Horrendous Evils and the Goodness of God

This is my final essay for the Spring Providence, Evil, and Suffering class at WTS. I found Marilyn McCord Adams's book (of the above cited title) a challenging if not entirely satisfactory read. The essay runs to about 14 pages, which is way too long for one post, so the jump link is to a complete PDF version.

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If Christ has not been raised, then our proclamation has been in vain and your faith has been in vain…. If for this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.—First Letter of Paul to the Corinthians, Chapter 14, v. 14,19

At the beginning of the semester, I wrote a sentence about evil that I believed to be true: “The persistence and prevalence of evil is the single greatest obstacle to faith, and the only answer to it is a witness to God’s love through human action, made possible by grace.” Reading Marilyn McCord Adams’s Horrendous Evils and the Goodness of God has helped me to focus my thinking more closely on the problem of evil, and specifically on the issue of theodicy. The book advances arguments along a variety of fronts for the compossibility of an omnipotent, omniscient, and perfectly good God alongside the indisputable existence and prevalence of horrendous evil in the world. I certainly cannot and do not seek to address them all in the scope of this paper. I will focus my discussion on just a few key points: how Adams frames the problem so that specific elements of Christian theology can provide a meaningful response; clarification of an essential element of her argument, which is surprisingly de-emphasized (one might go so far as to say “glossed-over”) despite its centrality to orthodox Christian doctrine; and a brief review of potential difficulties her analysis presents for the faithful Christian, a secular reader, or an adherent of another faith.

Let me begin, however, by emphasizing elements of Adams’s presentation that I find especially helpful and personally congenial. Her repeated insistence that the goodness of God must be such that “God is good to each created person, by insuring each a life that is a great good to him/her on the whole, and by defeating his/her participation in horrors within the context, not merely of the world as a whole, but of that individual’s life” (p. 55) is at the heart of the matter. Adams is not satisfied with grand utilitarian analyses that get God off the hook for creating the best-of-all-possible-worlds, if that world ends up crushing and destroying any number of individuals beyond all salvation. It has always seemed impossible to me that I could worship a God who permitted the desolate and unredeemed life of a child chained to a radiator, beaten, starved, sexually abused, alone except for her torturer, and ultimately abandoned to death; it is especially appalling to imagine a God worthy of adoration who would accept that as an inevitable price of creation. What in creation could possibly be worth the suffering of even one such child? For legions of people throughout human history whose unrelievedly horrendous life experiences legitimately make them wish they’d never been born, the notion that their suffering is an essential consequence of, say, human free-will merely adds insult to injury.

Adams is also quite serious about her demand that God be good to every created person in a way that person can accept and appreciate, and that therefore includes not just the victims of horrendous evil but also the perpetrators of that evil. This universalist element of her argument carries, as I shall discuss later, some challenges along with it, but it also points us again to a God worth worshipping. How can we respect and love a deity who creates individuals that are ineluctably doomed to go bad and fail, to become and remain beyond redemption? It is no coincidence that Julian of Norwich gets as much or more page-time in Adams’s book as any of the more canonical or academic theologians; Julian’s mystical declaration of the promise that “All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well,” is the gold standard by which God’s goodness is measured for Adams as well, and I appreciate the largeness of this vision.

[read the full essay]

A Critical Review of Can I Get A Witness

The Book of Revelation is something of a cultural and spiritual rorschach test; people see very different things in it, and there's no one "correct" way of reading it. Ever since it was received into the canon of Christian scripture, church communities and faithful people have struggled with the text. Springing as it does from a context of deep alienation from and oppression by a dominant culture (the Roman empire), it has found its most enthusiastic readers amongst groups who likewise experience themselves and their most closely held beliefs as profoundly at odds with their surrounding cultural milieu.

