What a Week!

This has been quite a week!  Last weekend I hosted and was a pianist in a concert to benefit restorative justice.  After months of preparation, it was a success both in attendance and money raised.

Here’s Monday.  In the morning, I played for a ballet class, in the afternoon, biked to my chaplaincy training time (CPE) at the hospital and, in the evening, read about the future of churches in post-modernity. 

After taking the bus out to seminary, I went to Tuesday’s midday chapel even though I was still in the middle of cramming to be up to speed with my reading and writing assignments for my Final Integrative Seminar in the afternoon.  Chapel was a good respite.  As soon as class was over (which included a lively discussion about the Holy Spirit), I bummed a ride from a classmate back to the hospital, eating dinner in the car, before my evening’s CPE classroom session started.  This week half of us presented learning goals for the school year and got feedback from others.  It was emotional to review what we see as our spiritual growing edges!

Wednesday morning, after first taking the car in to get looked at (reading while I waited), I played for another ballet class.  After lunch, I met with a committee of ten about my sense of call to ministry in the UCC.  Fresh out of the meeting, I got a call to do some computer programming ASAP.  So – I headed off to Eagan to get that done.  The afternoon’s committee meeting had been a bit grueling but not as bad as the period of second-guessing until getting a call later in the evening (while reading up for Friday).  Finally, the process of discernment which informally started back in February or so became official from the denomination’s end!

After biking to the seminary from South Minneapolis, I spent Thursday morning organizing my time for the coming week, remembering to include chores at home.  I read up some on the meditative practices we are to explore for class this coming week before assisting my friend Sonja in hosting chapel.  After a bike ride to the hospital (through lots of wind) and four hours spent on the unit, I am done and drained.  It’s hard to see how slow I am to grasp the simple feedback being offered!  Here I am writing my blog post at home.  Next, I will try to finish the reading for tomorrow’s class.

Friday morning I will finish the programming project started on Wednesday, then play piano for Parkinson’s patients.  In the afternoon Christian Ethics class, we will discuss M. L. King’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail”, a novel, and the rest of this week’s reading.  Then, I have a date with my wife!

Over the weekend, I plan on doing work to wrap up the summer’s independent study on the book of Revelation as well as starting our next book for Integrative class.  Then it’s a breather before launching into next week!

- Karl Jones, MDiv student

Miles to go...

Five courses, an internship and then some. That is my semester. It wouldn’t be my life if I weren’t doing a bit too much and trying to do it reasonable well. This is my last year in seminary, so I might as well go for it.  Without a doubt, the semester has gotten on its way while I have been moving at a brisk, quad-burning yet manageable pace beside it.  Even as I write this blog over a much needed double-espresso macchiato at Nina’s just before heading in to my internship site at Dayton Avenue Presbyterian, I’m in the cool down phase of my week.  I’m taking inventory of the past twelve days wondering if the pace I’ve established is one that I can maintain until Christmas. Or will it pick up a bit? I hope it doesn’t but of course it will. 

Happily, I have managed to get to bed at a decent hour every night since this semester began with the exception of last night. This morning my alarm fired off sirens and my body reacted in a protest of paralysis.  It was six-thirty and I needed to post my interpretation and reflections on Genesis 2:4b-24.  I subordinated the warring members of body into conformity with my plans and dragged my aching eyes and murmuring abdomen to the shower and remained there until everyone agreed: we are going to write that essay before breakfast!  And so we did.

In addition to learning, this semester will be full of teaching. I am a teaching assistant in historical theology, running one more lap around a mountain range of classical Christian thought, more confident and curious this time than the last.  My internship director is brave enough to loose me among his sheep with Ecclesiastes in hand for adult education.  Another venturesome spirit has agreed to extend my Older Testament exegesis course to engage a group of young emerging church leaders attending Kwanzaa Presbyterian Church on the north side of town.

I am fortunate to have the diversity of these experiences available to me as I make decisions about my future in ministry and academics.  It helps to have several great pastors and professors coach me with their wisdom and expertise with a spirit of generosity. With so much support and encouragement (and a little more sleep!)  I am sure I can keep up the pace. But I think I need another shot before I go.

- Jermaine Ross, MDiv student

Swimming in a Sea of Chaos

In the coming week, I’ll have put in at least 40 hours at the office (in addition to my 100-mile round trip commute); 8 hours of clinical time for my CPE plus another 3 hours of CPE group time and a couple hours of prep time. I’ll spend Friday afternoon in a classroom for my first day of Christian Ethics and a good chunk of my weekend doing the reading and prepping for next week’s class, since between work and my CPE schedule I don’t have time during the weekdays for school work. Oh yeah, I’ll spend a couple of hours on Sunday at my place of worship for education and centering. Then there’s my family. I try to spend at least part of one day visiting with my parents. Anything left is committed to my spouse, three dogs and two cats.

Am I crazy? Not really. I’m one of the many United students who have chosen to make the next important step in our vocational path and are straddling the line between wishing we could devote more of our time and energy to going to school and realizing if we wait, it may not happen. Many of us just hold our breaths and jump in with both feet and do it. Surprisingly, most of us survive … and flourish.

In my household, there are two of us attending United. My spouse has been attending part-time for about four years; I’ve just completed my third part-time year, with about three more to go. Sometimes we’re able to work out our schedules so that we can take a class together – in its own way, class and commute time becomes a “date” of sorts.

We appreciate each others' support, but even if we weren’t both in school, we’d still feel supported by the staff and students at United. I’ve been to graduate school before. Seminary brings the best of the mental rigor of grad school, without the competitiveness. That’s not to say we’re not challenged by our instructors and peers. Think about it for a moment: Many of us are hoping to become pastors at some point. For the time being, we are both ministered to and ministering our classmates, faculty and staff at United. That doesn’t mean the atmosphere is one of a big “hug-fest” – it does mean that there’s a level of accountability to one’s self and the United community to grow and challenge individually … and as a community.

If I’ve got to be swimming in a sea of chaos at this point in my life, at least I’m bobbing along in good company. 

-Jayne Helgevold, MDiv student