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She Does Seminary: A Whole Month

A month since I first met my classmates in an awkward lobby mingling. There were nametags and I was stressed, looking for a corner and familiar faces. But I survived, and found my friends, and made new friends, and one old-and-now-new again.

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I can translate whole sentences out of the Greek, at least if their verbs are "to be" or "to say." It is amazing to think that a month ago, I didn't even know what an omicron was.

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Tuition is waiting to be paid, and debt is happening, but I'm keeping calm. This small job on campus is a life-saver and I'm grateful that I will at least be paying for groceries out of pocket.

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My head is above water, but I am not doing all the readings. I am assuming I can/will catch up over Reading Week; this may be naive.

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Crises of faith? No. Crises of self? Yes. What I am doing and where this will take me seems much foggier than six months ago. And there are already decisions to be made. Do I take a CPE (clinical pastoral education) unit in the summer, or go on the intensive course to Tanzania? Do I focus on an academic stream, or concentrate in spiritual formation? In the big spectrum of the church, am I conservative or liberal? Is it possible to forge a middle ground?

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Taize prayer continues to be a highlight. I crave this quiet, still space, this community that listens and watches together.
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