At the outset of Can I Get A Witness? Bryan K. Blount admits that Revelation was not originally the book of scripture that most drew his attention, but that once he engaged with it he found it to be a text that lends itself particularly well to his cultural-studies-based hermeneutic. Blount rejects universalizing methods of interpretation which "dismiss readings 'from below,' to appeal instead to 'objective' methodologies that valorize the dominant cultural ideology inscribed within them, while all the time arguing that no such ideology exists." (p. 17) By insisting that no reader of biblical texts is an "academic construct or scholarly paradigm" (p. 21), a cultural studies approach calls attention to the cultural lens through which we read scripture, seeks out and presents an alternative lens (in Blount's case that of African American experience), and thereby also helps us to recognize and value the different cultural contexts embedded in the Bible itself. (p. 26)

After treating the classical approach to biblical interpretation quite dismissively, Blount nevertheless proceeds to use many of its academic and scholarly techniques in his subsequent analysis of the role of "witness" and the slaughtered Lamb: historical context as reconstructed from a variety of sources, close reading of the Greek text, and literary analysis of the metaphorical tropes employed. Once he has developed his thesis about John's intention — that of provoking Christians to claim their identity as witnesses of God in Christ and thereby actively put themselves, as it were, in harm's way in a hostile environment — he seeks and finds a parallel in the actions of African Americans and their allies during the Civil Rights movement. This seems an appropriate and helpful comparison, especially as prominent leaders of that movement were both Christian and members of the oppressed group, and consciously drew upon their Christian heritage and traditions to fuel their resistance. In reminding readers that the response to oppression and the hope for liberation and vindication found in Revelation is not a mere historical artifact, but something that continues to speak to marginalized, alienated, and persecuted communities to this day, Blount provides us with a useful way into this difficult scripture — one which can be revisited and reframed by others in similar circumstances.

In what seems to me like a strained reach for relevance, however, Blount goes on to try to make a case for a parallel between the hymns found in Revelation and contemporary rap music. I was with him while he built is case for similarity with spirituals and gospel music. I was less persuaded by the attempt to bring blues into the picture and then utterly skeptical when he tried to extend the argument for a similarity in role (the vital and sustaining expression of cultural resistance, albeit secular, by an oppressed group) for rap. He hinges part of his case on one or two slim uses of Christian language and imagery in Tupac Shakur's oeuvre (personally, I'd have been more impressed by a reference to Kanye West, who is not a gangsta rapper) and claims that the misogyny and violence of rap actually connect it to Revelation.

The notion that rap is primarily a cry of resistance to the dominant culture is, I think, at best deeply flawed and incomplete. Contrary to Blount's claims, I think rap represents an attempt to appropriate the values and ideals of the dominant culture in an extreme, almost caricatured fashion. The American dream of individual power, achievement, and material gratification is writ large in the Thug Life of guns, drugs, hos, and lots of money. I don't buy the argument that most rap is "rapping on Rome" (p. 117). The main "counter-cultural" thing about it, if there is one, is the notion that disempowered Black men are claiming it for themselves, frequently by illegal and/or violent means. Salvation in gangsta rap is bought by becoming dominant oneself at any cost; nothing could be more unlike the salvation described in the hymns of Revelation, where it is an almighty God and the witnessing and sacrificed Lamb who do the saving and who are glorified with praise.

I find this particular interpretative move by Blount unsuccessful; frankly, I also suspect it would be laughed out of school by most fans of rap music (of which, I confess, I am not one). There are few things less helpful to the Gospel message than strained grasps for contemporary "relevance" that fall embarrassingly flat. The very overwhelming success of rap music itself — its vastly lucrative creation and consumption as part and parcel of the culture it supposedly critiques, and in which it has achieved widespread, mainstream acceptance (the overwhelming majority of consumers of rap are middle class and White) — makes it a poor candidate as a parallel to the songs of Revelation. In this case, I'd say Blount is looking at a black-and-white ink blot but describing a radio broadcast: these two things are simply not like each other at all.

Blount is most successful when he speaks from his own solid scholarship and personal life experience and interests (e.g., the Civil Rights struggle), and less so when dealing with material with which he is less familiar. I would wager money, for example, that he is not himself an avid listener to rap music; his analysis seems primarily to draw on others' descriptions. I find Can I Get A Witness? to be a curious mixture of solid scholarship, imaginative interpretation, and occasionally downright misguided contemporary parallels. It will serve me both as a useful model and as a cautionary counterexample for how scripture can creatively be read through a particular cultural lens.

Reading: Blount, Bryan K. Can I Get A Witness? Reading Revelation through African American Culture. 2005. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press.

