AS I WRITE THESE WORDS, I’m sitting in a hospital bottle feeding. And I wanted absolutely no part of it for waiting room. My dad is undergoing his second knee my own life. surgery in three months. My mom is doing her best to I’m far from alone. According to the US Census stay focused on her crossword puzzle as CNN drones Report, in 1970, there were 38 million unmarried on in the distance about the war in Ukraine. It’ll be a American adults (28 percent). In 2021, the number 12-hour day of wait and worry. I’ll drive them home swelled to 122 million (48.2 percent). Almost half of the when this is over and help my dad get as comfortable population! While marriage and family are worthwhile as possible in his inexplicably uncomvocations for many—and you won’t find fortable recliner. I’ll probably be back a disparaging word on the institution “Let the Church always the next day to work from their house in this piece—that calling falls on deaf be a place of mercy in case they need any kind of heavy liftears for many of us. And I, for one, am and hope, where ing or errands. not ashamed. everyone is welcomed, This is no great hardship on me. Our culture and our Church make I’m more than happy to do it. Through it difficult to justify my disinterest in loved, and forgiven.” —Pope Francis marriage. I think unmarried people, in various health challenges and surgeries, being geographically close to them the eyes of many, look incomplete: half makes me feel that I’m contributing something—and instead of whole. Certainly, many singles long for the it puts my mind at ease. As I sit in the hospital waiting joys, comforts, and challenges of married life, but it’s for the surgery to be over, a thought occurs to me: If I simply not a call for everyone. You’ll find my name on were married with children, I don’t know that I’d be this that list. available to help them. While Pope Francis hasn’t spent considerable As a young twentysomething, I did my research. A time trying to shift the Church’s view of singlehood vs. college friend of mine had three children in as many marriage and family (especially for divorced Catholics, years. As a full-time student and new mother of three many of whom feel unsupported in parish circles), he’s girls with a husband who traveled constantly, she certainly cautious about cliques continuing. “Let the needed support, so a few of us took turns with childChurch always be a place of mercy and hope, where evcare. I loved those kids—they were smart and funny eryone is welcomed, loved, and forgiven,” he has said. and curious. It wasn’t out of the ordinary for me to take I love the inclusivity of that line. I don’t feel on the an evening shift, while a friend and fellow helper would outside looking in. I love that he wants our Church to be cover other parts of the morning and afternoon. It was a place where all are welcomed and safe under its roof— a crazy, fun, fulfilling era of baths, bedtime stories, and regardless of marital status.
by Bob Vojtko These scenes may seem alike to you, but there are changes in the two. So look and see if you can name eight ways in which they’re not the same. ANSWERS: 1) The band on Sis’ shirt is wider. 2) There are now chips on Friar Pete’s ice cream cone. 3) The bumper on the truck is now rounded. 4) Sis’ cone is longer. 5) The bottom star on the truck is now a different shape. 6) The pattern on one cone in the truck is now straight. 7) The light at the top of the truck is larger. 8) The rim over the wheel is shorter.
TOP: SHAPECHARGE/ISTOCK; BOTTOM: MC KOZUSKO/FRANCISCAN MEDIA
UNMARRIED AND UNASHAMED By Christopher Heffron
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