a confession.

I have a confession to make. It’s not an easy one to make, either. In fact, by making it, I will be revealing myself to be a sham. I will give many people who know me, or even who have glossed briefly over this blog, ample reason to call into question any further claims that I make about myself. That is because this confession that I am about to make finds its source in a recent epiphany of mine, which occurred while I was showering just a moment ago. That is to say, I myself wasn’t even aware of this fact. And it calls into question, for myself, much of what I have come to think about, well, myself:

I don’t love to read. And I never have, really.

Now this is distinctly different from saying that I don’t like to read. That’s not the case at all. And in fact, there are an immeasurable number of books and articles that I have devoured, to the point where I could say that I loved reading them. But for me to continue telling the world that I am a bibliophile who spends all of his leisure time rummaging through the pages of Church Dogmatics or Kant’s Critiques would be disingenuous. On top of the usual other possibilities, such as drawing and playing piano or guitar, there is also the possibility of sleeping. Or, watching sports. Basically, if a good football game is on, you can forget about me doing much else.

Sitting down to read almost always has two results: One is that, while reading I will come across a nugget that catches me, and then sends me into a tailspin of emotions and implications, as this novel, brilliant thought intersects my web of beliefs. Those implications often have me chasing me after other further implications, and before you know it I am spewing out original (at least, to me) thought after original thought, as I take these implications and hold them up to my “web,” taking note of both agreements and discrepancies, and as I began to hypothesize what my “web” might look like were I to incorporate this new knowledge. All wonderful things, except that they force me to stop reading in order to concentrate on this task of cognitive reorganization. So I put the book down, and resume reading after I have entertained this new thought fully, perhaps by writing notes in the book margins. A page or two later (or a paragraph, or even a sentence later, if you’re a particularly perceptive writer and the subject matter is engaging me at the moment), I’ll find another nugget, and the process will repeat itself. The result of this is any number of unfinished books on my shelf at one time, having started them and enjoyed them, and even had them influence my thinking to a great degree, but never actually being able to finish them, because the book exhausted me and because it took me an hour to read 5 pages of it.

The other result is that the book is either not engaging, either in general, or to me at the moment that I pick it up to read, or I simply choose, for time and sanity’s sake, not to go down too many of the above-described “rabbit trails” that I normally would. So I skim the book… doing so at a reasonably fast rate, and getting the majority of the book’s content in the process (a skill learned in seminary). I usually get bored, however, and unless I am required by a deadline to continue pushing myself to read on, I will inevitably fall asleep.

There are two problems, as I see it. The first is that I have problems focusing on one thing for long periods of time. Like those with attention deficit disorder, I will experience “hyperfocus” at times, but at others, if I am not engaged by the author, I don’t pay attention all that well. The second is, I think, the greater issue: I am not by nature a “sympathetic” reader. That is to say, I do not attempt to enter the world of the author; I force the author to enter into mine, narcissistic as I am. To follow an author’s thought patterns as disseminated in whatever work of theirs that I might be reading is not natural to me; far more natural it is to break off branches and to graft them into my way of thinking about the world.

I have another confession: I strongly believed the immediately preceding paragraph as I wrote it, but now upon further reflection, I am not so sure. After all, my thoughts are the synthesis of my studies, which involved hours of pouring over sentences and paragraphs. Sometimes my studies truly pulled me into the author’s world and thought process; I recall feeling this when reading Cost of Discipleship or God of the Oppressed. And sometimes, I would read things intently although I had nowhere to “put” the new information assaulting my brain; i.e., it couldn’t yet fit into my web and yet I couldn’t ignore or dismiss it. This was largely my experience with Exclusion and Embrace, although now upon rereading it, I can see just how much the book has influenced my theology. It is perhaps the most influential book for me in my tiny library, in fact. And if I wasn’t at least a little bit of a sympathetic reader, this couldn’t have been possible.

I'm not sure where all of this leaves me, or you, since you chose to read this entry. But the confession is healthy; if nothing else I feel liberated. This is also an exercise in self-reflection. I still love to study and learn, though....so, my nerd-dom is probably safe. But if I come to any further, similarly riveting conclusions, I'll let you know.

for realsies. I'm back.