Interpreting the Apostolic Tradition

Introduction to New Testament: Epistles, Essay 2

When we read the New Testament epistles, we are listening for God’s word to us today as spoken through documents written nearly two thousand years ago. We are faced with a myriad of challenges to interpretation, but we are far from the first Christians to find ourselves in this fix. The problem of interpretation is even embedded within these texts themselves, as they struggle to reconcile or contrast their experience of the gospel with their own previous traditions — whether originally Hebrew scripture, Gentile philosophy, or pagan practice — and with their contemporary context. (Lincoln, p. 256) We are still doing this work of locating ourselves within the apostolic tradition, as we seek to understand it for ourselves and for own time.

How are we to make sense of the scriptural abyss that seems to open up between Paul’s ecstatic declaration of the unity and equality of believers in Galatians 3:28 (“There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female, for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.”) and the rigid hierarchical roles assigned to masters and slaves, men and women, parents and children in the Household Codes found in Colossians, Ephesians, and 1 Peter? What sort of church are we to be: one where each person is like a member of the body of Christ, with his or her own unique gifts contributing to the well-being of the whole without dominating or taking precedence over the others (1 Cor. 12:4) or is the church to be a well-ordered community like a household of the empire or the state itself, with Christ as its head, its Lord and Master, and each member of the body in proper hierarchical relationship to Christ and to one another ( Col. 1:18, Eph. 5:23-24)?

An awareness of the changing circumstances between Paul’s letters and those that shaped the Deutero-Pauline and Pastoral letters can help us sort through the differences. The theology and ethical teaching in Paul’s undisputed letters were driven by his personal encounter with the Risen One and his call to spread the gospel of faith and freedom to the Gentiles, as well as his grounding in an apocalyptic tradition of Judaism which expected that when the Messiah appeared a new age was imminent. For Paul, the Easter event was a recent one, the Spirit was alive and moving, and the time before the parousia, the end-time return of Jesus Christ, was very short, compelling urgency in communicating and living out the good news. His letters are marked by joy and excitement, and also by frustration and irritation at the communities who just don’t seem to grasp the radical nature of God’s grace in Christ, who are distracted by false-teaching outsiders, internal squabbles over status, or the worldly seductions of empire.

By the final decades of the first century, however, the earliest Christian communities were in a new phase of their life. The second coming had not occurred as promptly as anticipated, some of the first witnesses and believers had died, children were being born, households had to be managed and sustained, and Christian churches had to contend with either persecution and/or alienation from both the Roman empire and the various local cultural norms in which they were embedded. Prolonged exposure to the enticements of the surrounding environment made vital the reinforcement of the Christian community’s identity and values. Conversely, a movement that had held special appeal to outsiders and the powerless (like women, slaves, and displaced people) (Lincoln, p.258) now was reaching a wider spectrum of people at all levels of social strata, and needed to negotiate for its longer-term survival and prestige in a society that put a premium on order and honor. And as the Christian communities grew, their social, ethnic, and geographical diversity put them at risk of splintering apart and losing their shared identity of belief and practice.

The period of time which gives us these later letters was also the time during which the Gospels first came to be composed, drawing upon oral traditions of Jesus stories and liturgical materials of the earliest Christian communities as well perhaps as written collections of teachings/sayings. In both the Gospels and the epistles we find documents that address the needs and concerns of specific communities, but that also point to an emerging consolidation of lines of authority and a universalizing ambition for “the faith.” (Perkins, p. 238) The care that the authors of the non-Pauline epistles took to associate themselves with the Pauline and apostolic traditions (e.g, by pseudonymous attribution or by adopting the formal structure of the Pauline letters) speaks to the importance placed on the authenticity of that transmission by authors and audience alike.

We can see these factors at work, for example, in 2 Peter. Its attribution to Simeon Peter presents the author as squarely in the apostolic tradition, and the description of witnessing the transfiguration at 1:18 (found also in synoptic Gospels) underlines the connection. It carries only vestigial elements of the letter format, however, as it is written in the rhetorical genre in Jewish literature of a farewell address or testament, leaving advice and guidance from a leader to the community (Watson, p. 317). The community addressed is at risk because the delay of parousia has left it susceptible to the teaching of “false prophets” and abandonment of a strict Christian behavioral ethos. The letter presents the apostles as having a unitary message that is normative for the church and treats the Pauline letters as acknowledged — if sometimes difficult to understand — scripture. (1 Pet. 3:15-16). (Watson, p. 315, 319) A falling away from the ethical standards and practices promoted by the apostles is presented as an offense against and insult to the Lordship of Jesus Christ and a rejection of his saving mastery. (Watson, p. 320)

