a decent update
Feb. 6th, 2004 12:50 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
terrypurple73I’m going on the Further Along the Journey retreat this weekend, and it probably couldn’t be coming at a better time. I need a retreat so badly. I talked about it some with my small faith group last night, and the more I talked about it, the more I realized how true it is. I think it hit me in part after Tuesday afternoon. My wonderful and ever-understanding Jessica stopped in the CCSJ, and we had a few minutes to catch up before I had to run to class. Man, I miss her. It was so good to spend even fifteen minutes with her, just talking and knowing that she gets what thinking and what I’m going through. And vice versa. I miss having someone who knows how the deeper parts of my spiritual life work. I miss having someone who will sit and struggle with me through the moments when we wonder about faith. And I miss seeing the sparkle in someone’s eyes after a retreat, knowing that God was seen in a new way over a weekend. Jess and I shared those, and seeing her on Tuesday made me realize how much I miss our friendship’s frequency (in both the wave-length sense and the time-spent-together sense). My faith has not been challenged this year, and I don’t like that. That’s a hard aspect of life to just remove with the start of a school year. I miss it, and I feel a lacking when I don’t notice God in new ways. I don’t like to say nearly the same prayer every time it is my turn to pray before dinner. That makes me feel like I’m not growing in all the ways I could be. So going on retreat this weekend will hopefully be really beneficial, growthful. It’s a small group, and led by Ellen Harms and Sean Burke. Those two are powerful leaders, so I think no matter what it’s bound to be good.
On other notes, I had an interesting time in the CCSJ the other day, even before Jessica came in. Maria Teresa wanted me to read over the applications for the group going on the El Salvador trip this summer. (CCSJ leads a ten-day immersion trip to Salvador each summer; this summer it’s being offered as part of a theology class.) Tere told me that there were spots for twelve students, and they’d received nine applications so far. And she said she really wants me along. The woman is persistent, persuasive, and knows what I really want out of my Creighton experience. So I think I might be going to El Salvador this summer! Eeep! But I’m really excited. I’ve wanted to go to the DR since I started at Creighton, but there hasn’t been a way for me to fit it in. This trip would allow me that experience of being abroad, but without the huge time commitment. And ten days in a country where I don’t speak the language is a lot less intimidating than a summer or a semester. I’d been waffling on the idea of this trip for a while, and I’d avoided doing the application because I assumed the trip would fill with no room for me. They obviously are going to make room first for students who are taking the trip for course credit, not for the students who will have fully graduated by the time we would leave the country. But it sounds like there will be room, and I think I might just go to Salvador! Goodness!
I almost called up Bill tonight and asked him out on a date. I’ve been asking him out in my head enough lately that I thought I might as well get it out of my system. But I talked it over with Kat, and she gave me some advice that made some sense, such as maybe waiting until I have some free time to schedule a date. So I could wait, and that would make sense. But I was all set to do it. I was in a kind of off mood, which for some reason made it feel completely right to ask out a boy I really like. When I asked Jack on a date last year, I wrote the email at something like four o’clock in the morning after I’d finished a paper. I think my mindset was that I was too tired to be embarrassed, too frazzled to overanalyze what I was saying. So I just did it. And that’s how I was feeling tonight, in a sense. I was feeling peopled-out. If I’d wanted to talk and share with everyone, I would have over-analyzed it and freaked out. See? Weird moods are the perfect time to ask out boys. But I didn’t do it, and that’s all right. Another time. For real. I really have been asking him out on a regular basis in my head.
The snow keeps coming, and I, for one, and perfectly pleased with it. I hope I can always live in walking distance to where I need to be on a regular basis. I would never have to possess a car, so I would never have to shovel it out when the weather got beautiful cold like it has been here.
Hey, maybe there won’t be any Salvation tomorrow due to “inclement weather.” That could be relaxing.
I have a saying hung on my wall by my computer, a quote I got ages back, probably when Mana and I facilitated religious ed. It’s from a youth minister named Jeff Johnson.
“I hope that we in youth ministry keep surprising kids. Not just with zany skits and bad jokes. But catch them off guard by showing up on their turf without rules or roles to restrict our relationships.
I hope we surprise them by calling them by name, as Jesus did to Zaccheaus.
I hope our vulnerability quietly disarms them of their defenses.
I hope our faith and lifestyle creates curiosity among the young, a curiosity that leads them to track down the source of the love they experience in our presence.”
On other notes, I had an interesting time in the CCSJ the other day, even before Jessica came in. Maria Teresa wanted me to read over the applications for the group going on the El Salvador trip this summer. (CCSJ leads a ten-day immersion trip to Salvador each summer; this summer it’s being offered as part of a theology class.) Tere told me that there were spots for twelve students, and they’d received nine applications so far. And she said she really wants me along. The woman is persistent, persuasive, and knows what I really want out of my Creighton experience. So I think I might be going to El Salvador this summer! Eeep! But I’m really excited. I’ve wanted to go to the DR since I started at Creighton, but there hasn’t been a way for me to fit it in. This trip would allow me that experience of being abroad, but without the huge time commitment. And ten days in a country where I don’t speak the language is a lot less intimidating than a summer or a semester. I’d been waffling on the idea of this trip for a while, and I’d avoided doing the application because I assumed the trip would fill with no room for me. They obviously are going to make room first for students who are taking the trip for course credit, not for the students who will have fully graduated by the time we would leave the country. But it sounds like there will be room, and I think I might just go to Salvador! Goodness!
I almost called up Bill tonight and asked him out on a date. I’ve been asking him out in my head enough lately that I thought I might as well get it out of my system. But I talked it over with Kat, and she gave me some advice that made some sense, such as maybe waiting until I have some free time to schedule a date. So I could wait, and that would make sense. But I was all set to do it. I was in a kind of off mood, which for some reason made it feel completely right to ask out a boy I really like. When I asked Jack on a date last year, I wrote the email at something like four o’clock in the morning after I’d finished a paper. I think my mindset was that I was too tired to be embarrassed, too frazzled to overanalyze what I was saying. So I just did it. And that’s how I was feeling tonight, in a sense. I was feeling peopled-out. If I’d wanted to talk and share with everyone, I would have over-analyzed it and freaked out. See? Weird moods are the perfect time to ask out boys. But I didn’t do it, and that’s all right. Another time. For real. I really have been asking him out on a regular basis in my head.
The snow keeps coming, and I, for one, and perfectly pleased with it. I hope I can always live in walking distance to where I need to be on a regular basis. I would never have to possess a car, so I would never have to shovel it out when the weather got beautiful cold like it has been here.
Hey, maybe there won’t be any Salvation tomorrow due to “inclement weather.” That could be relaxing.
I have a saying hung on my wall by my computer, a quote I got ages back, probably when Mana and I facilitated religious ed. It’s from a youth minister named Jeff Johnson.
“I hope that we in youth ministry keep surprising kids. Not just with zany skits and bad jokes. But catch them off guard by showing up on their turf without rules or roles to restrict our relationships.
I hope we surprise them by calling them by name, as Jesus did to Zaccheaus.
I hope our vulnerability quietly disarms them of their defenses.
I hope our faith and lifestyle creates curiosity among the young, a curiosity that leads them to track down the source of the love they experience in our presence.”
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Date: 2004-02-06 03:04 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-02-09 12:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-02-09 07:21 am (UTC)~Theresa