I divide my professional life between teaching at Wycliffe College and working as a clinical psychologist in private practice. The latter means that I often spend time with people who are trying to make sense of why someone they love has been hurtful to them. I also spend time with people who are trying to make sense of their own hurtful behaviour.
1. Let your superiors advise you.
Whether your superior is a bishop, a moderator, a superintendent or other denominational head, there can be a certain wariness between students and the people who will be deciding (or speaking into) their futures. But denominational leaders are generally happy to have students who are preparing for pastoral ministry share their questions, struggles, and concerns. Allow these relationships to become relationships of conversation and discernment.
2. Remember your boldness.
Two years ago, my husband, Ephraim, and I were proud parents at our son’s graduation from university. The afternoon before the graduation ceremony there was a baccalaureate service in the chapel of his school. Seating was limited; each graduate could only invite a few people. Not surprisingly the Chapel was packed with parents, grandparents, and a few siblings.
My family and I live in a Victorian house in downtown Toronto. One of the things that drew us to buy this old home was the entrance, which consists of two nicely sculpted wooden doors with stained glass panels that make up the upper half of each door.
Christians familiar with liturgical traditions will know that we are in the season of Epiphany, a period that focuses on Bible passages that disclose the fact that Jesus was divine. Yet for most of us, the word epiphany means having an “aha” moment, a time when we discover something that makes a huge difference in the way we look at things. So, which sense of the word epiphany is best?
I once heard a priest address a congregation with a question: “What is the complaint I hear most from parents?” Then he answered it by saying: “they lament the fact that their grown children have stopped going to church.” The priest went on: “Do you know what I tell them? Pray to God that your children suffer more.” It was a shocking statement, and people audibly gasped when they heard it.
Wycliffe's Lord and Lady Coggan Professor Emeritus of New Testament, Terence Donaldson, muses on a question that has long occupied the minds of scholars: was the Apostle Paul an Anglican? With tongue firmly in cheek, Prof. Donaldson examines the evidence below.
Will Postma is an adjunct professor at Wycliffe College and the Executive Director at the Primate’s World Relief and Development Fund (PWRDF), the humanitarian and development arm of the Anglican Church of Canada. Having just come out of the Christmas season, when people’s thoughts readily turn to those living in poverty, Will’s blog is a reminder to be mindful of our poor brothers and sisters year round.
Ruth Bartlett is the 2018-2019 Senior Student. She is in the MTSD and the MDiv combined-degree program. She hopes to be ordained with the Canadian Baptists of Ontario and Quebec.
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J. Ryan Smith is a transplanted prairie boy and a first year PhD student at Wycliffe College who studies divine violence in the Scriptures.
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