Anxious Time to Wash Your Hands
As of this afternoon, I am certified in CPR and First Aid. Well, as much as a day’s course can provide. I’m very glad I took the course, and am happy to work with 120+ other Montreat Summer Staffers who did likewise. Having CPR/First Aid certified folks around makes Montreat a safer environment in which to work and live.
That said, the course and the questions it elicited from us, reminded me of my culture’s severe penchant for fear, anxiety, and worry. Perhaps this reaction is just part and parcel of such a course and considering the dangers we face daily. On the other hand, I wonder if twenty-five years ago such a course was even offered, and if so, if there was any discussion about the necessities of mouth guards for giving CPR, or having to get verbal permission to treat injured parties to avoid later lawsuits.
One of the things I love about summer is its carefree nature. Kids without homework and counselors without the same. Long evenings of hanging out and ice cream. Fewer demands, perhaps, or at least, a change of pace.
Call me old, but I wonder if summers have lost a bit of their fearlessness. Maybe it’s the economy or our better knowledge of allergic reactions or just the fact we know so much these days (like the CDC’s daily tracking of Lyme disease cases), but it all makes me wonder about what all the anxiety is doing to us. Was camp without cell phones, tb screenings, and antibacterial gel so bad?
Using the necessary words to set the record straight
Preach the gospel at all times; when necessary, use words.
St. Francis preached plenty, but he never used those words. That, at least, according to his biographer Mark Galli.
It’s one of those fantastic quotes that sometimes gets things just right. Us Christians tend to be a bit too wordy. Not enough action. So when one uses the quote, it feels only right to attribute it. And recent tradition has done so to St. Francis of Assisi.
But as Galli writes in the article “Speak the Gospel” in Christianity Today online, the quote wasn’t attributed to Francis in the first two hundred years following his death and, in actual fact, Francis was a darn good preacher of words — turns out that’s what made him famous in his own day.
It’s an overused quote, but a good one I suppose in a culture that likes its sound-bytes and emotive phrases. And, heck, I’ll probably refer to it again before too long. But, thanks to Mr. Galli, I shall do so without attribution. Those words seem necessary.
From there to here
It’s been quiet on the blog front recently, but there’s been plenty of action otherwise. So I graduated last Saturday. That was sort of a big deal, I guess. It was a fun weekend. Appropriately celebratory and the like.
The day after graduation we packed our stuff into a storage unit. The day after that we cleaned our apartment and packed our car. And the next day we drove to Montreat, North Carolina for me to begin work at Montreat Conference Center. I had two blessed days of address-lessness which actually were a bit freeing. For a brief time I had only two keys to my name. Oh the light pocket, the freedom, the peace.
Then I got to Montreat, and, well, have a bit more responsibility now if responsibility can be measured by one’s key chain (and there’s several more keys to track down).
Work has been fun — hardly exactly “work” — and had taken plenty of mental, organizational, and even physical energy. My position, Director of Recreation and Community Life, calls for supervision of a broad and varied range of persons and activities around the conference center. So it should be a summer of thinking on my feet, working with some great folks, and enjoying God’s great activities in the mountains of western North Carolina.
So, as they say in Scotland, “that’s me” for now. I’ve got some posts coming up next week. I’ve also got to buckle-down and finish some writing for an actual paying gig so I won’t be posting abundantly for another few days or so. Keep checking back, though.
People are Weird, Especially in Coffee Shops
Spend enough time in coffee shops and you’ll see the darndest things. Now I know Decatur/Atlanta area isn’t New York or San Fran, but we’ve got our fair share of God’s most curious creations.
Sure, I do spend a fair amount of time in coffee shops so I have a big sample size. (Re the time spent, a few months ago I realized that I had an accidental streak going of 10 days straight with coffee shop stays.) So amidst packing boxes and cleaning and packing boxes and looking for a job, a few coffee shop highlights:
- Not sure how I feel about people having Skype or video chat meetings using headsets while in coffee shops. Totally messes with my public/private space assumptions. If they’re not too loud, I’m cool with it. Otherwise, get a room.
- At Starbucks this week I witnesses what has to be the most picky customer in the history of the world. She ordered her drink, her SPECIALIZED drink in a process that took at least 10 minutes. She had to have an employee assigned to her and she walked her through every step of the enormously complicated beverage (without even any coffee in it!) Bless the Starbucks staff for accommodating her (or did this just affirm her narcissism?)
- Fun fact: Megan asked me to marry her in a coffee shop.
- I enjoy people who bring their instruments to practice/play at coffee shops.
