Finding Room for Faith

Unlike the majority of my peers at Catholic University, I had attended public schools for grades K-12.  All my life, I was accustomed to keeping my faith separate from school; God was something for Sundays only and prayer only took place before bed.  A huge reason that I chose to attend CUA for college was because I wanted my faith to become the cornerstone of everything I did.  I wanted to learn about Catholicism in class, I wanted to walk by crucifixes in the hallways, and I wanted to make friends who shared my passion for Jesus.  CUA proved to offer all of this and more, and over the course of my undergraduate career, my life become centered around my Catholic faith.  I had no idea that this would be a hard lifestyle to maintain while attending CUA as a graduate student.

The name of the game in grad school is stay alive.  Okay...I exaggerate.  However, to describe my life as extremely busy during this nine month Master's program would be accurate.  I am slowly but surely learning how to balance a part-time job and a full-time student work load in a discipline that I am not used to.  I am learning, mostly through trial and error, what I do have time for this year and what I don't.  I have learned that this is going to be a year when my social life takes a hit, my gym card isn't swiped nearly enough, and a full night's sleep is what my naps senior year of college looked like.  But I am okay with all of this, because at the end of it all, I will have earned my Master's degree and will be one step closer to obtaining the career of my dreams.  

What I am not okay with is this becoming a year where my relationship with God is put on the back burner.  Unfortunately, this has been more of a challenge to prevent than I had ever anticipated.  I am no longer taking courses in theology, I am in class or at work during every conceivable mass time, and I fall asleep before I get through one Our Father at bed time. Upon realizing this and feeling the difference this lack of God made in my life, I made an appointment to meet with one of my favorite professors here at CUA - Professor Andreas Widmer.  I explained to him that I was struggling to find room for faith in my schedule that seems to become busier everyday.  He told me to begin offering the work that I am doing in this program (the mornings I wake up at five a.m. to finish homework, the late nights working on a group project, the stress and anxiety I feel during midterms) as a prayer.  In offering these moments up to God or as prayers for others, our work life becomes one with our spiritual life.  God would cease to become something that I would need to find room to squeeze into my life, and He would again become the cornerstone of everything that I do.  I was so appreciative for this advice and plan on living it out as best I can for the rest of my time as a grad student at CUA.

Discovering my Passion for Marketing at San Miguel School

To say that I lucked out when it comes to my internship would be a gross understatement.  Through my role as Development Intern at San Miguel School in Washington, DC, I have discovered a passion that I never knew I had.  San Miguel DC is a Catholic middle school that exclusively serves at-risk Latino boys living at or below the poverty line in the district.  Therefore, we are financially dependent upon donations from poverty programs, foundations, and, most importantly, generous donors in the community.  I knew that I would thoroughly enjoy the service aspect of this internship, but I was not quite sure what I was getting myself into in terms of the "development" part of this internship.  Would I be asking people for money?  Would I just be a glorified office assistant?  Would I even feel fulfilled while working here?

The answers to those questions are no, no, and YES.  My internship at San Miguel is more than I could have ever imagined and I have the director of the MSBA program, Mr. Stewart McHie, to thank for that.  When I was first accepted to the program, I explained to Professor McHie that I desired to serve through my work as a business woman, so I was most interested in obtaining an internship at a non-profit organization.  He thought about this and then asked me if I was interested in marketing and/or development.  I told him in complete honesty that I didn't know enough about it to know if I was.  He proceeded to connect me with a former MSBA student working at San Miguel and said, "Well then, let's find out." 

My boss, the said former MSBA student, has truly taken me under his wing since I have begun work at San Miguel and I could not be more grateful.  Since beginning in August, I have been given great responsibility and have gained experience in conducting market research, producing advertisements that are catered to target donors, and writing copies that adequately reflect the faith that we have, as a staff, in the mission of San Miguel.  In just two short months, I have discovered a real passion for marketing and development when in conjunction with service organizations, and can truly see myself pursuing a career in this line of work after finishing school.

My Story: Continuing my Education in People

As an English major turned Business student, I am often asked, "How did that happen?! How do those two subjects even relate?"  This always makes me chuckle because for me, there is no separating the two.  My love for literature can be summed up in one statement made by George R.R. Martin: “A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies.  The man who never reads lives only one.”  Ever since I can remember, I have been consistently and constantly amazed at the number of people that I have come to know through reading.  I have come to know Martin Luther King, Jr., Harry Potter, Jane Eyre and Anne Frank on very personal levels.  What amazes me is that they are all like me and you.  They have experienced great tragedy and they have felt great joy.  They have struggled to connect with their peers and they have fallen in love.  They have had their voice taken away and they have been given great responsibility.  Literature taught me that we are all fundamentally the same, and in realizing this, my love for literature evolved into a passion for the human person and a deep desire to serve. 

Becoming a business student after having been an English major is therefore not a desperate attempt to get a job, and it's certainly not an abandonment of what I truly love.  It is an extension of my education in people-in who we are as humans and in how I can best serve and connect with those around me.  The knowledge and skills that I have gained as an English major serve as the perfect foundation for learning about business: the main way that the characters of this world interact and take care of each other. In earning my Master's degree in Business Analysis, I am obtaining the practical skills that will enable me to best serve others in the non-profit and for-profit world.  These skill sets combined will undoubtedly prepare me for the next part of my journey, in which I hope to change the business world for the better as I endeavor to serve the humans that I have come to identify with and love.