Lauren Whalen is a freelance writer and performer living in Chicago. She reviews books for Persephone Magazine, movies for The Film Yap and plays for Chicago Theater Beat. Lauren’s work has appeared on The Huffington Post, the AIDS Foundation of Chicago’s award-winning Inside Story blog, and the ‘Hoods blog for RedEye, a supplement of the Chicago Tribune. Check out more of Lauren’s writing on Facebook and Twitter.

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I’ve been thinking a lot about religion. For many years I tried to avoid the topic. I grew up Catholic, have 13 years of parochial education, and a degree from a Jesuit university. I felt done.

But this is a year of my past coming back, through old friends, hometowns, religion, and the reevaluation of everything. A good friend is a liberal feminist Christian blogger; another, an outspoken atheist. There’s everything in between on my Facebook feed. I now identify as agnostic. I can’t get behind the Body of Christ anymore, but I’ve resumed my yoga practice for more than just the exercise. Many of my friends are also in their thirties, so perhaps we’re all reevaluating. Faith is deeply personal and often fraught.

I approached Lisa Takeuchi Cullen’s novel Pastors’ Wives with some trepidation. I was fascinated by the subject matter: what happens when a woman marries a man of God? How exactly does that relationship work, and what if her faith is significantly different from her husband’s? They still have sex, right? (Hey, I grew up Catholic. It’s a valid question.) Are all pastors’ wives as outspoken as Annie Camden?

Image credit: Plume

Like me, Cullen was raised in the Holy Roman Church and had no idea herself, until she wrote a Time Magazine article in 2007 about pastors’ wives, their lives and their growing social networks. Pastors’ Wives is a novelization of this article, focusing on three very different women in an Atlanta “megachurch.” Ruthie is the new girl in town: also a former Catholic (are you getting a theme here?), she and her husband lived in New York until he felt “the calling” and uprooted them South to serve as an associate pastor. Candace is the wife of Aaron Green, Greenleaf’s super-pastor who charms the masses, drives a Prius to reduce waste, and works with a rabbi and imam to foster positive interfaith relations. Ginger is Candace’s nervous daughter-in-law, deeply faithful but personally unsure: her pastor husband is away on mission trips more often than not, and Ginger lives in fear of someone discovering her torrid past.

I’m fascinated by the megachurch culture, but fearful too. Even just reading about it feels dangerous sometimes. Cullen did an excellent job of pulling me in as a reader while making me feel safe too. I immediately identified with snarky, questioning Ruthie, which was probably the idea: the book alternates perspectives among the three women, but Ruthie is the only one who narrates in first person. I could understand her confusion: in some ways, it’s cool to see people come together (really, that’s the main theme of The Book of Mormon musical), but at what cost? Greenleaf has an “ex-gay” group, but Candace also takes down a preschool teacher who tries to tell her grandson that dinosaurs didn’t exist.

Speaking of Candace, she’s a force. I loved how this character was written: she embodies an entire generation of women (religious or no) who don’t take any credit, but get stuff done. Candace is petite, pretty, and terrifying. She’s fiercely loyal to Aaron, her family and community. She cleans up huge personal messes and directs a fabulous Christmas pageant. I liked Ginger as well, and enjoyed seeing her journey from timid housewife to strong advocate.

I could not put this book down, digging in on the bus, in a hotel lobby waiting to meet a friend, in my armchair until the very last page. I didn’t agree with all the beliefs, but I loved these complicated characters, Cullen’s clear and precise writing style, the very fair portrayal of evangelical Christians and exploration of faith. The epilogue is a bit cliche — and I won’t give any spoilers, but Cullen could have used a better framing device — but at the same time, I liked how not every loose end was perfectly tied. The three women felt even more real, evolving, processing. Kind of like faith itself.

Pastors’ Wives is now available in print and ebook. Amazon | B&N

Notes

 Lauren was sent Pastors’ Wives free of charge, with no obligation to review.

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This post was originally published at PersephoneMagazine.com and has been crossposted with permission.

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This content is being published while I am out of the country, so my involvement in the comments may be limited until I return.

Note: This content is being published while I am out of the country, so my involvement in the comments may be limited until I return.

