Welcome to "The Gods Are Bored," parochial school edition! I swore up and down I wasn't going to write much about my Chinese exchange student, but oh damn. It's irresistible.
Background: "Extra Chair" is living in The Spare's bedroom and going to the local parochial school. Her parents are paying room and board, tuition and fees to the school, and who knows what else to the agency that arranges for the schooling. Then there's the airfare, and Chair's dad even sent a limo to drive her to JFK at the end of last year. The kid is in the chips, but she's as unspoiled as a spring morning.
Today I had to drive over to the school, Boniface VIII, to pick her up after a club meeting. She had a friend with her, another Chinese student in the same situation.
The two girls were perplexed. Their religion teacher had given out an assignment. All the American kids understood it perfectly, and it counts as a quiz grade.
Chair and her friend gave up trying to pronounce the word they had been given and just asked me if I had ever seen this thing, begins with "b" that you get in church? This is something you can carry home from church at the end of the service. It has information in it.
"You mean a bulletin?" I asked.
That was it. They have to get a church bulletin, from any church, and bring it to school on Monday. It has to be from a church, and not from online.
I asked them if it mattered what denomination the bulletin came from. They didn't know what that word "denomination" meant, but it doesn't matter. The closest church to my house happens to be a Catholic church, Christ the Despot RCC. So I guess I'll be taking that one-block stroll to Mass on Sunday in search of two church bulletins.
I hope they give out bulletins at Christ the Despot, because I don't want to have to drive to Snobville United Methodist for theirs.
Too doggone bad I didn't know about this assignment early enough to request bulletins from the OBOD East Coast Gathering, but what's done is done. Two bulletins, Sunday. Quiz grade.
7 comments:
Don't the girls themselves have to attend church and get the bulletins? Surely that's the point of the exercise, or am I missing something? Or will you just be accompanying them to church as, oh I don't know, a chaperone?
So many questions, LOL!
You should go to and get a bulletin from a Unitarian Universalist church, and maybe blow the teacher's mind....
Though, the bulletin mostly has events rather than theology, so they may all be similar despite denomination.
Have you considered a synagogue?
..Hopefully there are no 'bullets in'.
Have fun, be of good cheer; Old Sol is beaming my part of the planet. The trees are flowering, bees are buzzing. All is well with the world.
Christ The Despot?
Bwa Hah Hah!
If I ever get to New Jersey, can I buy you the tasty beverage of your choice?
to bad there's not a Buddhist temple around
Oh, readers, you give me so many good ideas! There are many synagogues in the area, and I'm sure a Buddhist temple. There are Black Muslim churches, Chabad, and Christian Scientists. I don't know where Reverend Moon's people meet, or the Scientologists. But all of that makes me warm inside, just to think of the endless variety of bulletins those girls could tote in for their quiz grade.
Deb, I'm prepared to stay for Mass, or at least for the opening hymn.My student is an atheist. I don't think religion should be forced on her.
Good for you for taking a hit for the team, so to speak.
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