In my element

And classes have begun! I finally feel back in my element – at least in part. I love learning. I could read and experience life and be in a classroom or sit over a cup of tea and learn something every time and then integrate it all. The ability to learn never ceases to amaze me, however it does have its down sides. Since I can see connections that aren’t always evident to others and express them differently, I feel misunderstood quit frequently. I’ve been told by both the Houghton prof and his wife that I need to back off the schoolwork. I’m not even exhorting myself. I’m just doing what I love to do for fun. This is how I’m stimulated. This is one of the ways that I see God. This does not mean that I haven’t had a lot of other experiences this week that have been God saturated, but I don’t think that we should tell people to seek out seeing God is a different way or to change their identity. I am a child of God first and foremost. But I am a child of God who among other things loves learning. We would never think of telling someone who likes to explore nature or build that they shouldn’t be experiencing God that way, so why is learning so looked down upon?
So classes…I’ve had four so far and two more today. Here is an overview of school up to this point.
Monday:
Engaging Australian Culture – apparently in years past HDU kids just took trips and kept a journal about it, but this year we are meeting once a week on Monday nights to have devotionals, hand in short papers about the previous weeks trips, and have cross-cultural training. We are going to have at least one trip every week, usually on the weekends, with this as well. This is the class that is going to challenge me the most. Looking over the lists there were a few things that are I’m not sure I can physically or emotionally do, and there is one that I know for sure that I cannot participate in. I’m trying to figure out what to do with that (and please pray for discernment as well) because I don’t want to close a door that God is opening, but I’ve also learned this summer that I need to take care of myself and honor clear boundaries, both physical and emotional ones.

Tuesday:
Most other people have a class on the book of Acts in the morning so that is really my time to communicate with people back home (especially my parents but a few of you just might be surprised. Haha.) and work through some homework
Australian History – In the afternoons all HDU students are required to take this course. It seems that we are going to be exploring history through both lecture and film. The class is being taught as both a theology and history course like History of Christianity I and II at Houghton. In fact Glen, the prof, reminds me a lot of Tyson just in the amount of knowledge that he knows. It’s amazing. And I had to giggle the first day of class because he started talking about places that we live in the states and theological connections to each area, one of which I had just written my term paper on last semester for Tyson.
Christianity and Postmodernism – This is the class that I wanted to take the most. And it looks like I will not be disappointed. The prof, Peter, is teaching this class for the first time so he’s sort of making it up as he goes, but we’re going to be watching “postmodern” films and visiting emerging churches. And he’s quoting a lot of McLaren and other books I’ve read which is great for me.
Wednesday:
Independent Study Day – some of you aren’t aware but Houghton has this funny class that everyone has to take for each major they are in called Senior Seminar (or various other things) which is in most cases a “what can you now do with your major” class. The religion department was the last to add this class and I’m the first graduating class where it is required. Although the department is running it a little differently and we have to actually study this huge corpus of material on a theological topic. This created some issues with me coming to Australia because a.) the class is only offered during the spring now and b.) it is mainly based on in class conversations. So Dr. Walters, the head of my department, had this idea where I take an independent study on the topic that will be taught next semester through the prof at Houghton (Dr. Case) who will be teaching it and I get the other religion students going to Australia to take the same independent study so we can work through it together. That means Shane. He is the only other religion student on this trip – really designed for social science and religion majors since that is the majority of what Kingsley offers. Okay, Shane and I can make that work, we normally talk about theology anyway. Then we got the topic from Case “The History, Doctrine, and Worship Implications of the Trinity in Conjunction to the Christian Faith” Needless to say it a hearty undertaking. We have six books, mostly to be read in 1-2 weeks and three papers that we don’t have the topics for yet. We decided to meet once a week to go over the material. Yesterday was our first day.