This content was originally posted in the summer of 2012. I got through the first season last summer before things got a little overwhelming. I’ll be returning to the series of posts this summer to see how much farther I can get, but first I’ll re-post the old content.

In high school, I was an X-Phile.

I started watching the show in 1997, when episodes were airing nightly on FX. I was a good Christian missionary back then, and I had it ingrained into my supple, evangelical brain that “things of the world” were bad, and that the X-Files was probably a thing of the world. My spiritual leaders had taught me that secular music and R-rated movies were a sin, so I definitely avoided those things at all costs. But despite having heard sermons about the evils of R-rated movies, MTV and Vh1, soap operas, REM (yeah, the band), and a handful of other fixtures in popular culture, no one had ever directly preached to me that watching The X-Files was sinful.

I let myself watch it, but mostly in secret. In case it was wrong.

I was fourteen, watching an episode from season two and an episode from season four every night. It was pretty difficult to get the story straight, but I loved it. I loved the tension between Mulder and Scully, loved the humor, loved the weird little stories. I even loved the ones about the occult, and it didn’t bother me to see Mulder and Scully go at it in their arguments about faith, God, belief, and doubt.

For a while I was pretty worried that my mom would find out I was secretly watching the show in the basement, and that’s why I slipped away every night around 8. Imagine my surprise when I finally screwed up the courage to watch an episode in the living room, and she liked it, too! In fact, so did my sister Karen, and eventually my little sister Sara, too. (I probably should have realized then that my parents’ version of fundamentalism was several steps less extreme than the fundamentalism I was being taught in youth group and on the mission field.)

Once I had the official parental okay, my love for The X-Files went from private to public.

I collected posters, action figures, calendars, books. I bought a hardcover book called The Unauthorized X-Cyclopedia, which indexed the first four seasons by episode, characters, themes, and places. I would put a new tape in the basement VCR every Monday and set the timer to record every night’s episode from FX. Then, during a long snowstorm in 1998, I went through my huge stack of VHS tapes, watched the first five minutes of every episode until I noticed a unique character name or location, looked up that reference in the X-Cyclopedia, marked the name of the episode on the videotape’s label, and got all of the episodes in order. (This would have been a lot easier with the help of the internet, but there is something kind of cute and quaint about a 15-year-old girl in basement during a week of snow days, nerdishly sifting through an encyclopedia ofX-Files episodes to organize her collection of VHS tapes.)

I posed with my X-Files collection for one of my senior photos. I drew a picture of Fox Mulder for an assignment in drawing class. I bought the show’s magazine from Suncoast whenever I saw it there. I discovered the awesomeness of the internet via fan websites, early versions of memes, and audio clip archives of great moments from the show. uring a missions trip abroad the summer that the first movie came out, I refused to let anyone spoil the film by telling me what I missed. The day after I got home from overseas, my sisters and I went to the Ski-Hi drive-in theater, the only place still showing the film, and I spent an hour and a half in X-Phile heaven and angst.

My love for the show stayed strong throughout the series’ run. Now that the show has been off the air for ten years, I have been revisiting old episodes.

I thought my blog would be a good place to chronicle my reactions to those episodes.What made me like them in the first place, when I was a good Christian teenager? Which episodes will stand up to time, and which will be wanti

ng? How would the episodes be different if they were filmed in the present and not 10-20 years ago? Might as well find out.

It must have been a really good Christmas that year–X-Files Barbies AND a sweet desk calendar.

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If things had gone as planned, I would not be in India when this post goes live. Instead, I would be taking care of a newborn baby right now. My due date was April 20.

I miscarried at eight weeks, during the first three days of the fall semester. The routine ultrasound on that Tuesday revealed a slow heartbeat, and instead of an 8-week fetus, there was something closer to the size of a 6-week embryo. When my doctor came in to speak with us, she said, “Hope for the best, of course, but prepare for the worst.” Her demeanor was kind. By Tuesday night I began to miscarry. I worked through Wednesday, walking slowly to my classes and introducing syllabi. My supervisor found out what was going on and encouraged me to take a few days off, and so I spent Thursday and Friday at home. My mom took care of Ruthie, and Chalupa and some dear internet friends took care of me. By Saturday, everything was over.

