When I was in Divinity school I went to the Process and Faith summer institute to take a week long Process Theology class.  It was a great experience because it combines class lectures from the big names like John Cobb or Marjorie Suchocki or Ron Farmer, class discussions, and theological engagement with pretty sweet films.  Between the class and hanging out with the theologians you have a pretty packed week of theological imagining.  This year the center is doing something really cool for divinity students, setting the whole week up as a three hour class.  Basically you will be able to hang in Cali for a week and get an awesome theological experiance while eliminating 3 hours from your graduation requirements in one week.  The details are on the flyer below, so check it out.  If any HBC Deacons decide to come or have questions let me know, it would be great to hangout.

My Mom is awesome.  She is one of the best human beings I know, really she is.  For being stuck with three Fuller boys growing up she handled it well.  My bro, Pops, and I are all three ministers who like to turn religion and politics into a recreational sport around the dinner table.  Mom has a very specific and special role in those moments, she reminds us of two things.  The cherished humanity of whoever we talking about (even ignoramus dimwits) and the purpose actual purpose of theology.  She will throw in statements like, ‘How does that help you partner with God and do kingdom things?’ or ‘That does seem wrong but I imagine God thinks that about me sometimes too,’  or my personal favorite ‘I don’t know about that but I sure do love you.’

My Mom is awesome because she is a lot less likely to let love be an idea, she likes to keep it a movement.  Since she does she has even been known to make God present when three Baptist ministers are arguing about atonement, war, and universal health care.  What is so cool about my Mom is that she has had this gift of making God present in the most odd of places my whole life.  After baseball games when I was far from a ‘good sport,’ when I was having trouble learning boundaries with my humor (imagine that!), and even when I had embarrassed her and the rest of the family she was more gifted than anyone else on the planet that I know at making God’s love present to me.  That is why my Mom is awesome.

Your Mom can be awesome too, but mine is like totally uber-awesomeness.

….that is Down Low.  Both Alecia and I’s hard drives died within 12 hours of each other so I have been out of action.  With the death of both hard drives went the texts for all my final papers for my first semester in a phd program.  Now that you know all the HBC Deacons out there can rest assured that at the completion of my papers (for the second time) I will be back giving you adequate blogging attention. Tim Conder’s podcast is safe on the HBC network and will be reeditied for your listening pleasure soon.

This summer Tripp will blog on:

- a stack of books (11) with at least a review a week

- the historical Christ and the Jesus of Faith (no error there)

- the Dodgers winning the pennant despite Manny being A-Rod