Guys, you'll never believe it, but school is done! I have narrowly escaped another round of the NBA draft by declaring student status, but that is one semester shorter now. My lowest grade was in intermediate French which makes me very angered but that's okay. I'll live. I will miss school, but I won't miss homework. I hate homework. You maybe wondering, "hey email guy, I'm pretty sure all you ever do is homework. What else are you possibly going to do to fill your day?" Well, well, well, let me tell you. I have two jobs: my office job and research post. The research is still quite hand wavy, I'm not really sure yet what exactly it is that I am supposed to do, but they do pay me. My office job is most exciting. I get to come up with projects for myself since there aren't very many existing ones to do. Today I started what might be my favorite one yet.
My work has two problems: one, we don't have a ton of documentation for what we do. It kind of relies on people teaching other people, and then knowledge gets lost. Two, I'm leaving at the end of the summer. I decided to solve both of these problems at once. I am writing and compiling documents that explain how to use all of the tools that we use and the processes that most effectively accomplish our jobs. Then, I am writing documents specifically about what I do and how I've found to best do things. Using those documents, I am training an AI assistant to answer questions about the documents. This way, when someone is confused and wants to know how to do something at work or where to find XYZ or how to accomplish some task, instead of searching through tutorials or asking coworkers who may or may not know what to do, they can ask my AI (proudly named will.ai.m) how to do it. It will then respond using the answers from the training documents that I gave it. As pointed out by my friend, I am trying to replace myself out of a job. It seemed to be working pretty well when I tried it out today, I just have to make sure it is actually referencing the document that I gave it.
In other news, there was an earthquake last night. Magnitude 3.9. I could barely feel it and apparently it caused a whopping $0 in damages.
I saw Revenge of the Sith in theaters. It was a wonderful occasion. I wore a suit and a clone trooper helmet. I was quite disappointed when the movie theater employee told me I couldn't wear the helmet because of the Minecraft movie riots.
I also learned this week that it is probably a good thing that I couldn't do Americorps. Our favorite elected official shut it down, cut $400 million of grant funding, and told all the volunteers that they would not be receiving a living stipend and would no longer be participating in the program. DC and 24 states promptly began lawsuits. We will see what happens with those. Hopefully I still get to go on a study abroad and that other world leaders don't go, "Hey, actually we don't want Americans here. Closed."
Easter was a crazy day for many reasons, but one stands out. No, not the fact that it was Easter, that happens every year (although still important to the Western religions). I'm talking about the fact that Pope Francis passed away. For those of you who know nothing about the Catholic Church, the Pope is even more important to Catholics than the prophet is to LDS adherents. Because of his death, a process must begin called the conclave. All of the authority figures, called cardinals, gather in the Vatican. They are sealed away from the outside world, with no technology, no face-to-face contact, no news, no nothing. They will then vote every day (usually takes about 2-5) until one candidate from amongst the cardinals receives a 2/3 majority. He is then declared the pope publicly from the balcony of St. Peter's Basilica. The longest conclave was 33 months, which marked the end of the Western Schism. This election is extremely important because it tells the world which direction the Church is moving. Pope Francis was notably more progressive than his predecessors, being more openly accepting of LGBTQ+ individuals and fostering increased financial transparency amongst the Church's highest levels.
There is an excellent movie that just came out. Conclave received multiple Oscars, and for good reason. The movie tackles complicated questions and shows the Catholic Church in a way that doesn't make it unblemished nor evil. It makes the Church human. I've been thinking about this lately, especially in the context of the church and the leaders that many of us are so familiar with. The thing that makes a person a good person or a bad person is what they choose when faced with a choice in which both options are equally as viable. Do they choose to minimize potential harm to others, sometimes at their own expense, and seek to maximize human connection and understanding? Or do they choose to look out for themselves and consider only what they might want? Even some, dare I say all, of the most incredible people make less than ideal choices. It is the context of those choices that makes the difference. If someone has had a life full of abuse, pain, and suffering, who are we to judge when they use substances as an escape from that? If I were in the same situation, odds are I'd make the same choice. If I were given the option to commit fraud and save $50,000 in taxes by listing things as business expenses with minimal chances of getting caught, would I? It depends on the context. If I'd been shady all along and had constantly been taking small amounts of money from my company, then I'm way more likely to do something bigger. If I had never really been in love with someone but didn't tell them how I really felt, instead continuing a half-in relationship for 18 months until I suddenly disappear and marry someone else, does that make me a bad person (thank you 500 Days of Summer)? Not necessarily, although I do side with Tom in that movie.
