Archives for 2023

Early in the spring semester, I had another bout of feeling like an impostor in the classroom.  I cannot recall what exactly prompted it this time, but the feeling was familiar, the voice in my head saying, “you do not know what you are doing.  You are not the teacher ...

Part Three: Ritual Bring Us into a Divine Dance (the real-time, active participation in the transcendent, where the physical realm intercedes for the spiritual realm). A Divine Dance; ritual creates a divine dance between the guide and the participants, the teacher, and the learner. Ritual uses the spiritual nature of ...

On October 7, 1962, Robert H. Walkup preached from the book of Job at First Presbyterian Church in Starkville, Mississippi. Walkup graduated from Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary in 1941 and had been the pastor of this congregation for nine years. Before Walkup accepted the ministerial position in Starkville, Walkup made clear to the ...

It’s common these days, you may have seen, on academic conference name tags or at the bottom of email signatures, to indicate one’s pronouns--not “preferred” pronouns, since this isn’t some kind of preference, but rather just an identity a person holds, like any other. It’s happening ...

A summer joy is hosting workshop groups on our campus. The visits allow me conversations with participants over breakfast, or chats while visiting the local ice cream shop. A significant concern for our early career colleagues has to do with agency--or the lack thereof. Colleagues will recount an incident then ...