Friday marked the finish of the three-week orientation session for new seminary students. We’ve begun to form as a community—but this Tuesday the Middlers and the Seniors will show up on campus, and we’ll have a whole new group of new faces to get to know! It will feel a little like starting all over again!

Last week I finished the Oral Interpretation of Scripture class, which ran for just six sessions. It was a great first experience at the seminary, and I felt sad that my first small group at seminary was ending so soon. We finished by reading in the chapel, and we each had the opportunity to read the Easter Story from Mathew—a powerful experience, we could imagine what it must be like to proclaim that story to the community at Easter.

We’ve had lots of orientation sessions, including Orientation to Learning Styles, Orientation to Field Education, Orientation to Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE), Orientation to Student Life, and Orientation to the Library. We should have started with an Orientation to Getting Oriented—we’re all a bit disoriented from all of the information that has been thrown at us! I think that most of us are pretty glad that we’re finally through this phase and ready to start the full school routine.

The Orientations to Field Education and to CPE were interesting, since these are going to be such important parts of seminary formation experience. Field Education is the hands-on experience of being in a congregation under supervision. It generally is for ten hours per week during the four semesters of the Middler and Senior years. The orientation discussed how to evaluate possible sites for Field Education, and how to conduct interviews for placement. We’ll be in the process of choosing our Field Education sites throughout the fall.

We will go through a similar process in choosing our CPE sites. CPE is for ten weeks during next summer. We’ll each be placed in situations (hospitals, prisons, nursing homes) where we will be ministering to people in need and crisis, and there will be extensive small group supervision to help form us. I’m looking forward to CPE, it sounds very intense. Stephen Ministry on steroids?

All of the new students spent a day together in a program called Building Respectful Christian Community. This was primarily small group activities to build awareness of and appreciation for the diversity in our class. Even though many of the students complained that they had been through “this stuff” before, I could still see how it worked as a tool to form and shape us as a community.

Heidi went one night to an event for the partners and spouses of seminarians, a dessert social. She met several people, and it sounds like there will be an ongoing program to bring this group together. We’ve observed that the student community has three circles: at the inmost, the students who live on campus, who are together nearly 24 hours a day for meals, classes, and study. Further out, the married students who live in off-campus housing, who form a neighborhood where the children play together and the adults barbeque on the weekend. And the third circle are the students who live independently off campus, coming from different directions and distances, and who really go away from the seminary when they go home at night. We’re glad that the seminary makes an effort to create events that bring all of these groups together, such as the Labor Day picnic and a monthly community Eucharist.

I’ve had several tests already in Greek, which I’m enjoying a lot. Even at the very beginning level, it’s exciting to be learning nuances of New Testament vocabulary and verbs. I’ll be continuing with that in the next semester. This week we’ll be registering for the rest of our fall classes, and getting started in them. I’m sure I’ll have plenty to tell about my classes when I next send an update.

Peace!

Charlie

First week of seminary is behind me now, I've got homework and reading and a head full of new names, new faces, and new experiences!

It has been a good week. On Monday morning everyone met at the Chapel for a Community Eucharist, then we traipsed over to the auditorium for a first orientation. There are nearly 80 people entering this year, about 57 M.Div. candidates -- it's a really big class, I think that the class ahead of us is a total of about 40. Everyone took a few minutes to introduce themselves... which took two hours! It looks to me like the class is about 1/3 women, which surprised me, I expected 50%. People of all ages, some with young children, some with grown children. Some retired, many in mid-life and changing careers. Maybe 20% are young people, nearly straight out of college. After lunch we met again for additional orientation on academic expectations and a brief session on community worship. And we finished the day with a picnic for students and their families, a chance to mingle.

