Apr 18 | Good Books and Shock Locks

And at the end of yet another year (well, almost) I’m still alive and kicking!

I’m not quite finished yet; I have one more paper to write, which I’m taking way too long a break from right now. It’s not due until Monday and I spent hours today working in the library. When I came home I just couldn’t bear to look at it again. This time I colour-coded the notes I made and it’s going to make everything go a lot smoother!

Tomorrow I’ve got my Clinical Pastoral Education interview. I’m really nervous about it. I know the supervisor for the program is quite conservative, theologically, and…well, I’m the kid with the Tank Girl haircut. Don’t matter how nice I dress, it’s hard to avoid the cut. I’m in a weird position – I have no desire to mislead anyone, so I don’t want to wear a wig or anything, and wearing a hat to an interview just chafes my brain. At the same time, there’s a latent grown-up hiding in there that’s afraid of being laughed out of the room. The grown-up is doing battle with the person who demands to be fully accepted because of inner worth that was hard-earned. My hair does not change my capability and eligibility for this program. I also received explicit proof last Sunday that my hair has been a sign of hospitality and strength for at least one other person – a woman who had been afraid to come to church bald but no longer was after seeing me.

But I’m still trying to be accepted.

All I can do is represent myself well – and if I’m going to be myself I guess I might as well go all the way.

Everyone says I’m worrying too much and everything will go fine. I’m praying they’re right.

In other news, the Book Fairy at school left a couple of books outside the library and I grabbed one because it had “Coffin” written on the spine and I figured it was by William Sloane Coffin, who I really like.

The book was actually written by Henry Sloane Coffin, William’s uncle, and it’s called The Meaning of the Cross. The first couple of chapters got me a little nervous, because it seemed like it wanted to sell me on the redemptive sacrificial meaning of the Cross, and that’s something that can get me nervous. I’m really skeptical and twitchy about substitutionary atonement and anything that comes too close to it. I decided to give the book a whirl, though, on the off-chance that the writer would give me some new way of thinking about it that might make it work better for me. Just because I write off that interpretation of the Cross doesn’t mean other people do, and I’m unwilling to be too absolutist about an interpretation. Besides, I love to get creative about things in Christianity that bother me!

After about ten pages, though, I was hooked. I’ll write a proper review of it later when it’s not almost midnight and I’m not watching The Colbert Report as I type, heh. I’ve just been impressed at how the book is both deeply faithful and yet also very committed to a very merciful and social justice-oriented reading of the Cross (at least so far – I’m only 50 or so pages in but it’s a skinny little thing).

Anyway, I also happened to find this website which contains some more of his work, if you’re interested. :)

All right – I should really be getting to bed. I just wish I was tired.

-Clarity

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