Today is Ascension Day, which is a national holiday in Sweden. Friday is the gap day between a Thursday holiday and the weekend, so it is also a de facto holiday. This is good for a catch up day. Here’s what I did.
- 50 minutes of reading an article on African biblical studies while on the exercise bicycle and 6 minutes of praying on the rowing machine at the gym.
- Careful editing of my colleague’s paper. Hoyce is writing in her 3rd language, so I help out with polishing the English. She will be giving this paper in Tanzania on 1 June, so I scanned it and emailed it back right away for her to work through the edits and suggestions.
- I’m also giving a presentation, though shorter than Hoyce’s presentation. I’m responding from the perspective of the Western academy with regard to biblical studies. So, I analyzed my notes that I’ve collected over the past three weeks and was able to put them into a framework that seemed to come together better than I expected. I won’t really have enough time to develop these reflections, so this may become a paper someday.
- I also wrote an abstract for a to-be-written paper, which will be submitted for consideration for a collection of essays on classical religious texts in global contexts. My working title is, “Recovering and Integrating Ontology:
Multi-epistemological Exegesis for Intercultural Biblical Interpretation.” (Doesn’t that sound nerdy?!?) - The message that I give on 5 June in western Sweden (on the way back from Tanzania) needs practice of the Swedish pronunciation. So, I’ll go over that in preparation for the session with my Swedish tutor tomorrow. I’ll see if I craft a PowerPoint to help illustrate my message. If my Swedish is bad, I may just “close caption” it.
The good news is that I was able to read Hoyce’s paper in the hammock on the balcony. It was neither warm nor sunny, but it was nice to be outside, even with a few layers on.
With my upcoming trip to Tanzania, with a departure on Wednesday, I have begun the packing process.
With blessings,
Beth
I am so proud to have a friend who works so hard to serve well. Much love, Jane