Encounters

About four o’clock yesterday I quit studying at the library and headed home for an early dinner with friends.  A couple weeks ago on a Saturday my wife and I had attended the first of a three-session anti-racism workshop.  After tonight’s dinner we were all supposed to head out for the second installment.  Fortunately, I had the presence of mind to realize that I was probably not up for taking time off from my studies to see more of my blind spots and explore the world’s problems in yet more depth. 

The couple with whom we were having dinner are on-and-off-again Unitarian Univer­sal­ists.  Though I am the most religious of the bunch of us, we are deeply interested in each other’s lives.  So when Peter asked about my week, I found myself talking about how overwhelming but thrilling it had been to do my midterm for Christian Ethics. 

I still remember sitting in the library poring over Martin Luther King Jr.’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail” for the third time.  It is always bracing to be in the presence of his courage and vision.  But, this time, because I was formally studying it, I was struck by his rich knowledge of the philosophers and theologians that he was drawing on – from memory in his prison cell, initially.  I found myself wanting to also absorb Plato and Tillich in breadth and in depth.  But even more beautiful was the way that over and over he would take criticisms leveled by other pastors against him and the civil rights cause and reframe them as mandates which should be self-evident to anyone who carefully looked at Paul’s letters and Christ’s actions.  The process of retracing MLK’s steps through this great letter left me awed by his mastery of rhetoric and hungry to be more grounded in scripture.  That communion with such a great mind and spirit leaves me feeling like I’m in the right place.

The scramble to finish everything before the deadline – followed by detailed responses to the four case studies for my Final Integrative Seminar which were due a few days later – has also left me dead tired.   After everyone else left for the racism workshop and I had finished the dishes, I crashed on the couch for a couple hours.  Once my wife returned, we watched an episode of Commander In Chief – our decadent plea­sure these days – before I switched gears and returned to my studies.  For the last couple hours before bed, I read John Howard Yoder’s classic analysis of the gospels in which he lays out his fascinating picture of a thoroughly political Jesus.

This morning, after studying more and doing some of my work as a computer pro­grammer, I biked over to the hospital.  Each visit is different.  Each day is its own adventure and brings its own lessons. 

- Karl Jones, MDiv student