Okay, I'm back for real. I say this with confidence, because my girlfriend is making me....:) well, maybe not, but she does has her own coercive means. But I digress.

I haven't blogged much...(okay, not at all) for almost 10 months now because I don't have internet at my house, but now Amy and I have a new plan to both blog more and to get more into each others' heads: Meet every Thursday night at a coffee shop w/ an internet connection, one person blogs (on Amy's Mac) while the other reads, we switch places; we talk about what we read/wrote. So, here I am, and here we are, sitting at Bean Town in Sierra Madre, one of our favorite places for joe and tea in town, listening to the regular Thursday night troubadour, with a name something like Johnny Rotten--while he hasn't (yet) sung the acoustic version of "Anarchy in the UK,", he did sing one of December by Collective Soul, one of my favorite angry preteen songs. Otherwise, he's nothing spectacular, but what do you expect...

As the less-than casual reader might notice on the sidebar, I am now a Fuller GRAD. As in, GRADUATE. I'm done!... and I'm sad, because I loved seminary. But, now I have a new challenge: as Youth Pastor at New Life Community Church, just down the highway from Pasadena. Very excited about serving there...so, looks like So-cal is the immediate future, for at least a while. Missions and/or Ph.D are still in the potential future, but this is a welcome opportunity to start applying my passion and my seminary education to a church setting. And, I am falling in love with the community, the staff, and the youth here. Which is always a good thing.

Also, still doing homeless ministry on Monday nights, but I have scaled back my role, and have given over leadership to Melinda and to Jerry (who works for Oasis International) and am now focused on mentoring a few folks from the park, one of whom named Phillip is a pastor in the making, and it is a privilege to be considered his mentor. I am currently still tutoring, although now privately in a few homes in La Canada rather than in San Marino. I am also continuing my summer experience as a hospital chaplain intern by volunteering at Huntington Hospital as a chaplain on Friday afternoons. Put a serious relationship in the mix, and your schedule fills up pretty quick.

Our troubadour just sang a song about Bean Town, which means that I need to wrap this up. But as I said, more is to come!

someone needs to edit my blog.

Anyone willing to volunteer?

i'm back?

...i have a question mark there, b/c I really hope that this post marks my triumphant return to the blog world, except that I'm not sure how that will work out over the next few, busy weeks.

Well, needless to say, a lot has changed in 6 months...and my blog was not one of those things...it needs some serious updating. For one, this profile picture, as my girlfriend Amy says, "looks like a totally different person" than how I currently look. As of right now, I haven't cut my hair in, oh, about 6 months, and I'm rocking the full beard. And I've put on another 5 pounds or so, but you can't tell that from the picture. Anywho, I digress....

At the moment, I don't have regular computer access. Which actually, I've really grown to appreciate. I don't feel tied to checking my email 8 times a day, or wasting time looking at random blogs anymore. (Although I do miss getting the latest scoop on tunes. I've still managed to buy numerous CD's over the past few months, despite this.) So, I don't think about blogging as much, which means, esp. for me, that I will not blog. But now I'm hoping to make it a (at least) a once-a-week thing, either from the school library or from my girlfriend's house. I just have to remember.

Also, I keep putting more and more stuff on my plate (which is everyone's story in seminary, I'm aware, but still it is a bit overwhelming at times). I'm currently a full-time Fuller student, one of my classes being a doctoral seminar in philosophical methods (and I'm still very much a newbie to philosophy) with Nancey Murphy (who is pretty big-time); I am in about the 8th month now of leading a homeless ministry that I and a few others started at my church (Lake Avenue Warehouse), which is my internship for Fuller; I am tutoring kids for money (very) part-time, and I'm also a TA for a Fuller professor (who supplements my income with lattes); and I am also in a long-term relationship, now for almost 14 mos. (Wow, that's crazy)...which is awesome, but you know, such things take time. So there's a lot going on, and next quarter appears to be another step deeper into the bog of busyness.