In the Pastoral epistles, Pauline ‘faith’ — which was a response to God’s free gift of grace and act of justification — has become “the faith”—propositions or sayings and a way of living and worshipping together to which the church community assents. (Dunn, p. 275; Ringe, p. 550) This church may even have second-generation members (“from childhood you have known the sacred writings that are able to instruct for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus” 2 Tim. 3:15) and the author can point with confidence to “sound doctrine” and expect that his audience will carry forward the work of evangelism in that tradition (2 Tim. 4:3, 5) The church community is 1 Timothy has also become more deliberately structured, and now has an “overseer” (bishop) as well as deacons. (Dunn, p. 276) As in the Household Codes and the Stoic virtue lists to which they are related, hierarchical relationships in 1 Timothy are now inscribed with the values of the wider society: women (who had been matter-of-factly described as deacons in the undisputed Pauline letters) are now forbidden to teach (1Tim 2:12) and have authority. The community living by the scandalous message of the cross is made more tolerable to outsiders by limiting its blatant offenses to the honor/shame system that gross contravention of its hierarchical mores would entail. (Ringe, p. 547-8, Martin, p. 213)

The same tensions between the apostolic tradition, the requirement of Spirit-inspired interpretation for changing circumstances, and the radical roots of the gospel message have recurred again and again in the life of the church. Paul was able to envisage that the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ could wipe away the vast cultural gulf between Jew and Gentile by inscribing Gentiles within Judaism’s sacred history and liberating Jews from the burden of the law. The church he helped bring into being, however, was unsuccessful in extending that paradigm to the relationships between masters and slaves, husbands and wives (and men and women, generally), and parents and children.

Scriptural justification for the practice of slavery lasted well into the nineteenth century and, as Clarice J. Martin outlines, it took a concerted effort of hermeneutical reinterpretation on the part of slaves themselves, as well as abolitionists, to reassert the primacy of the Pauline emphasis on shared human kinship as adopted children of God and our unity and equality in Christ. (Martin, p. 215-7) The same liberating hermeneutic was not, however, extended to the male/female relationship at the time. That work had to wait yet another century and, sad to say, is still far from complete among many churches. Similarly, movements to include other excluded and traditionally vilified groups, such as gay and lesbian people, are still making slow progress against the literalist and exclusionary readings of scriptural codes of who’s in and who’s out.

In 1 Timothy 1:19 we read, “by rejecting conscience, certain persons have suffered shipwreck in the faith,” and in 2 Peter 1:21-2 that “no prophecy of scripture is a matter of one’s own interpretation, because no prophecy ever came by human will, but men and women moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God.” Accordingly, we must listen to our consciences when we interpret scripture and the apostolic traditions, remaining open to and mindful of the movement of the Holy Spirit in our time and in our church.

Bibliography
Dunn, James D. G. 2005. “The First and Second Letters to Timothy and the Letter to Titus.” In The New Interpreter’s Bible New Testament Survey, 274-281. Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press.

Lincoln, Andrew T. 2005. “The Letter to the Colossians.” In The New Interpreter’s Bible New Testament Survey, 238-262. Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press.

Martin, Clarice J. 1991. “The Haustafeln (Household Codes) in African American Biblical Interpretation: “Free Slaves” and “Subordinate Women.” In Stony the Road We Trod, ed. Cain Hope Felder, 206-231. Minneapolis, MN: Augsberg Press.

Ringe, Sharon. 2004. “1 and 2 Peter, Jude.” In Global Bible Commentary, eds., Teresa Okure, J. Severino Croatto, Nicole Wilkinson Duran, 545-551. Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press.

Watson, Duane F. 2005. “The Second Letter of Peter.” In The New Interpreter’s Bible New Testament Survey, 315-320. Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press.

Frozen

I've reached an acme of anomie and procrastinatory paralysis.

I have two papers due tomorrow, one big and one small, and find myself incapable of doing either. The sheer irony is that I got a congratulatory phone message from WTS yesterday, which means that apparently they've decided to admit me as a degree student.