The pregnancy was a planned one, and yet I never felt connected to it. I wasn’t sick like I had been with Ruthie. I felt few, if any, pregnancy symptoms, and when Chalupa and I went in for the ultrasound, I said, “They’re going to find something wrong. I don’t think we’re going to have this baby.” Two weeks before that, when a best friend from college let me know that she was miscarrying, I didn’t tell her about my pregnancy for two reasons: one, I though it would be cruel to tell her during her miscarriage that I was pregnant, and two, I was pretty sure I’d be in her shoes before long.

At my follow-up appointment the next week, my doctor gave me six months’ worth of birth control pills, which I eagerly accepted. I knew for a fact that I was not ready to go through this again any time soon. I needed to figure out what it meant to go through a miscarriage before I was ready to be pregnant again.

What does it mean to have a miscarriage?

While I was miscarrying, several dear friends spoke up and shared their experiences with me. I got together with that college friend a few weeks later at Starbucks, and we talked about how our bodies and emotions were doing in the aftermath. I’ve seen friends fall apart after their miscarriages. I’ve seen others move on like little happened. I’ve had friends who count miscarriages as their “children in heaven.” For women whose pregnancies have been unplanned and unwanted, miscarriage has felt like a second chance at life. For women who have felt that a given pregnancy was their only chance at motherhood, miscarriage has been among the greatest tragedies of their lives.

It seems that miscarrying means something different to every woman who experiences it.

Because miscarriage is a uniquely female experience, I found myself asking: What does it mean, as a feminist, to miscarry? And: Does my worldview as a feminist affect my understanding and processing of my own experience?

Truthfully: my feelings about my miscarriage are not all very intense at this point. I was sad to lose the pregnancy, and the change in hormone levels in the weeks surrounding the event was difficult to navigate. I haven’t suffered any long-term side effects, and I didn’t even think of the lost pregnancy on what would have been my due date. I thought of it that week, sure, but the day passed without me even recognizing its significance. I don’t feel that I lost a baby, and aside from the first two weeks and a few acute moments in the following months, I felt little need to grieve my loss in the way that other women have grieved theirs.

I feel lucky that the pregnancy ended itself as early as it did. We hadn’t told out friends yet, and I certainly hadn’t made any announcements on Facebook. I accept the common wisdom that a miscarried pregnancy is often the result of an embryonic abnormality, likely a heart defect. I am grateful that I accepted the offer of an 8-week-ultrasound, because it was so comforting to know in advance what was going to happen–even if it was only four or five hours in advance.

It feels a little heartless to say all of this, especially when I think of my friends who have suffered so much because of their pregnancy losses. But this is my experience. The story of my second pregnancy goes like this: I was very excited, then very anxious, then very sad, then a little sad, then not sad anymore.

I’ve come to the conclusion that my understanding of this event as a feminist simply backs up my earlier understanding: that miscarriage is different for every person who experiences it.

As a feminist, I believe that life feels different to each person. What hurts me may not hurt someone else. What makes me happy is not going to make someone else happy. What devastates someone else may not even make me flinch. That’s why we find such joy in shared moments and mirrored experiences–because that feeling that someone else knows what we’ve gone through is such a special one that doesn’t come around all that often.

If I had not miscarried, I would not have been able to accept the position as the India trip leader. I wouldn’t say that that makes it worth it, but I would say that I recognize that every life circumstance is complicated. If there is a lesson I learned from my miscarriage–aside from the fact that the whole experience is generally shitty–it is that people’s responses to difficult circumstances should be respected, no matter what they are. The grieving woman who has lost a pregnancy should be free to mourn her loss in whatever way is best for her. The woman who is relieved to miscarry should not be made to feel guilty for that. The woman like me who is sad about the loss but not devastated, should be able to embrace the broad swinging pendulum of emotion that goes from “devastated” to “fine, thanks” without feeling like something is wrong with her.

