In the second class we watched clips from “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy and connected it to how we are all on a journey of our own. Both the Matrix and the Lord of the Rings are meant to help us pull back and see the bigger picture of our lives. It may not feel like it, but each one of us is a part of something EPIC. We are born into a story that is full of darkness and light, danger and redemption. There are true stakes and the decisions we make have lasting impacts. Each person has a crucial role. Each one of us has a unique and crucial role, a mission. Like Gandalf says to Frodo: “All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.” Those who have gone before us have paved the way, and now we have to decide how we are going to live out our part. We are part of a fellowship. We have a God King who fights for us. We cannot see the end, but we can trust that we can find help, light and sustenance along the way.
Everyone: Please watch the related YouTube video below (Bishop Barron on Tolkien) and answer the homework questions. Reflection questions + Homework questions are BOTH on the same Google Form at the end of the page; everyone must complete the Homework questions.
If you missed class: Please watch the following clips (password is: smaconfirmation (no spaces, no punctuation, no capitals), look over the related materials, watch the related YouTube video and answer the reflection questions + homework questions. Reflection questions + Homework questions are BOTH on the same Google Form at the end of the page; everyone must complete the Homework questions.
Related YouTube Video
Scripture Passages
I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. – 2 Timothy 4:7
There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens: a time to be born and a time to die… a time to weep and a time to laugh…a time to mourn and a time to dance. – Ecclesiastes 3
Catechism Quotes
We firmly believe that God is master of the world and of its history. But the ways of his providence are often unknown to us. Only at the end, when our partial knowledge ceases, when we see God “face to face”, will we fully know the ways by which – even through the dramas of evil and sin – God has guided his creation to that definitive sabbath rest for which he created heaven and earth. #314
Movie Quotes
“I wish it need not have happened in my time,” said Frodo. “So do I,” said Gandalf, “and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.” – J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring
“It’s like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger they were. And sometimes you didn’t want to know the end. Because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? But in the end, it’s only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you. That meant something, even if you were too small to understand why. But I think, Mr. Frodo, I do understand. I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn’t. They kept going, because they were holding on to something. That there is some good in this world, and it’s worth fighting for.” – The Return of the King Movie based on the Lord of the Rings
Quotes to Ponder
It is Jesus who stirs in you the desire to do something great with your lives, the will to follow an ideal, the refusal to allow yourselves to be ground down by mediocrity, the courage to commit yourselves humbly and patiently to improving yourselves and society, making the whole world more human and more fraternal. – Pope Saint John Paul II at World Youth Day in Rome, 2000
In the struggle for existence, it is only on those who hang on for ten minutes after all is hopeless, that hope begins to dawn. – G.K. Chesterton
SMA Confirmation 