I'd like to blame my incapacity on Satan, but I suspect it's all on me.

Still here

What with Blogger making it difficult for me to post, and with work and family stuff really reaching new levels of stress-inducement, I'm afraid I haven't had much opportunity to write. Things are still fairly grim, but I'm trying to tell myself that one day this particularly unpleasant stretch of time will be well and truly in the past.

What's most discouraging for me is that my creativity seems to be on extended holiday at a time when I need it the most. I feel like I'm running on fumes. I'm very demotivated, and all the tasks that face me seem pretty nasty.

I have to laugh at the thought that I've been making a feeble effort at dating. I'm SO not in the mood for that at this moment, and the thought of trying to "put my best self forward" is simply preposterous. I certainly wouldn't want to meet me right now.

Everything that can go wrong...

...is going wrong.

Man, I hate this.

My sister, whose 60th birthday is today, is having a horrible stomach flu. She is freaking out about everything. She's now reconsidering taking my father with her to New Mexico. She moved her departure forward by three weeks, and has no time to get together his documentation and is worried that they won't let him on the plane with an expired passport for ID.

There are lawyers everywhere, but talking to them is a nightmare.

My work life is a nightmare. I can't concentrate, and I feel like a complete and utter failure.

I have eight loads of laundry to do but I can hardly bring myself to shower and change out of my pajamas.

This is not a good time.

Doubt & the Devil

There's nothing like having actually put in an application for an M.Div program to cause every rational doubt you've ever had about a Call to come surging to the surface. Not to mention the irrational ones.

Assessing the current state of my life, which is not pretty, I have to say that it would be convenient to lay it all at the foot of some external evil trying to foil my progress toward God and service to God. I don't think that's what's going on though. I think that I've got a lot on my plate and the stress caused by my busy-ness is compounded by a significant underlying, but well-masked, bout of depression.

I am: taking two seminary courses; clumsily juggling a daunting workload; having first dates with strangers I meet through an online dating service; trying to cope with family stuff. And somewhere in there, I've got the black dog lurking. It's not the best situation.

Last night, in amongst some malformed dreams, I received some kind of message — whether from God or from my subconscious, you be the judge. I woke up thinking this way... It occurred to me that very few people ever have the notion that they are meant to be ordained. And that of those that do, very few are quite sure about it all the time.

If only those who are sure go forward, there will certainly never be enough ordained persons to sustain any institutional church. Should all institutional churches die? (I don't think so, although I suppose an argument could be made for it.)

I think about the conversations I've had lately — at my apartment building's front desk, over a poker table, in a noisy bar — with people who are curious about theology, who want to understand Christianity, who are clearly if perhaps not consciously hungry and thirsty for a live-giving faith. I have been (I still am, perhaps) in their shoes. They are so afraid of being judged and condemned for thinking about these matters.

I think maybe I have something to offer. I think maybe that with more thought, prayer, education, and the approval (deus volente) of my institutional church, I might have something really different to offer as an ordained person. I am never going to be a cookie-cutter representative of the faith.

Maybe that's a good thing.

L'evangile en français

Last night after my Epistles class, I walked past the WTS chapel on my way out. There was a service going on, with a small number of attendees... in French. A preacher stood in front of a microphone.

I sat in the back and listened for ten minutes. He had a lovely voice (and of course it was in French, which lends itself to sounding beautiful), and I was pleased to find that I could follow what he had to say without much effort. This despite never having learned the specific vocabulary of Christianity in French.

What intrigued me was that it gave me a special thrill to hear the Gospel preached in a language other than English. For some reason, this foreign language seemed to lend it a special credibility or legitimacy. I'm not sure why, but it's an interesting phenomenon. It may have to do with making it concrete that other people are believers too. After all, the church was born at Pentecost.

Classes

Yesterday was my first day back at seminary, and already I'm excited. I'm taking the second part of the required Intro to New Testament, which focuses on Epistles (with a glance at Revelations). The other course is "Providence, Evil, and Suffering," which looks to repeat many of the strengths of my Theology class last semester: same great teacher, about 15 students, hard but vital subject matter, and a real variety of perspectives.

Given that I'm only taking two classes, I'm rather impressed with the amount of reading and writing I'm going to be doing.