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Dear Greg Garrison,

I listened to your radio show the other day. You were talking about Jason Collins’s decision to come out of the closet. You talked about how you don’t begrudge anyone the right to love anyone who they want to love, but you really don’t want to know who someone else is having sex with. You also said that Collins coming out of the closet was a selfish move of him and an attempt to get attention, which he got because the media is obsessed with him. You suggested that he’s trying to overshadow the rest of his team. You said you just don’t need to know that he has sex with men. You asked how parents are supposed to explain to their kids what it means when they ask at the dinner table, “Who is Jason Collins and what does it mean that he’s gay?” You don’t know why someone would need to come out in such a public way–it’s exhibitionistic and selfish and unnecessary, right?

There has been plenty said about Jason Collins‘s decision to come out. I’d like to address something you said in your show that you might not have realized was offensive, though.

You mentioned your wife.

That was it. That was the really offensive thing. See, I just don’t appreciate that kind of information about your sexual preferences.

I’m sorry, I just really don’t know how I’m supposed to handle that kind of arrogance and self-centeredness. I mean, I don’t begrudge you the right to love your wife. I’m sure she’s absolutely amazing and you have a great relationship with her. But do you really have to talk about that relationship on the air? I don’t know you personally, and I’d rather not know who you have sex with. It just seems really pushy of you, a radio host, to talk so openly about your sexual partner on the air.

I often listen to the radio in the car with my daughter. She’s three. What am I supposed to say if she asks me what a “wife” is? Obviously, just like you would answer that a gay person is someone who has sex with people of the same gender, I would have to answer that a wife is someone that a husband has sex with. What a nightmare! We clearly haven’t told her about sex yet–so why are you forcing this conversation on us?

Just keep it to yourself, Greg. Please. I don’t need to know you have a wife. That information is way too personal. It’s not like radio hosts with wives have been the victims of ongoing persecution in their field or anything. It’s not like aspiring radio hosts who want to have wives are bullied for that in school or anything. It’s not like radio hosts with wives are more likely to commit suicide based on that kind of bullying. It’s not like radio hosts with wives are expected to keep their wives secret or else they face being villainized by other radio hosts, tv show hosts, commentators, pastors, and bloggers.

You mentioned that you have gay friends, but they just don’t tell you about that stuff anymore than you talk about your relationship with your wife. Take a lesson from your gay friends, Garrison. Don’t talk about your relationship with your wife. It’s just so selfish to make a perfectly normal conversation about you and your sexual attraction to your wife.

Thanks,

A Listener

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She bought some supplies and came to the house one afternoon, and together with my Grandma, our good family friend Patti, and my sisters, we got the room painted in no time.

I didn’t just call her because she’s great at home improvement far more complicated than painting a room, but also because she’s the first person who offers to help someone when they need it. I can think of so many times that she has shown up to help one of us move or paint a room or clean out a garage. She patiently teaches us whatever it is we need to do, and when we screw up, she shrugs and says, “Eh, whatever, it’ll be fine. We can fix it.”

Some people are just generous–generous with their time and their kindness. That’s Tammy. Tackling projects with her is also fun because we can talk politics the whole time, supporting each other’s points of view with, “YEAH! You’re right! How can anyone think like that?” Whenever I want to know a teacher’s opinion on whether or not Indiana is still working to steadily screw over our education system, I know Tammy will tell it like it is.

We Boltzes are lucky to have Tammy as part of our family. Tomorrow is her birthday, and I’m posting this just a little bit early to say HAPPY BIRTHDAY, TAMMY!

I am a ridiculously lucky person.

Less than three months after I finished my MFA in Creative Nonfiction from the University of New Hampshire, I was hired as a full-time composition and creative writing instructor by my current employer.

I proctored my last final of the semester today, which means that I am officially done with my second year as a full-time college instructor. I get to go by the title “Professor Ranfeld,” and I have an office with a computer and shelves of books. Because I volunteered, the university is sending me to India this month to co-lead a group of seven awesome students. I have the option of taking the summer off and spending it with my daughter Ruthie.

