Restored hope
My ranting (see previous entry) got the attention of Dr. Joel B. Green, the Dean of the School of Theology and moderator of Table Talk, and he provided this explanation…
I don't know if this will influence the way you feel about this, Nathan, but attendance at the Teach-In was expected because 15 nominal hours of contact are required for each unit of credit we assign a class. Hence, the only way we could do the Teach-In was to count the contact hours for the Teach-In as if they were contact hours for Thursday courses — and, then, to set out our expectation of attendance at the Teach-In in the same way we would set out our expectation of attendance for classes in general.
— JBG
To which I replied…
That explanation was very helpful. I feel that if that was made more widely known, students would have been a lot more receptive. Sorry if I came across as rude, please forgive me. I know I can be a bit hot-headed. Many times, zeal overrides my capacity for wisdom. I felt very humbled by the foot-washing that Dr. Greenway did at the inaugeration. It re-instilled in me the conviction/belief that Asbury is the right place to be, where servant leadership is modeled from the top-down.
So yeah, with all its problems, I still think that Asbury Theological Seminary is a good place to be, and hope to see things improve even moreso in the future. To elaborate on my description of the presidential inaugeration: It was great. Many thought it was a bit lengthy, but I found it to be inspiring, reminding me of why I chose to come to Asbury in the first place. The governor of the state of Kentucky even declared Nov. 11, 2004 as Asbury Theological Seminary Day, in honor of all that the school has done for the state. Pretty cool, if you ask me.
The crowning moment at the inaugeration was, in my opinion, when our new president Dr. Jeff Greenway knelt down and washed the feet of our student president, the student president from the Orlando campus, and a student from Kenya. He challenged the faculty and staff to model that same type of servant-leadership in their own lives and ministry. I think this was good for everyone present, to be reminded that we are not here for self-serving motives, but to glorify the name of Christ. This is something I, and all of us, need to hear often, lest we forget.
So yeah, the inaugeration was good, and I think they chose the rignt man for the job. And yet, I still wonder, how do the trustees justify spending $250,000 on the inaugeration alone, when they are going to raise tuition upwards of 10% again next year? I'm sure there's some logical answer, it just escapes me at the moment.