Required texts: 12
Weekly short assignments: 20
Short essays: 3
Longer essay: 1
20 min. class presentation: 1

The only good news is that there are no in-class exams.

Now I've got to get my act together and actually apply to become a degree candidate. And I need to do it soon so that I can be considered for merit money. Whether I'll actually become a degree candidate depends on all sorts of other factors, but I suppose I need to keep all the possibilities open.

Things Made New

On Sunday the new rector that my search committee called was officially installed, with all due pomp and bishoply circumstance. It was a great occasion.

On Thursday, I'm starting my second semester of seminary-lite. It's another step on a mysterious journey.

Done and done

Gospels paper: submitted, graded and returned.
Theology take-home exam: submitted.

My first two classes at seminary are well and truly over. They were both eminently worthwhile.
I'm exhausted and sick.

I have a day to recover before I head to Boston.

A Reason to Love Seminary

I made it to my class this morning on sheer bloody-minded determination. I'm crushed with deadlines and feeling thoroughly wrung out.

It seems as if my instructor is under similar strains. Several times during this morning's lecture on the Gospel of John there were pauses as she struggled to choke back tears and regain control. At the first hour break she shared some of the reasons why with the class.

Immediately, one of my fellow students piped up and asked if someone might offer a prayer for her, right then. The teacher invited the one who'd asked to do so. The student proceeded to deliver an extemporaneous prayer, using the same Johannine language and themes we had been studying. By the end, half the class — including me — was in tears.

This tenderness for one another and this willingness and eagerness to turn to God in community is deeply moving to me.

The Hound of Heaven

Sometimes I do feel as if I'm the victim of an elaborate conspiracy.

Today I ran into a couple who own one of the other condos in my Dad's brownstone. They live in Washington too, and go to my church. They insisted upon taking me out to lunch, and getting me to tell them what was going on in my life.

They asked me about my classes at WTS. The husband zeroed in on the topic like a laser beam, and wouldn't let it go. "That's where you heart is, isn't it?"

I explained the many complications of my circumstance: financial, diocesan, chronological, personal.

"Aren't you ready to make a change?" he asked me. Oh if he only knew just exactly how ready; I'm in the throes of another work nightmare.

Their enthusiasm on my behalf seems to come out of nowhere. Do you think if I stuck my fingers in my ears and said "la-la-la-la-la" very loudly, I could avoid hearing this message again and again?

[P.S. The last word in depravity: using your Theology course readings as procrastination fodder. I have no shame.]

All Saint's Day at WTS

Each of the luminaria (the white bags) you see in this picture represents an American service-person death in Iraq. This display on the Wesley Theological Seminary campus is part of the school's All Saint's Day vigil.

I'd like to add that if recent estimates of Iraqi civillian deaths are accurate, then each of these white bags represents 216 killed since our invasion.

Some things are more important than others

I am exhausted. Physically, yes, but even more so emotionally.

Is the life and death of a seven-month-old kitten more important than my second New Testament: Gospels paper? I don't know; but I do know that I haven't had even a scrap of the wherewithal to get going on it up to now, and that it ain't gonna happen tonight either.

That will leave me tomorrow to produce it in. Oh swell. Should I pull an all-nighter just when the antibiotics are starting to kick in? (I finally went to see a doctor; I now have pills that cost eleven dollars apiece, if you can believe it.)

See Pascale. See Pascale weep. See Pascale's academic reputation go down the tubes. Slide, Pascale, slide. It's a slippery slope, but going downhill isn't as easy as it looks.

Midterminated

Well, my Overview of Christian Theology mid-term exam is over. While not an utter debacle, it hardly represents my best and most shining self. And I'm afraid I abased myself to be one of those students who makes a special pleading for her inadequacies with the professor after it was over.

Gah. I'm embarassed to be me.

So, to summarize: still sick, still sad, still overwhelmed. And now feeling like an idiot too. Oh goodie.

Epiphany

This was a first.

Today's Theology class featured a discussion on predestination. I went into the class with a nasty headache, and the conversation, while fascinating and rich, certainly didn't help.

We worked our way through Augustine and Pelagius and Calvin and Arimaeus and Wesley and Origen. And then the teacher gave us a thumbnail sketch version of Barth's take on predestination (do NOT ask me to replicate it here, because I know I can't just yet).