It’s not an easy job. I spend a ridiculous amount of time grading papers and figuring out how best to help my students improve. I have up to four courses to prep during a semester, and I’m often scrambling to put together the finishing touches on a presentation or assignment. I stay up late grading papers night after night. I live in the frightening tension of being far more progressive than most of my students. I struggle with how best to teach them to be critical thinkers and move beyond what they’ve been taught up until now without doing anything that could be construed as indoctrination or manipulation–I want them to think for themselves, not think like me. I doubt my abilities and question whether or not I’m doing anything right. I have to figure out how to deal with students who have terrible attitudes, and those who don’t show up to class, and those who cheat, and those who beg for extra credit, and those whose depression is preventing them from being able to make it out of bed in the mornings let alone into the classroom, and those who have lost a friend or family member during the semester, and those whose high school education was pitiful, and those who don’t want to listen to me because I’m a woman, and those who cry at the slightest criticism, and those who think they are special snowflakes who deserve unique treatment at every turn, and those who hate everything about learning to write papers, and the list just keeps going.

I love this job, despite its challenges. I hope I never tire of it.

Today I want to celebrate some of my favorite moments of the 2012-2013 school year, because it has definitely been a great year.

• I served as a faculty mentor for a group of freshmen during the first semester. Having them over to my house for dinner during their orientation weekend was a blast. They were shocked to see a Mos Def channel among my Pandora settings, and perhaps that was the start of our good rapport.
• I centered my basic composition course (which is, in oversimplified terms, a course for struggling writers) on the superhero movie genre. We watched The X-Men and The Avengers in class, and my students wrote rhetorical analyses of the films. By the time they had to explore the way the genre represented a specific social issue of their choosing, I was thrilled to see complex and insightful thesis statements. One student explored the way that the Christopher Nolan Batman trilogy mocks and maligns the mentally ill. Several wrote about the problems of whitewashing in superhero movies, or about the problematic positions women superheroes are put into.
• Last week, a student came to my office to ask me for advice about breaking into travel writing. She told me that the creative writing courses she took from me this semester were challenging and engaging, and that she was so glad to have ended her time at the university with my courses. Then she told me that after I left the room to allow the students to fill out their evaluations in private, they began to discuss what a great class it was and how glad they were to have me as their instructor.
• I had several extremely talented students in my creative writing classes this Spring. One of them went far beyond the scope of our assignments and created an entire book of memoir, poetry, and visual art. I hope to see her publish her work someday, because her grasp of nonfiction voice is extraordinary.

So, like I said–I’m lucky to have such a great job! I am hopeful that 2013-2014 will be just as great.

I met with my co-leader for the India trip last week to finalize details. Because he was added to the trip just a month ago, we hadn’t really sat down to talk until that afternoon. I think Tom and I will work together really well as co-leaders for this trip. We only have seven students, and our main responsibility is to make sure they are stay safe and are able to process the things they see and experience in Kolkata.

I’m trying to think back to the positive lessons learned by the leadership of my trips as a teenager. I may have written an entire book about the conflict caused in my life by the terrible teachings that came out of those organizations, but I still have a lot of respect for several of the people who led the individual trips.

When I was fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, I couldn’t wait until I had the chance to lead a missions trip myself. I idolized the people in charge of the trips. I wanted nothing more than to be like them–to be part of their elite group. I dreamed about making decisions, leading prayer time, taking care of missionaries under my care. When I swore off short term missions after my last trip to India in 2001, I thought I had lost that chance. I used to say, “Well, I’ll do short term missions again, but only if I get the chance to be in charge. I just can’t stand being under all those rules again.”

But the longer I spent away from those organizations, the more I realized that I was a terrible fit for them.

I didn’t want to evangelize. I didn’t want to lead praise and worship sessions. I didn’t want to tell teenagers that their job is to save the souls of the lost around the world. I didn’t want to be a part of the evangelical subculture that youth mission work is part of. I didn’t want to be complicit in messages sent to teenage Christians that art is bad, gays are bad, sex is bad, the world is bad, and people of other religions are bad.

Now I have the chance to lead a trip that is much closer to what I’m interested in doing. No evangelism. No strict rules. Just service. We will be bodies in motion, working physically to alleviate the suffering of others.

As co-leader Tom said when we talked, “I told the students two years ago that if they think they’re bringing God to India, they’re wrong. God has been there since the beginning of time.”

Thinking back to those people I idolized as a teenager, I still have much to learn from them.

