I’m still in the process of organizing this blog still.

Until this blog is fully operational, posts are up at lutheranjulia.blogspot.com.

Thank you for your patience.

I just received the most recent issue of the Yale Alumni magazine and the feature story is entitled “The Class I’ll Never Forget”. Inside the magazine, there were 15 short paragraphs from various Yale alums- describing their most memorable class and what made it so. Inspired by the article, I began to make a list of the classes I took while attending Yale Divinity School and my different teachers.

You’d think the class that I’ll never forget would pop right out at me, but as it turns out I think of the professor and the class so often, it took a minute to bring them to mind in context. I would like to say, however, that I took many classes from deeply profound and caring professors who inspired me in any many ways. These were men and women who taught me to see the humanity and the Spirit in church history, the power and the humor in Scripture, the darkness and the light in Christian ethics.

Yet, the class I will never forget is “What Would Jesus Write” with Jack Hitt. For this very small seminar class I had to submit a writing sample, preferably in the style of an editorial or magazine pitch. I wrote “Where would Jesus drill” about the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and sent it in, fingers crossed.

When schedules were published, I saw that I was in! The class initially conflicted with a language requirement, but Hitt moved the time and we gathered once a week to hear each other’s pieces, encourage one another in submission, and to be told, bluntly, where we needed to cut, shape, and get over ourselves.

I believe only 8 or 9 of stayed in the class and, I’m not entirely sure, but I believe I was the only one in the class aiming toward ordination at the time. We wrote about politics and personal experience, religion and education, science and mystery. And Jack Hitt inspired us all. If you’ve ever read his books, heard his pieces on This American Life, or flipped through a magazine he’s edited- the man knows how to tell a story. He knows how to wind you up, play you out, and then bang you on the head and hang you out to dry. And he imparted as much of that skill as we could soak up in a semester.

He showed us how to sell ourselves, sell our writing, and sell the point we were trying to make. I wrote 300-500 word piece after piece in that class- some poignant, some funny, some angry. Hitt edited via email to us all, talked on the phone, and spun out three hours of some of the most useful class time I’d ever have.

Having written for radio prior to YDS, I was used to writing short, informative pieces. Hitt gave my writing a whole new edge, a sharpness and clarity that was absent before- perhaps because of necessity or because of lack of skill.

Even now, when I am writing a sermon (or a blog post), once I pass 500 words- I wonder if I still have anything to say or if I’m just talking. The very best of my sermons and posts are definitely influenced by that class and by Jack Hitt and what I learned from him. I read almost everything he puts out, in the hopes of continuing to shape my own style through his lessons. Of all the classes I took, of all the things I remember from seminary, the thing I ask myself daily is “What would Jesus write”?

Lent 1 (Year B, Narrative Lectionary)

Too tired to write
The blank screen sits accusing
Today to-dos won.

If you were to teach as a career, what would you teach?


One of the reasons I haven’t considered hospital chaplaincy more seriously is because I love to teach. I think I would enjoy teaching religion- world religions, church and culture, Jesus (and Jesus figures) in film, modern religious movements.
…..




Above is all I could write in one minute, but it caused me to think back on some of the classes of my Religion degree (undergraduate) and remember how much I really enjoyed them. 

Psalm 19 – Contemporary English Version

The NaBloPoMo prompt for today is: When was the first time you realized that your home was not like other peoples’ homes?

I recall roller skating in a friend’s garage in kindergarten. We didn’t have a garage, but that’s not the memory that sticks out in my mind. Nor is it when I think about playing with Barbies at other peoples’ homes, but not having them at home.

When I was in eighth grade, I went to spend the night with a friend and I remember her house looked totally different than either my (parents’) house or other houses I knew. There was something odd about the place that I couldn’t put my finger on for a while. Finally, we were dancing in the living room and I stopped and said, “Where are all your books?”

I was used to a house that had reading material everywhere. In the living room on shelves and by chairs. In the laundry room on the “brown table” that collected everything. By my parents’ bed. Both sets of grandparents had many books as well.

This pristine house had lovely shelves of knickknacks and picture frames, but no books that I could see.

For me, it’s just a house until I put my books all over it. Then it’s home.

A couple weeks ago I went to an excellent production of Fiddler on the Roof, one of my favorite musicals. John Preece was Tevye and he was AMAZING. I was seated in the front row (a friend picked the tickets) and Preece’s expressions and emotions were mesmerizing. (I can’t find any videos that show Preece, but you can hear him here.)

Her characterization of Tevye was of a man who prayed without ceasing, in continuous give and take conversation with God. His wrestling and faith were evident in each sideways glance, tap of a mezuzah or fidget with his tzitzit.

One of the scenes that has stuck with me is the song “If I were a Rich Man”. Preece ambled around the stage and it was as though each new verse struck him as an epiphany. My wife could have servants! I would be respected! We could live in a bigger, better house!

Then the last verse came very poignantly and I heard it in a way I’ve never heard before. “If I were rich, I’d have the time that I lack to sit in the synagogue and pray. Maybe have a seat by the eastern wall. I’d sit and study the holy books with the learned men- seven hours every day! And that would be the sweetest thing of all.”

Preece’s eyes teared up and he clasped his hands to his chest and you knew he meant it. This wasn’t a promise to get something from God, but his fervent hope that he could have enough wealth to have free time to pray and study scripture.

Would I do that? Would you?