pop culture catholic

In early June, a fashion show at London's Fashion Week piqued my interest.

I'm usually not interested in modern haute couture as I typically find its offerings to be absurd. This particular show exceeded that: it featured several male models sporting rubber prosthetic pregnancy stomachs.

The models went down the catwalk with these bare bellies that were clearly not meant to be mistaken for the result of imbibing in too much food or drink. These were fake baby bumps. On men. Offered up as fashion.

The same weekend Alfie Evans passed from this life to the next, I spent the weekend at my sister's house, babysitting my niece. My weekend was filled to the brim with all things childhood. As a single woman with no children, I found the entire weekend both utterly exhausting and spectacular. While I spent the weekend buying huge milkshakes, glow-in-the-dark punch balloons and jewelry that had strawberry scented lip-gloss hidden somewhere in its form, my thoughts occasionally returned to poor little Alfie and his parents.

We just left the spiritually rigorous season of Lent. We should be exhausted, tired and hungry. We spent 40 intense days facing our mortality, our depravity and our unworthiness. In a spiritual desert, we united ourselves to Christ, who spent His own 40 days in an actual desert fasting, praying and preparing Himself to go out and preach a new law; to change hearts and minds; to change the world.