- I’m not a fan of PDA, not in coffee shops, not anywhere I can see (…or hear)
- Job interviews in coffee shops always strike me as a bit, umm, unprofessional (that said, I’d love to have any interview these days)
- Photo shoots in coffee shops are ok I suppose, just a little disruptive.
- But even after all these curious experiences I’ve yet to witness my dream: someone coming in and shouting, “This round’s on me!”
image by Kostya Kisleyko
What use is a M.Div. ?
As my friend Brian put it, I’m now a “seminarian*” — the asterisk means I’ve completed all my courses but not yet graduated. Commencement is next Saturday, May 16. So as I look at it, I have about a week to reflect on this whole Master of Divinity thing before I get the paper that acknowledges, officially, that I have in fact mastered all things divine 
(Or as Megan looks at it, I have a week to pack.)
As the situation has it, I have the fun of task of searching for non churchy jobs with a M.Div. degree on my resume. For you pastor types out there, this may not seem difficult since we pastor types tend to think the M.Div. is a pretty tricky generalist degree that takes at least three years to earn (sometimes four depending on the seminary and denomination). Those lawyers spend three years and get a Juris Doctor, but we can spend four and get a piddly masters! That means the M.Div. is a big worthy respected masters degree. And on the one hand, that’s right. The M.Div. covers a huge amount of ground and is a formidable masters degree.
Let’s consider. In the last four years I’ve taken classes in Greek and Hebrew; read and practiced the latest in counseling methods; taken multiple courses in public speaking, rhetoric and public relations (we call them “preaching courses”); learned to analyze systems and communities; studied conflict management; investigated a variety of budgets large and small; gained a boatload of critical thinking skills; and learned to be more self-aware than, I dare say, most other masters degrees require.
Sure, the M.Div. as a generalist degree is very broad and very handy for life. I haven’t for a minute ever regretted my studies at Columbia Seminary, and Columbia especially has proved a darn good place to undertake them.
On the other hand, however, the M.Div., because of its generalist nature, does not really translate well into much outside the church. Sure, it sets a solid foundation for many activities, professions, and contexts, but it doesn’t quite order great respect in the marketplace. The M.Div. feels like another liberal arts degree — I loved to earn it, but I’m left with a bit of a let-down feeling when flipping through job postings. I think: I know I could do that job and that job — well, in fact — but the letters after my name don’t exactly back that up. The M.Div. is a hint in the right direction for many positions, maybe a wee nudge towards an interview, but it’s not a key that will magically open any door outside a church.
So as a seminarian* I’m really looking forward to graduation and earning my Master of Divinity degree. One day, perhaps, I’ll frame it and put it on my office wall. In the meantime, I’m wondering a lot about what that office wall will look like: a cubicle? a delivery truck? a church study? a classroom? an evergreen? Maybe plain old plaster or sheet rock.
So if you’re a would-be employer reading this, wondering if I’m qualified for your position even though I have an M.Div., simply ask me and I’ll explain. I dare say the M.Div. has taught me to be more self-aware than, say, online masters degree programs like those of MBA programs online. Oh, and my studies included lessons in persuasion as well.
I'm Tallahassee. What are you?
One of the challenges of living in Scotland for a year was just that — we only lived there for a year. A year is long enough to do many things in life, like plan a wedding, write a book, wear out a pair of running shoes, but not nearly long enough to really get to know a place. A year is not long enough to feel like you belong to a place.
The language North Dakotans speak is a unique version of English. Though they don’t have thirty different words for snow like the Inuits are said to have, sometimes a local will come out with a phrase that’s new for me, but a phrase that just works. One example of such a phrase is to say something like, “Sam is Fairdale” or “Jenny is Park River.” A person’s name followed by “is” and a town name works as a great indicator for some. One’s hometown becomes very descriptive of oneself.
I’ve lived in Decatur, Georgia now for about four years — or at least, my possessions have stayed in the city limits for about four years and I’ve usually be with them. I’ll never “be Decatur” as they might say in the midwest, but I sure do like it. That said, it’s taken me about three years to really feel it, to get those windy roads but also to feel like I understood it. After three years of breaking it in, I’ve got my favorite restaurants and waiters, running paths and dogs to see jumping at the fence, book store and dry cleaner, and my particular drinks at specific coffee shops. It took about three years to feel at home, but that did it. It did it good.
When you get a drivers license with a new home town, it looks strange for a long time. Eventually, though, if things are going well that state and town name begins to become a part of you. You don’t have to say anymore, “I live in ________, but I’m actually from ______.” You might change your facebook hometown and subscribe to the local paper.
Feeling settled takes a while, maybe even three years or so, but the trick, I think, is to enjoy the transition, to not rush it, and just be where you happen to be.
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