Personal

Hey everyone! Just a brief update to note that I’m looking for a new role to supplement my part-time work as Managing Editor of Anglican Compass! I’m pretty flexible at this point, but I want to do something that benefits the church. I think I would make a great Assistant Rector! 🙂 Any advice, opportunities, or connections you can offer would be appreciated! You can view/share my CV here. And here’s my LinkedIn profile. ...

This is, admittedly, a half-baked opinion. However, I need to get back in the habit of blogging/writing regularly, so here goes. In my opinion, the use of the sign of the cross in clergy names/signatures—unless it’s done in official ecclesiastical communication or immediately after a blessing or prayer for the recipient—is pretentious. It’s showy. At the very least, it conveys or connotes pretentiousness. Note that I’m not making a claim about the *people* who use crosses in their signatures, their inner thoughts, or their intentions. For all I know, every single clergyperson out there says a prayer of blessing for their recipients every single time they use the sign of the cross in a signature. I’m also not writing this about any person in particular. ...

Due to increased symptoms of depression and anxiety in recent weeks, I’ve decided to try out a combination of counseling and medication. Sure, I’ve still been able to get out of bed in the morning. And I wasn’t having any serious thoughts about hurting myself. But still, I was feeling hopeless and trapped often enough that I decided it was time to seek out help. I know, I know. That’s pretty personal for a blog post for the whole internet to read! ...

I needed this prayer this morning, and I plan to return to it often in the days ahead. Most loving Father, you will us to give thanks for all things, to dread nothing but the loss of you, and to cast all our care on the One who cares for us. Preserve us from faithless fears and worldly anxieties, and grant that no clouds of this mortal life may hide from us the light of that love which is immortal, and which you have manifested unto us in your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. ...

Not sure how this is going to go, or even why I’m doing this anymore, but here we go! Still praying for either a dissertation break-through or a clear sign that I should quit. I hope to receive or discover one of those before the end of the calendar year.

After listening to the Blinkist summary of Cal Newport’s Deep Work (I’ve read the book, this was just for a refresher), I’m convinced that it’s time for another 30-day fast from Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. I think I’ll still keep my micro.blog up and running, but between running Anglican Compass and sprinting for some last-ditch clarity on my increasingly frustrating dissertation, I need all the extra bandwidth I can get! If you need to get in touch for some reason, please use the contact form on my website. You can also sign up for my very occasional email newsletter here. ...

For months and months now, I’ve been praying for either (1) a breakthrough on my “Barth, Bonhoeffer, and the Bible” dissertation or (2) a clear sign that I should quit the Ph.D. Unfortunately, after countless confusing dead ends in my endeavors to put Karl Barth and Dietrich Bonhoeffer into precise conversation with each other regarding specific passages of the Bible, I’ve now realized that such an approach is not going to work. ...

After realizing just how easy it was to lose access to the physical books that I own (now sequestered in my library carrel at Wheaton), on a bit of a whim I created a fundraiser to help my upgrade my Logos Bible Software library to either the Anglican Gold ($216) or Anglican Platinum ($582) libraries. Upgrading would help me in my preaching, teaching, and writing roles (as a pastor-theologian and as the Managing Editor of AnglicanCompass.com). I’ve already benefited immensely from the Anglican Silver package I bought when I got into the Logos Bible Software ecosystem a couple years ago (mainly to gain easy digital access to Barth and Bonhoeffer’s writings for my dissertation). I plan to stick with Logos—especially for biblical commentaries, systematic theologies, and reference works—because it allows me to quickly research, prepare for sermons, answer questions from readers, etc. ...

I’m a husband to Rachel and a father to Eva. I’m also: An Anglican Priest (serving/volunteering without pay) A Ph.D. Student at Wheaton College (full-time, including a fellowship as a Teaching/Research Assistant) Managing Editor of AnglicanPastor.com (part-time) In May 2020, my full-time residential obligations to Wheaton’s Ph.D. program will come to an end. I’ll still need to finish my dissertation in the following 1-2 years (the sooner, the better!), but I will no longer have to work on campus as a teaching/research assistant. ...

My Bishop, Todd Hunter, preached [an excellent, challenging sermon (“Love Your Enemies, Really?”)](https://friendsofthesavior.org/sermons/love-your-enemies-really-bishop-todd-hunter). It’s definitely worth a listen!

I’m trying to put together a basic home gym in our basement apartment. Mainly, I’m interested in doing squats for now. Then, I’ll expand to deadlifts and benchpress. Our ceilings are too low for overhead presses, however. Anyways, I just ordered the Valor Fitness BD-9 squat rack from Amazon. I still need a decent Olympic bar and Olympic plates.

I’m reading Walter Sinnott-Armstrong’s excellent book, Think Again: How to Reason and Argue. In it (on pages 25–26), I came across “Rapoport’s Rules.” First formulated by mathematical psychologist Anatol Rapoport and discussed by Daniel Dennett (Intuition Pumps and Other Tools for Thinking, 31–35), here they are: 1: You should attempt to re-express your target’s position so clearly, vividly, and fairly that your target says, “Thanks, I wish I’d thought of putting it that way.” ...

I became an “egalitarian” in college, before I became an Anglican in seminary. It’s taken some time for me to get used to the different contours of the women’s ordination debate within Anglicanism. Growing up, the debate was all about particular Bible verses and whether or not women could teach and preach. However, in Anglicanism, although those same questions/arguments are present, I hear much more about whether or not women can administer the sacraments as priests. ...

Last night, the scale read 192.4. I’d really like it to read 180 or less. So, in lieu of how effective putting money on the line via StickK has been for my daily writing habit these past two weeks, I’ve decided to put money on the line as motivation to stick to the Slow Carb Diet for a month. For my writing habit, I’ve committed to writing 500 words toward my dissertation every day for 8 weeks. For every week I’m unsuccessful, $35 goes to the NRA. (I’m a pacifist. I do not like the NRA.) ...

Right now, I’m using the RSS readers Inoreader and Reeder to subscribe to the following blogs: Snakes and Ladders – by Alan Jacobs Farnam Street — A Collection of Signal in a World Full of Noise. Seth’s Blog Study Hacks – Decoding Patterns of Success – Cal Newport James Clear Barking Up The Wrong Tree – How to be awesome at life. The Appademic » Technology, productivity and workflows for academics, students and other nerds McSweeney’s Internet Tendency Lifehacker – Do everything better What are you reading? ...