We are very quick to label someone or something as bad or good often because it is easier to fit it into our mental gestalt when we do. It is much harder to instead work to understand nuance and context and exigence to piece together exactly what something is worth to you. What is worth more than anything else to you may be worth nothing to someone who walks and talks just like you do, and that doesn't mean that either of you is wrong. This is the thing that I think is so often missed in religion, especially the faith closest to many of us. It doesn't have to be 100% accurate. It doesn't have to be right for everybody. It is okay to be a little bit skeptical and it is okay to not agree with things. The important part of any belief is what it does for the believer. If it motivates you to be less judgemental and care for those around you, then it is worth holding onto. If it prompts you to be more like the good person described above, then it is worth thinking about. If you find that belief making you less like that person and increasingly motivated by fear and habit, then you must reconsider what you believe and why.
Let me give you an ironically related example, almost an exercise, in how this is to be done. Consider this document: the Happiness Letter. I abhor the situation that was leading to the creation of this piece of writing. Reading it triggers a deluge of ugly emotions in my heart and I do not at all agree with most of what it says. I don't condone its use nor its creation, yet there is one line that I think is worth some consideration.
"That which is wrong under one circumstance, may be, and often is, right under another."
Let me be clear, I don't agree at all with how this statement is used in the context of the letter as a lousy attempt to write-off terrible and inexcusable behavior. However, I think this is a very valuable statement in terms of belief and making hard decisions. Crazy, isn't it? I don't agree with the source or any other part of it, yet I agree with one very small piece. It changes your whole perspective. Such is the power in a critical perspective. You can very carefully articulate what exactly you believe in and what you don't, instead of generally choosing vague yes and no's. I don't think it means that you are at all "straying from belief" or having "issues of faith", which aren't unique to our church, mind you. I think it means you are actually internalizing something which ought to be the entire point of religion, no?
I will close this email with a speech given in the movie Conclave. I found this speech to be remarkably poignant in the power it carries despite its brevity. It is delivered as a homily by a cardinal who desperately wants to avoid the papacy.
Let me speak from the heart for a moment.
St Paul said, 'Be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ.'
To work together, and to, er… to grow together, we must be tolerant.
No one person or… or faction seeking to dominate another.
And speaking to the Ephesians, who were of course a mixture of Jews and gentiles, Paul reminds us that God's gift to the church…
is its variety.
It is this variety, this diversity of people and views
which gives our church its strength.
And over the course of many years
in the service of our Mother the Church,
let me tell you, there is one sin,
which I have come to fear above all others.
Certainty.
(someone clears his throat)
Certainty is the great enemy of unity.
Certainty is the deadly enemy of tolerance.
Even Christ was not certain at the end.
(in Italian): My God, My God, why are you forsaken me?
(in English): He cried out in his agony at the ninth hour on the cross.
Our faith is a living thing,
precisely because it walks hand-in-hand with doubt.
If there was only certainty…
and no doubt…
there would be no mystery…
(whispering)
and therefore no need… for faith.
Let us pray that God will grant us a Pope who doubts.
And let him grant us a Pope who sins and asks for forgiveness,
and who carries on.
This speech captures, in essence, what is to me the root of a human religion. There would be no point in any religion, neither Judeo-Christian nor Near-Eastern, without the people who follow it. It is the people who spend their time thinking about, caring for, and loving one another that make religion worth it. If that's not happening, then it was for nothing anyways. Tolerance is a part of the growing seed and the tree and the vine and the water and all of those other living images that are conjured to help a reader understand the point of life itself. Tolerance breeds charity, charity breeds care, and care breeds love.
I apologize that I haven't written an email in a little while! It's been a busy last few weeks, but now I am free. Finals were killer. I am also much more able to respond to emails, so if you sent me something a while ago and I never responded, send me another email because I promise I want to check in.
I think that's all for now. Have a splendid week!
- will.ai.m's human counterpart
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