Do you practice a religion? How does that affect your writing?
I was baptized and raised Roman Catholic and still practice that faith. I figure that if I keep practicing, I may eventually get it right. But I haven’t quite managed to succeed at that yet, which is why I’m still working on it.
My religious identity is a bit more complicated than simply saying I’m Catholic, however. I grew up , and still live, in the Southeastern US, which means I’m a member of a religious minority, and that has affected my religious identity. I have studied, and try to regularly live by, the tenets of Catholic Social Teaching. I also was a lapsed Catholic for a good decade-plus during my teens and twenties, and in fact did not receive the Sacrament of Confirmation until my reversion. As such, I have been through an abbreviated version of what’s now known as OCIA.
In addition, I come from a family with a significant Protestant presence. In recent generations, the Protestant members of my family have primarily been United Methodist, but historically there are strong strands of Quakerism and congregationalism. In an interesting twist, both my Catholic and my Protestant forebears came to the United States because of religious persecution (at different times and in different places).
The Catholic worldview significantly informs my writing, but I’m not necessarily a Catholic writer. My experiences and background mean that I can imagine lives lived outside of Catholic orthopraxis (right behavior), and my beliefs mean I’m more likely to see generally ethical, but non-Catholic, behavior as lacking fullness and understanding, versus being worthy of condemnation. Compassion is important.
When developing characters, I generally consider people good unless and until proven otherwise, which is an attitude rooted in the Imago Dei. The compassionate part of me also realizes that no one is a villain in their own mind. My conflicts, then, are usually more complicated than simple “good guys“ and “bad guys.”
In recent years, I have become a bit more overtly Catholic in my writing, but since I’ve experienced ill-informed — and sometimes even malicious — attempts to “save me” from my own faith (this is part of my lived experience in the Southeastern US), I have an extreme distaste for prosyletization, lecturing, or preaching. For that reason I stay far, far away from anything like that in my own writing; and I don’t imagine my work will ever be strictly Catholic in nature.
What is your opinion of [x] social/political/economic topic?
Because I’m trying to maintain anonymity on this site, I’ve elected to mostly refrain from comment on social, political, and economic topics. It’s not that I don’t have such opinions; I very emphatically do, and I express them in other forums.
But I tend to stay away from controversial topics in my writing. I generally do depict an ethos that’s rooted in Catholic belief and Catholic Social Teaching, but as I note above, I don’t strictly hold to it. My lived experience has shown me that the best way to handle things is to function under the assumption that people usually desire what’s good.
That said, when it comes to topics that are writing-related, I have no issue expressing my opinion here, and I have, more than once. I fully expect to do so again if and when circumstances seem appropriate. At that point, I see no need to hesitate.
Otherwise, however, I’ll take my opinions to other, more appropriate forums.