Deleted Post

Dear Socratics,
I deleted my previous post about LE@DD website because I just found out that we're still in the "soft" launch at this point and seeking corrections/feedback. So we're not yet advertising it. Anyway, when it is a full public launch, I'll post it again.
Peace,
Tom

Hardest moment?

So where is everyone? Here's a very open-ended question. What has been your hardest moment in your ministry since graduating from Duke in May? You've had five or six months on the ground.

I'm still waiting for Sarah to graduate, but I did serve as the interim pastor at PUMC this summer for three months while my pastor was on sabbatical. The trickiest thing for me was navigating various people's personalities, needs, wants, desires, and demands. This included staff and lay folks and the interchange between them all. I realized it was the thing I had the least experience with and it often took up considerable amounts of time. I'm not sure I always did very well.

Knowledge in other fields

So I'm currently working at LE@DD (Leadership Education at Duke Divinity). LE@DD is looking to borrow knowledge from other fields of study (business, government, social sciences, etc). So I'm not too interested in the abstract question about the boundaries on this kind of project. Rather, I'm interested to know when and where you've found something helpful for your ministry outside of a theological "source."

Here's a first one from me: I was watching the movie The Story of Us. Not a great movie but there was a scene at the dinner table where everyone went around and said what was the high point of their day and what was the low point. I think those two questions have produced a lot of conversation in various settings for me. My wife even led a girls small group around them.

So what knowledge or resource did you pick up and use for leadership that wasn't specifically theological in nature?

Where does theology speak?

Or, more specifically, where is it most difficult for theology to speak? This post is mostly going to be a series of questions attempting to refine each other, but since complete inactivity has descended upon this blog, I hope to try and promote some dialogue between students and alums.

Practical atheism is almost axiomatic today, for pastors and theologians as much as for anyone else. What I am interested in looking at is places where this is more apparent than others. What are the aspects of life that people find easier to submit to Scripture or Theology or revelation (i am not so much interested in terminology here)? What are the difficult places? What are the situations where we choose to ignore or dismiss the teachings of the Church? One example, I feel, is the works of mercy wherein it almost laudatory for someone to describe how they fail to feed the hunger, clothe the naked, etc.. Thus, instead of actually participating in the works of mercy, people feel self-satisfaction for their own humility. This is only one example, but I want to brainstorm some other ways in which the teachings of the Church fall on deaf ears to the life of those in the Church.

I am assuming only people with Bloglines or Google Reader will get this post, but if you can, please spread it to people you know so that we can get a variety or thoughts.