Tuesday morning began with Morning Prayer, then about 60% of the students headed for Beginning Greek and the others to Beginning Hebrew. I'm in the Greek group, which is meeting every morning for 2.5 hours. It's great! We've learned the alphabet and our first verbs. We're using the first chapter of John for reference, and we're learning to say the Lord's Prayer. The professor is making it all fun, and I'm busy making flash cards! After lunch, I began another class, a six-meeting class called Oral Interpretation of Scripture. Basically a grounding in being a lecter. It meets for an hour and a half, begins with a 30 minute talk about the importance of reading, then we spend an hour in small groups reading and critiquing one another. There are five in my group, and it's a lot of fun. We read in different spaces each day, and we're becoming friends as we take risks in front of one another. It's a good experience with a lot of affirmation, a good thing for the seminary to schedule at the beginning. Finished Tuesday with an orientation to computing at the school. They've got a great wireless network, so I'm able to get online with my own laptop almost anywhere on campus. They gave me an email address (cbrock@vts.edu) but I think I will continue to use my Yahoo email primarily -- it won't be taken away from me in three years!

Wednesday morning began with Eucharist. Since the seminary community doesn't worship together on Sunday, Wednesday is the regular day that we share the Eucharistic meal. Greek, then lunch. Lunch in the refectory every day is a mixing opportunity, a time to find somebody new to sit with and to learn about. All the faculty and staff eat at the refectory too. It's a great community gathering every day. Then Scripture. Then another orientation to Worship in the Chapel, a recognition of how it is different from most of our experiences, and an overview of how we will all have opportunities to participate.

Thursday. Morning Prayer, Greek, lunch, Scripture. And that was all! I settled into an empty classroom, and did homework until 5:30, and I was able to go home and have a sociable evening with Heidi. Hurrah!

Friday. Morning Prayer, Greek, lunch, Scripture. Beginning to feel like a routine! The end of the day was an orientation to Community Life and Spiritual Formation. The expectations of community life are that we all participate in it. Seems obvious, but stating it as a clear expectation really helps everyone carry it as a clear intention. The orientation to Spiritual Formation encouraged us to form small groups for prayer and mutual support. We also learned (surprise!) that the seminary provides spiritual direction opportunities for all students and their partners -- what a great gift for both Heid and me!

So that's the first week. The seminary explains its expectations of students like this: "go to chapel, go to class, go to lunch." And that's clearly what we'll be doing!

The next two weeks will look pretty similar to this week, but we'll do more small group work, and we'll be planning our full course loads for the fall semester.

I hope to keep you up to date like this -- it's a great way for me to reflect and remember what's going on for me, too. If you don't hear from me every week or two, remind me!

Love to you all

Charlie

I went out to the seminary for my interview today.

The first thing that struck me is that the campus is at the intersection of Quaker Road and Seminary Road. Felt like a pretty cool intersection of important parts of my life.

The second thing that struck me was the sound of the 17-year cicada invasion when I stepped out of the car. A loud metallic whirring, like the sound of a flying saucer from a cheesy 50's sci-fi movie. Sort of awesome. The cicadas are everywhere, big grasshoppers with wings.

The interview was with Margaret McNaughton-Ayers (Dean for Admissions) and George Kroupa, Assoc. Prof. of Christian Education. It was a relaxed and short interview. They asked questions like, "What are my gifts? What are my weaknesses? How do I expect my relationship with God to be affected by seminary? What do I expect to learn at seminary?" They gave me a copy of the Mission Statement to read while they had a brief consultation, and then asked me a few questions about that. Then we were finished.

I learned that they won't be able to let me know about my official admissions status until they hear from Vincent about my psychological evaluation, which I'll be completing next Tuesday (June 1) via telephone. So I'm hoping to hear by the 2nd week in June.

I also learned that classes begin on August 16th. A week later than I had thought, which is all for the good -- a little extra summer to enjoy!

Heidi and I arrived in Washington DC on Friday May 14, and we've been settling into our temporary apartment, until our house in Arlington is available (beginning of July). It is great to have the chance to live in downtown DC, and to get to know the city so directly. We're in Chinatown/Gallery Place, easy walking to everything. I've found a Starbucks with WiFi, so I'm able to stay connected over my daily cup of coffee.