And there in the classroom I began silently to weep.

I cried because it struck me as so beautiful and so true. I sat there with tears streaming down my face, with joy and relief and gratitude in my heart. They are flowing again as I write this.

After class I went up to the instructor and explained what was going on with me. I thanked him for helping me to hear and understand this. I told him that it was a big fat huge deal for me, and that in this moment I considered him as much or more a pastor than a teacher.

It was for an experience like this that I signed up for classes at seminary. I know it's just a tip of the iceberg, and that I'll need to inwardly digest and keep learning. But for now, just this: thanks be to God.

Seminary Humor

I arrived at class this morning a few minutes late, having not had a chance to eat breakfast. At our break, I dashed down to the dining hall and got some coffee, which is provided free of charge in reusable mugs. As I filled my cup I commented to the woman next to me about how delightful it was to not have to pay for it. She said, "Jesus paid for it!" *beat* "Jesus paid for everything!" Another *beat*. We both burst into laughter. "Hallelujah, thank you Jesus!" I said. And she said, "You know it," and though she was still smiling, she wasn't really joking any more. I sipped my coffee and said, "Taste and see how good the Lord is!" She nodded because she knew I meant it too.

Upstairs in the student lounge, as I fed money into the slot and selected a strawberry Poptart, I was bemoaning aloud my failure to pursue a healthier eating agenda. Another student in the lounge said to me, "Sometimes we have to be satisfied with the first fruits of Nabisco."

Who would have thought...

...that it would give me such intense pleasure to sit in a room with 10 other people and talk, for example, about how we know God?

I have been striving to bite my tongue, as I dearly wish to answer every question put to the class, and have something to add in response to virtually everything any of my classmates has to say. I don't want to be a pest or overbearing, however, so I am trying to listen at least twice as much as I speak.

So far, I've been favorably impressed by most of my classmates: their participation is thoughtful and candid. I'd be curious to know their life stories, and how they arrived in the seats next to mine.

I'm also really happy with the quality of instruction. I love an enthusiastic teacher... one clearly brimming over with eagerness to convey ideas and provoke thought about a beloved subject. As important as it is for students to listen, it's just as important or maybe more so for a teacher to be a good listener. Students are not always as articulate as they'd like to be. It's wonderful when a teacher can tease out the intended thought and bounce it back for further development and discussion. I also like it when a teacher encounters a new thought, or a new perspective, and you can genuinely see him or her chewing it over and filing it away for future serious consideration.

Still and all, the most startling thing for me is how much I'm enjoying this. I feel like someone is scratching behind my little furry ears and saying, "What a good girl! Do that again!" You should hear me purr.

If I were a betting woman...

...well, actually, I am. I play a lot of Texas Hold'em. So I have some idea of what constitutes a good wager, and what doesn't.

A bad wager puts at risk more than you can afford to lose. (What does it profit a woman to gain the whole world and lose her soul?) A bad wager risks a large sum against a proportionally small gain. Don't go all-in with your inheritance, for example, for a mess of pottage. That's a bad bet, right there.

A good wager risks a little for a similar or larger gain. A good wager only risks it all when the reward is commensurately great. Along those lines, I'm told that those who lose their lives will save them.

Many might consider it foolish to make a wager with incalculable odds. When one of the terms may either be ~ metaphorically speaking ~ either zero or infinity, there can be no rational solution to the equation. This is a strange kind of gambling.

But I chose to live, for now, "as if." I trust and hope that, whether or not my faith is rewarded in any clear-cut or concrete way, I will live a better life because of that choice. I may be wrong; if so, one day I'll remove my chips from the table and concede defeat. Until then I will be at play in the fields of the Lord, gamboling with the rest of God's fools.

On Monday I'm starting as a "special student" at Wesley Theological Seminary. I'm only taking two courses, "Orientation to Christian Theology" and "Art as Worship/Worship as Art." Because of chronic procrastination, most of the meat & potato courses were full up. That's okay, this is just a toe in the pond. I'm testing my temperature as much as the water's. We'll see how it goes.

So those of you coming here from both2and: beyond binary should know that this is going to be mostly about my academic and personal exploration of Christian life and community. No doubt the occasional cat picture or other off-topic item will pop up, but I expect it to be relatively tightly focused.

Thanks for visiting.