So, I preached my first (in the US...I did preach one sermon in Kenya, actually) sermon last night, to my church. The experience was awesome, and I had several friends show up or call me yesterday, which I was very thankful for. The sermon was, in many ways, preached to myself...I spoke on ancient Christian prayer practices, and the need for us to be in tune to God in our increasingly busy world. (The irony was, working on the sermon came to dominate my schedule all last week...go figure.) But I guess that's my story, as I continue into the Lenten season...not letting my schedule dominate me, but to keep listening to God, making time to orient myself towards Him, so that I can be in tune with him throughout my day.

So, I guess what I'm saying is... if blogging becomes a chore, then I probably won't do it, but if it becomes a release and a time to process, then I'll start keeping up with it again.

The sermon should be online... I don't know when the mp3 will be up, but go to http://www.ourwarehouse.org and click on "listen"..it should be there soon.

{sigh....}

(reminiscing about the days when I used to blog regularly...and when people actually read my blog...)




(i look like this guy, only scruffier, more hair, freckly, and more chiseled features. )

my first article submission for the SEMI-unedited

5 Random Lessons that I Learned in Italy

In case you didn’t know about it, Fuller and the Brehm Center have taken students to Italy for a study-abroad program for the last two summers, in order to have the opportunity to study medieval art and theology, and to experience these things in the culture from which they originated. I was lucky enough to be a part of the most recent trip. Of course, Italy has changed substantially over the past few centuries and so we students shared in the richness of the Italian culture, and its proud mixture of the past and the present.
Whenever we are displaced into a new setting, learning is bound to occur. Sometimes those lessons are pleasant experiences; other times… well, many of you all are aware of the “difficulties” that can occur when attempting to travel abroad. In light of my recent experience, I thought it to be my communal duty to share a few short lessons that I learned (perhaps a few at the end that might save you some traveling nightmares).

1. Europe is not the U.S. I know, shocker. Yet you would be surprised how easy it is to forget this. Lisa (my traveling buddy, who works for the SEMI) has made the point that we are more flexible and open to new experiences as American travelers when enter a culture far removed from our own (e.g. East Africa or India), since we expect cultural clashes to occur, and so we accept them more readily. We may go to Europe, however, expecting our typical comforts that we take for granted (e.g. wide assortments of foods, quick service, all-night convenience stores) to be available everywhere in Europe. When we discover that this is not the case (it isn’t), we might be prone to a worse “culture shock” than if we were to travel to non-Western locales.
2. Getting out of L.A. is nice. Yes, going to Rome and Paris (some of our side travels) is frenzied and littered with cars and smog and the like (although their cities manage to maintain their attractiveness anyway…the ties to the past that L.A. lacks help a lot in this department). But the quaint, cobblestoned city of Orvieto, where our classes primarily met, which crowns a lone Umbrian hill among rolling vineyards, which has a coffee shop or restaurant on every corner where conversations can leisurely take place over a glass of Classico… it was a breath of fresh air in comparison to L.A. I mean that quite literally. If you haven’t been on the “outside” for a while, you owe it to yourself.
3. Old is the new “new.” Another aspect of our “New World” lifestyle is our propensity to invent, create, develop, or refine; whenever we can find a way to be more efficient, we take it. While this has led to much wonderful innovation, it also leads to a numbing discontent, and a lack of respect for “older” ways of doing things. This sentiment has pretty much immersed the majority of American spirituality and religion as well. Thankfully, many of us have begun to attempt to reclaim our past and our traditions, recognizing our Christian experiences as the continuation of a story that has actually been told for quite some time before we came around. Going to a place where the past is still revered helped me in my quest to understand my past better.
4. Mega-churches are not a new phenomenon. This is something of a side note, but we saw cathedrals, even in the small Italian towns, that would make Bill Hybels salivate. Sure, medieval Catholics didn’t have Powerpoint; they only had masterpiece frescoes painted on the walls and ceilings that surrounded them with the story of God’s love. They didn’t have wireless mics, only massive vaults extending to heaven that helped immerse the sanctuary with sound. Creating accessible space for people to experience the divine en masse, filling the senses with sight and sound during worship… these are nothing new to Christianity.
5. My fifth lesson is actually a hodgepodge of lessons learned while traveling; to thee who hath eyes, read and taketh to heart.
-Don’t fly American. British Airways is far superior.
-Unless you want to develop a spiritual discipline of relinquishing your possessions, hold on to your bags at all times, in Rome especially. Wear a money belt.
-In Italy, try the grappa… just not in your espresso.
-Go to Venice. Anyone who tells you that it’s dirty and sinking and not worth the trip is a liar.
-Bring an alarm clock or cell phone, and keep them safe.
-Invest in a large pack you can wear on your back, if traveling frequently.
-Eat gelato every chance that you get.
-Be VERY early to the airport when flying out of Charles De Gaulle.

