funny how I only use this thing when I need to vent my inward frustrations.

Currently Listening Back to Bedlam By James Blunt Wisemen, High {I shouldn't like James Blunt...} see related

I think...Aristotle was mostly right about virtue.

I think I am reforming my idea about students on a Christian campus.  Though I have not been on a non-Christian campus for longer than a few hours I would be surprised if they were as generous and kind as the older students I have met here at Biola.  I cannot explain why I think it is different... but I have a hard time believing anyone could be as benevolent and good anywhere else except on a campus where Christian principles are promoted (especially after reading Henry Chadwick's The Early Chuch).  I had a very negative attitude last semester about this, and it got in the way of me seeing the good to be had here at school... it also got in the way of me getting to know students who were deeper in a good and healthy sense, and not because of pain and dysfunction that has yet to be healed from.  I do not want to take last semester for granted, and I am still in this waiting period of learning and trying to figure out what's neccessary to reconcile everything... but right now there is joy to be had -- that before -- I wasn't seeing.     

Here's an odd thing to say:  Three Cheers for upper-classmen! (and children, and young homeschoolers in plays. For philosophy classes that are too hard for me, and the upperclassmen who are willing to help. {and living with your twin, and growing in virtue together, and for tutors we haven't had in a session until this semester})

Health and safety are good things.  I love good things.  I love health and safety. =) (yay)

“Gather my broken fragments to a whole

As these four quarters make a shining day.

Into thy basket, for my golden bowl,

Take up the things that I have cast away

In vice or indolence or unwise play.

Let mine be a merry, all-receiving heart,

But make it a whole, with light in every part.”

George MacDonald

Currently Reading On the Incarnation: The Treatise De Incarnatione Verbi Dei By Athanasius, St. Anhanasius, St. Athanasius see related

Yesterday was beautiful.  And today will be lovely too.  It never ceases to surprise me... I let my life be lived without trying to make things happen according to my own will, and I find that all my prayers, (both before I left for school last summer, and during interterm) are answered. 

Mentors/Counselors? check.  about 5 of them. (now becoming 7...all of them very dear to me.  Most of them I meet with on a weekly (or bi-weekly) basis)

Good friends? check.  But the balance in that is still in wanting.

A Community? check.  Who I am learning to love each day.

Balance and wellness will be a theme of this next semester, because I trust my Father to whom I pray too, and who has already begun to fulfill them.  Not that I think whatever I pray may come to be.  I can't pray for my loans to disappear, but I can pray that I will trust Him who put me here, I can pray for help, even for miracles (but He does not work like a candy machine.  Prayers aren't quarters.) 

"Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so...little one's to Him belong, they are weak but He is strong." 

(And HOW awesome is it that I get to read Patristic Theology this semester?  And take Philosophy of Religion and International Relations with older (much more down to earth) students?  I am thrilled.)

Currently Reading Gates of Fire: An Epic Novel of the Battle of Thermopylae By Steven Pressfield see related

Back to school I go...

{Pray for me as I start this next semester.  I am getting ready to replace bad habits with good habits and bad attitudes with positive ones.  I am ready to be happy with all that God has given me, and ready to take advantage of every opportunity offered to me by Torrey and Biola and the many incredible professors and students there.}

  A couple of things worth sharing:

1. Website: http://righthouse.blogspot.com/index.html - a blog co-written by two people (Dustin Steeve and Jen Hardy) that ran Godblogcon (Rebecca and I volunteered to help with the conference when it was put on in October). 

&

2. Article: Defining Literacy Down - http://www.albertmohler.com/blog_read.php?id=859

It's unlikely I will "blog,"  but I've decided to make it a habit to read more about current events, and will share things from time to time. 

Also, I have been discovering what it means to be part of a community as well as what it means to be an individual distinctly seperate from that body.  My education in "place" and "purpose" seems to almost take a lifetime to learn (but maybe we're always adding to our education, no matter what the subject).  I am "learning" to be okay with that.

"Have your instructors taught you why the Spartans excuse without penalty the warrior who loses his helmet or breastplate in battle, but punish with loss of all citizen-ship rights the man who discards his shield?  [...] Because a warrior carries a helmet and breastplate for his own protection, but his shield for the safety of the whole line"

(Is there freedom in belonging to someone (or someone you are responsible to and meant to be cared for by) other than yourself?  Is there a type of freedom (virtue) in having a heritage, and in leaving a legacy?)    

Currently Reading Maximus Confessor: Selected Writings (Classics of Western Spirituality) see related

Is there a way for me to be ‘unified’ with those who are different from me, who have different goals, different paths, different values, who have dysfunction and sin in their life… while at the same time being so detached from them that my personal bubble will not be broken?  (meaning: either I may so preserve my boundaries that they cannot be broken, or when they are, at times, broken, I can forgive and not feel such heavy resentment and hate towards them.)

“Do not, because of the hate which as arisen in you today from the evil one’s abuse, judge as bad and vicious the brother who yesterday was spiritual and virtuous. Instead, through the patience that love gives, cast out today’s hate by thinking of yesterday’s goodness”

“When you are insulted by someone or offended in any matter, then beware of angry thoughts, lest by distress they sever you from charity and place you in the region of hatred”

“It is a great thing not to be affected by things; but it is much greater to remain detached from the thought of them.  Therefore, the demons’ battle against us through thoughts is more severe than that through deeds”

– Maximus Confessor “The Four Hundred Chapters on Love”

I did not understand what Maximus meant when he wrote about “detachment” as a virtue.  What he meant is self-control, and preservation against thinking and feeling wrongly.  The battle in me this last semester, (what I have been waging war on during interterm) is feeling resentment and hatred concerning certain events that took place during school.  What I did not realize is the battle is so quickly won against me when I entertain the memory of all my injuries.  I am very inclined to self-pity, and I did not realize what kind of a person I become when I allow it to over-rule me.  I still wonder if I can keep the friends I made, or reconcile relationships with past friends without it doing injury to me.  I see great value in certain people and in maintaining some form of communication, but I am not capable - at this stage in my life - to personally help them through their dysfunction and psychological trauma.  (maybe a professional relationship is possible?) 

Practice in charity with careful assertiveness may be necessary as a daily practice if I want this to work. 

Lord Jesus, I daily cry out to you, help me. 

For those who have injured me, I ask for a spirit of forgiveness and love, and to learn what "detachment" means.

For those I have injured or annoyed, I ask for forgiveness and to be taught humility.

Please help me to learn how to be happy.

 

"Purify your mind of anger, resentment, and shameful thoughts, and then you will be able to know the indwelling of Christ [...] God who has promised you everlasting happiness and placed in your heart the pledge of the Spirit has enjoined you to tend to your behavior so that the inner man, freed from the passions, might begin here and now to enjoy this happiness."