The reason we decided to go into the city is so we can just explore for part of the day and do the IS material for part of the day. Yesterday we worked our way through The Shadow of the Almighty which is an excellent book, for about three to four hours in King’s Botanical Gardens and then spent the rest of the day exploring. We ventured to the Shrine of Remembrance which is similar to the eternal flame in Russia. It is a flame set up in every town in a country in order to serve as a remembrance of those who died in World War II (which is referred to here not as World War II but by its dates). Then located behind the flame is a museum and sanctuary that you can go in to. I have been raised in a family that insists on seeing something historical on every vacation (I really think we are the only family who goes to museums and historical landmarks at the beach) but I’ve grown to appreciate that over time. Shane has been raised the same way so we both took a lot of time to work our way through the displays and take everything in. The thing about the Melbourne is that it is so spread out and so large that it is impractical to say that “we’ll just come back to it next week” because it means that you are going to miss something else. Therefore, you have to make each moment count. So we spent probably a good hour looking around. The thing that struck me the most was the huge plaque inside of the sanctuary, where people put flowers and wreaths to honor the fallen. It said “No greater love then this”. That floored me. What a different view of war then we have in the United States. We say that we are about protecting our country, but I would say that there relatively few wars we entered into without another motive, but the Australians see war as protection, as a sign of love.

We spent a large amount of time in the Botanical Garden as well, which is actually several gardens. It was interesting because as you moved from one section to the next you felt like you were in a completely different place. Where we sat down to do our IS work felt like fall, with leaves on the ground and these huge trees around us. Then we moved over into this pond section where everything was bright green and teaming with two of the most interesting birds I’ve seen (I wish blogger would start letting me post pictures). Next we went to a tea house beside a lake where ducks and fish that really looked like eels only with a fish head were co-existing together. Finally, we worked our way through the rain-forest section. What a way to see and experience nature! It also intrigued me because it is all maintained with very little water. Australia is in the middle of a several year drought so water conservation is a must, including facilities like this.

After we finished working our way through the weeks material for our study, we went to Evensong, an Anglican form of worship which is held daily at the church we attended on Sunday. Evensong is a form of Anglican worship where you read out of the book of common prayer and scripture lessons and pray for 45 minutes. We just started offering it at Houghton last year and it was one of the things I was upset to forfeit after leaving school. So it was a huge blessing to stumble upon this. We sort of botched our way through everything (the kneeling, standing, and sitting part) but we survived. One of the downsides was the study on the trinity has opened my eyes a lot to the ways that we address God and has made me semi- curious/ critical of how much the Holy Spirit is undermined in our daily lives and worship experiences. But more about that as my study progresses over the semester.

Following Evensong we embarked on an adventure to find food. It was around 6pm and neither of us had ate all day. We passed all of the American fast food restaurants and through China town for almost an hour before we stumbled upon this little ally that was full of restaurants. They are all sit down (which I really miss – the ability to just sit down and eat a meal with someone on a plate with silverware and feel civilized) and had their menus displayed outside and it was sort of like a market with everyone bantering to have you come into their establishment. One of the last places we walked by, close to 7pm was having this deal where you go an entrée and a desert or appetizer or salad for 25 Australian dollars, which is like 20 American. Wow. The best food I have EVER had. Hands down. Shane ordered Calamari, which came with a red wine sauce which blew us both away. For main courses I had amazing salmon that was charcoaled in a white wine and with a type of rice I had never seen before (it was yellow-ish) and then fresh, raw cucumbers were cut up around it. Then Shane had veal, which I didn’t try, but fantastic potatoes and then cooked broccoli which had been steamed with something on it. We’ve spent most of our time here trying to conserve money so it was time to splurge a little. We got over $100 worth of food for $60 Oh, the best part, I ordered chocolate pudding for dessert that was served as fondue, warm, with homemade ice cream. We had to wait close to 45 minutes for it but it was worth it. During our entire meal there was a fantastic guitar player playing cover songs right to our side. It was perfect. All I could say was “Welcome to Australia, Shane”.

After our meal we had an interesting time trying to find our way home, especially since neither of us knew how we had gotten there in the first place, but we made it to the state library before heading back to Kingsley. We’re not planning on splurging every Wednesday on food, but it was so nice just to relax during the day. I’ve had to explain myself to people a few times this trip, so it was great just to be in the presence of someone who I feel I owe no explanation to.

And now off to classes for the day – Life in the City and Australian Lit. Send me an email to let me know how you are doing!