sharing opportunities I've had in my adult life. If there is an Endow group in your area, I really recommend you check them out!
Thank you! NFP is very, very lonely. I literally know no one IRL who does it...besides our instructors.
ReplyDeleteOne year during NFP week, my husband asked our priest if we could give a short testimony about NFP after Mass during July. My husband spoke (I was busy with our kids...go figure).
DeleteFor the next few weeks people approached my husband to say that they used NFP as well. Granted these people were a generation above us, but it still was nice to know we weren't alone. Before the talk, we pretty much figured we were. It's such a personal thing, that it's just not talked about.
That's great y'all got to share your story in the parish!
DeleteIt really does help so much to hear that other people are doing this too. I've also found more people are open to the idea than you would think, but like us they have assumed no one like them would use NFP.