I’d like to take what I learned from Kelly and Anna, the two women who were in leadership when I first went to Kolkata, and offer constant encouragement to my team via handwritten notes and spoken words. I’d like to remember that Faith, who co-led my team in Nepal, was always quick with a hug when it was needed most. Trish inspired confidence in her team by reminding them of all of the things they were capable of–even the nervous fifteen-year-olds like me.

There are other examples, of course. I went on five short term trips, sometimes up to two months long. I can’t name every leader here, although I hope to take things that I learned from them with me.

I won’t be facilitating evangelism in the way they were, but I can still use the example of the kindness of their leadership to help my students process their experiences.

I am, however, a skeptic. I am critical, sometimes to a troubling level. I tend to furrow my eyebrows in disbelief a lot. In fact, this is what I often look like:

click to see gif in action

 

What makes me skeptical and critical and eyebrow-furrow-y? As a liberal, a feminist, and a Christian, the list is long. Oh, boy. Really long. Here are some basics.

As a liberal:

• I am skeptical of any legislation or policy that almost exclusively benefits people who already have a ton of privilege in society. Rich people, White people, Christians, etc. If someone is passing legislation to improve the lives of a group of people, and that group of people already has it really really good, I’m going to be skeptical of it. I might not reject it. It might turn out to be good policy. But I’m going to question it a lot before accepting it.
• I am critical of people who think that laziness and greed are character traits belonging to most poor Americans.
• I am skeptical of politicians who say one thing and do something else. Yes, I realize that’s all of them, from my governor Mike Pence (who says he opposes “government takeover of healthcare” but signs a bill that imposes medically unnecessary restrictions on abortion providers as a way to restrict the number of abortions) to Barack Obama (who claims to want a more peaceful future but who uses drone attacks to create more enemies in order to kill a few of them).
• I am skeptical of anyone who uses the phrases “reverse racism” or “colorblind,” or who denies the existence of institutionalized racism.

As a feminist:

• I am critical of the patriarchy.
• I am critical of male pastors who elevate maleness above femaleness, especially if they do so while insisting that no, they don’t mean that men are better than women, they just mean that God specifically created men to do more important, more recognizable, more intellectual, and more dynamic things than women, and that while men have a whole world of opportunities available to them, God designed women to be mothers and mothers only.
• I am skeptical of lesbian, gay, and bisexual groups who oppose or ignore transgender rights.
• I am skeptical of Men’s Rights Activists. Because Misandry.

As a Christian:

• I am critical of a world where “Christian” is more closely associated with a particular political party than a set of beliefs.
• I am skeptical of people who claim the don’t interpret the Bible based on their own experiences and beliefs, but who rather “just read it and believe it.”
• I am critical of the pro-life movement, which ignores real, practical ways to reduce the abortion rate and instead focuses on villainizing pro-choice women and punishing women for having sex.
• I am skeptical of the idea that sometimes gets floated through progressive circles that Christians are automatically stupid, anti-intellectual, blind, or irrelevant.
• I am skeptical of the idea that it is somehow acceptable that we live in a world of such great wealth, and yet there are children who are hungry every single day.
• I am critical of people who believe that the body, which scripture calls the temple of the Holy Spirit, is something disgusting, vile, or in need of constant revision.
• I am skeptical of people who deny that we are having an affect on our planet, which we’re supposed to be taking care of, not destroying.

I don’t like having my eyebrows furrowed all the time.

I try hard to recognize the good in the world where I see it. I think about God’s goodness a lot, and about the fact that the individual stories of life may be tragic and devastating and frustrating, but when they are combined together, they create an epic, beautiful novel of humanity. I choose to focus on the good things people are doing in the world and try to get involved with those things. I raise my voice in hopes of making a difference.

Sometimes it’s hard not to get overwhelmed by lists like this, because they are so long and so comprehensive. There are so many injustices in the world. I wish I knew how to stop a single one of them.

There are few people who are as widely adored as Mother Teresa, but love for her is far from universal.

