SchneiderWeb

August is drawing to a close and with it the Summer of John, which is what I dubbed this--my first extended time off in 15 years, and probably the last for the foreseeable future. As the calendar turns from August to September, there is a palpable change in the air. There are the welcome cerulean days and blanketed nights of September that render the haze of August but a hazy memory. But so too does the lazy rhythm of summer give way to the more purposeful pace of autumn, as schools once again open their doors and corporate offices resume five-day work weeks. Speaking of schools, in seminary there is a word to describe this transitional state between two worlds, which one hears surprisingly often--"liminal." Come to think of it, I'm not sure that "liminal" gets much use outside of seminary, although I may challenge myself to use it in casual conversation--that and "teleological." Here goes: Many students today probably found themselves in a liminal...

Korea, like most of the world outside the United States, and (I think) the UK, uses the Metric System. So in addition to learning Korean at a deeper level, I will need to familiarize myself with another foreign language. Whatever I learned of the Metric System in elementary school (thank you, President Carter) was lost along with my Rubik's Cube and orthodontic retainer. Let's attempt some basic conversions from Metric to English and vice versa. For the last few weeks Korea has been in the midst of a heat wave, with temperatures getting up into the mid 30s--Celsius, that is (~95 F). To walk a mile in another person's shoes is to walk 1.60934 kilometers, which seems more understanding but less poetic. An ounce of prevention is worth only 0.453592 kilograms of cure, which leaves me feeling sick. And then there's currency (not Metric, I know). One dollar is worth roughly 1100 Korean Won, which given my monthly salary, makes me a millionaire. Bartender, a round for the ...

Hello? [Tap tap tap] Is this thing on? I've fired up the generator, the lights are flickering, so... Let's Rock First off, to paraphrase a great American author, the rumors of this blog's demise have been greatly exaggerated. I would like to consider the time since my last post to have been a sabbatical, but really I was consumed with finishing my final semester of seminary, completing my ordination requirements, and then moving back to Englewood. And to be honest, a combination of inertia, laziness, and the lack of anything compelling to write kept me in hibernation. However, I am about to undergo what Facebook would classify as a "life event." On Sunday, August 11, I will be ordained as a "teaching elder"--Presbyterian parlance for "pastor" or "minister"--in the Presbyterian Church (USA) at Broadway Presbyterian Church in New York City. I almost need to type that sentence again to have it sink in. So this is what those three ye...