-And finally, Do not, I repeat, DO NOT, smile at anyone in Paris you don’t know. (If you need an explanation, ask me on campus sometime.)

post #51.

well, it's about high time I break the half-century mark.

so I'm back from Italy... LONG back (I've been back for about six weeks or so)... and it was easily THE most stressful travelling experience I had ever had. Since then I've also been to Texas to visit my girlfriend, and for us to meet each other's families... and while short, was quite a relaxing and rejuvenating trip. And now, i'm back in class, while still finishing up papers for my Italy classes, beginning a new church ministry with Warehouse/Lake Avenue, and still doing the tutoring thing.

Life is definitely in transition right now, hence the unnecessary stress and busyness, and hence the black hole that has been my blogging activity post-Italy. I will improve, I promise... I'll try to post Sat.

headed to italia!

I will be in Orvieto, Italy, taking Fuller classes with Dr. Dyrness and Peace through the Fuller Brehm Center's Worship, Theology and the Arts Summer Program. The above photos are shots of Orvieto, We will be spending two weeks there taking classes at a local convent, travelling around to various sights of artistic and theological import (inc. St. Francis' Cathedral in Assisi) and attending various Catholic ceremonies (e.g. Corpus Christi celebration, Mystery Plays, etc.) I'll be taking two two-week classes, one on Medieval Catholic Spirituality, and one of the theology of Medieval Art. Before and after the two weeks, some friends and I will be travelling around a bit (Paris, Venice, and Rome specifically). All very exciting stuff.

So, I am writing this entry (officially my 50th blog!) as a temporary "ciao," until I return home in (very) late June. I leave on Wednesday, June 7th (my birthday!...kinda bummed that I won't be able to celebrate with friends and all, but who am I to complain? I'm going to freakin' Europe!), flying into Paris to meet up with my travelling companions, who are done with classes already... I however still have two finals to go.

Which reminds me... I should be studying/grading papers right now...

guess what I bought?

Very excited about the prayer rope I just bought from easternchristian.com. I prayed the "Jesus Prayer" for the first time late last night, sitting upright in my hammock outside. It was pretty awesome. So much meaning packed into so few and simple words. Amazing that Christians worldwide have been doing these kind of things for centuries, and only recently have Protestants rediscovered their value. (that's the whole "protest" part of being a Protestant.)

For anyone who knows me relatively well, you may have heard me mention my own struggles in the last 9 months or so with "acts of personal piety," which for my background, usually consisted solely of reading the Bible for 15 minutes a day. While there's nothing wrong with this, I have always struggled with keeping focus, and I began to question why I was doing such things in the first place. Out of obligation? To be filled with "warm fuzzies about Jesus"? On top of all this, going to seminary had made it very difficult to open up any part of the scriptures and NOT analyze it to death. Being given new tools to analyze scripture has been a phenomenal gift and learning tool, and I wouldn't trade it for anything, but it has put a sizeable damper on my prayer life.

So, despite my fears of becoming too "gimmicky" and trying too hard to be cool (which I do enough of already), I am beginning to creep into the roots of our faith, kept alive today by the Orthodox tradition. We'll see how this goes. What will be next? Icons? Creed recitation? Ignatian Examen? Longer Retreat? All of those sound really attractive to me right now... for now, I'm dipping my toe in the water.

prayers.

I'm swamped, tired, drained...fill in the cliche. And my body is breaking down because of it (colon infection, acid reflux on crack cocaine...)

I'm taking Friday and Saturday off from school work, even though I have papers to grade.

Prayers are appreciated.