Mother Teresa and her order, the Missionaries of Charity, have come under some serious criticism for some of their practices, especially in India. The biggest critic of Mother Teresa was the late Christopher Hitchens, who wrote an entire book detailing his concerns about what she believed and how she behaved in Kolkata. Full disclosure: I have not read the book. What I understand is that he bases most of his criticism on some of her statements like: “I think it is very beautiful for the poor to accept their lot, to share it with the passion of Christ. I think the world is being much helped by the suffering of the poor people.” Because she believed this, Hitchens argues, she wasn’t working to alleviate the suffering of the poor in Kolkata, but rather she promoted that suffering.

Many critique the logical outcome of that kind of belief, suggesting that Mother Teresa refused to give pain medication, took money from criminals, didn’t provide appropriate levels of care to her impoverished charges, and sought to convert her patients in their dying days.

I will admit to having some trouble viewing Hitchens as a credible source on Mother Teresa, mostly because I don’t care for the way he spoke about women in general. I value what I’ve read of his work about atheism, but I dislike the idea of giving a man who seemed to dislike and distrust women the power to silence a woman who worked with what very little power she was given as a woman in a notoriously anti-feminist place like the Catholic Church and rose to such impressive places. I can’t imagine that a woman born in Albania in 1910 who felt burdened by the plight of the poor would have felt like she had many options to help, but Mother Teresa did something about her convictions.

The question is: what if her convictions were wrong?

Doctrinally, I see some major differences between myself and Mother Teresa. That makes sense, of course. I am not Catholic; she is one of the most famous Catholics in the world. I disagree with Mother Teresa’s stances on birth control, on abortion, on the best steps to alleviate poverty, on AIDS, on transubstantiation, on the sinlessness of Mary, on the intercession of the saints, on all kinds of things. When I read this 1989 interview with Mother Teresa, I find myself agreeing with some points and disagreeing with others.

I think there can be a lot of good criticism in the cult of Mother Teresa–the idea that she was perfect or that everything she did was perfect. She was surely a flawed person whose ministry benefited immensely from the way she was “sold” to the public as a modern saint. I find myself wondering what happens to the money that is donated to her cause–huge amounts of money, from what has been reported, that doesn’t seem to make its way to the poor of Kolkata.

Perhaps I am more comfortable with doctrinal differences than Hitchens. It doesn’t bother me to be in the company of people whom I strongly disagree with, and so it might be easy for me to look at her and say, “Yes, these beliefs of hers were bad, but these actions of hers were good.”

I am inclined to see her actions in Kolkata as good, even as I see corruption in the way the Catholic Church on the whole promoted her, used her, and benefited from her.

I’ve worked in the homes there before. When you’re in Kolkata, you are surrounded by such intense poverty and injustice that walking into her homes feels like a reprieve. I always sensed kindness there from the workers, volunteers, and sisters, although I’ll admit that my experience is limited to a few homes for a few days at a time.

Contrary to what I’ve heard critics say about Mother Teresa trying to convert the people in her care, the sisters gave all volunteers strict instructions that evangelizing is not permitted within the homes. If a volunteer is caught evangelizing, he or she is asked not to return.

The idea of dying in a room full of other dying people, on a cot with just ceiling fans circulating overhead, eating bland food, being bathed by strangers with no real training or qualifications, without anyone conducting diagnostic tests, without access to standard medical equipment —this idea is pretty depressing. But when you’re in Kolkata and you see the alternatives—lying on concrete under the sun or in some tiny bit of shade, without water or food—you begin to think that Mother Teresa’s homes aren’t all that bad. The homes feel like a respite because they are so much better than the other options.

But then I ask: is the care what it should be? Should we be settling for “better than dying on concrete”? At the home for children with disabilities, are they cared for appropriately? How much money comes in to the church because of the Missionaries of Charity, and where does it go? Are the caregivers kind? Is the system of volunteerism causing more problems in Kolkata than good? If Mother Teresa did believe really problematic things that harm the poor, what should be done now?

I’m interested to see what happens when I go there this month as an adult instead of a teenager. I was just learning to be critical when I was last in India, and now I’m critical of everything. (To the point that it is a fault in my personality, not something to be celebrated.) I plan on reading the work of some of Mother Teresa’s critics.

I am open to becoming a critic of Mother Teresa’s policies, not just her doctrine. I suppose all I can say for sure is that I’ll know more about how I feel in a month, when the trip is over.