Journal Entry 2
Oct. 5, 2007
Well it has finally set in. There has been reading for classes all along, but now the papers have started flowing. In fact I even have multiple papers due on the same day next week. I feel like a real seminary student now. The past month has been full of ups and downs. There were a few days that I felt like walking out the doors and never coming back in. And on other days I have felt like I can’t get enough. There have been moments studying that have brought me into deep reflection on me, God and how we experience faith individually and communally. Then I would realize that I only had fifteen minutes until my next class or until the Patriots game. That has been a frustration, not the Patriots, their doing awesome, but that there is often little time for reflection. We are reading, To Know as We are Known, by Parker Palmer, in which he talks a lot about education and how we come to know. One of his big ideas, which I agree with, is that a person really needs to interact and almost enter into a relationship with what he is studying in order to know the fullness of it. In our classes we go so quickly from one subject to another with very little time to stop, reflect and begin to enter into a relationship with the things we are learning. We have a little bit of help though in the sense that we have already entered into a relationship with the subject of much of our studies, which is Christ.
Oddly enough, or maybe not, my favorite class right now is Elementary Greek. It makes the most sense to me. I learn something one day, and then the next day it is put to use right away. Even if it doesn’t make sense why the crazy Greeks developed their language in such a way, it makes sense that if I am going to understand their madness, I need to learn all the little things that make it up. What happens in class and the work that is assigned all seem to be relevant. It is harder sometimes to find this relevance in other classes that seem more abstract. I am reminded of my semester spent studying in Russia. It was the best academic experience of my life. We were immersed in a culture and were studying about it at the same time. When we learned about a person, place or event, we could then go to the place where things took place and get a better understanding for what had happened. I will never forget standing in the stairwell where the murder described in Crime and Punishment is thought to have taken place. Nor will I forget the countless churches that we visited as we learned about the Orthodox tradition. But I digress. I feel that the professors here know that things can get abstract, and they are willing to help keep things relevant. It is one of the challenges of seminary that I am becoming more aware of. I hope that my awareness will enable me to keep the relevance of things in my life. Thanks again for listening.
