Integrating the Personal and Academic
For those of you who follow me on Instagram, you saw my recent post announcing a new blog series. To kick off that series, which is tied in with a class project for seminary, I wanted to introduce you to what I’ll be working on.
This term I am taking the class “Justice and Reconciliation” at Luther Seminary. Throughout the term, we are being asked to assemble a portfolio and participate in a regular journaling practice. We are encouraged to make this a resource that is available to our colleagues, as well as anyone else who might be interested. Since my goal has always been to share here regularly and lift the curtain on what it means to be a person of the cloth or seminary student, I thought, “Where better to share this project that at The Love Preacher?!?” So here we are.
During the term I will develop my working definition of “justice” and “reconciliation” based on both biblical and philosophical beliefs. Additionally, I will be compiling an annotated bibliography to serve as a starting point for texts, websites, videos, and other forms of media Each week I will put together a blog post with my thoughts about the class material and the lectionary text for the week, as well as curate resources and practices relating to the material and my area of focus - expansive language for God, the divine, holy, or sacred.
I have to say, it’s funny how the Spirit works. For the last couple of months, I have been feeling deeply called to connect with the Divine Mother. I don’t really have a lot to go on other than this is a theme and a yearning that has continued to show up. As someone who has always taken an expansive view of what/who my higher power is, it’s not totally abnormal for me to get a name and then build connection from there. This has deepened my desire to learn more about alternate images/representations of the divine. Enter fall term professor who says (paraphrased), “Hello, please choose an area of focus for the term on which you’ll do a class project. Choose something you care about, maybe a current spiritual or vocational focus of yours, and relate it to justice and reconciliation.” And that’s exactly how I came to a place where I get to integrate my personal spirituality with my academic learnings.