Bloy House News
The Episcopal Theological School at Claremont
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Greetings from Bloy House, the Episcopal Theological School at Claremont, where the Spring term is just getting started. Thank you for considering Bloy House/ETSC for theological coursework and continuing education alike. For information, phone 909.621.2419 or email bloyhouse@cst.edu.Faithfully in Christ,
(The Very Rev.) Sylvia Sweeney, Ph.D.
Bloy House Dean and President
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Matriculation Spring 2015
 New faculty and students pose with Dean Sylvia Sweeney (right front) as Bloy House begins its Spring 2015 term with Eucharist on Jan. 17.
 Bloy House student receives Episcopal Relief & Development pilgrimage scholarship
In February of this year seminarian Lisa Jacoby will be missing a week of school, and we are delighted that this is the case! Lisa recently received a special grant from Episcopal Relief & Development allowing her to be one of two seminarians who will take part in an ERD pilgrimage to Ghana. During her time in Ghana Lisa will have an opportunity to see the ministry of ERD in person and meet with fellow Anglicans from the Diocese of Tamale. The trip will center on Episcopal Relief & Development's partnership with the Anglican Diocese of Tamale and its implementing organization, the Anglican Diocesan Development and Relief Organization (ADDRO). With more than 20 years of experience working in communities in Northern Ghana, ADDRO administers integrated programs that address the challenges of malaria, improving food supplies, gender and reproductive health, disability rehabilitation and water and sanitation.
Lisa Jacoby is a  postulant for the diaconate from St. Margaret's Church, San Juan Capistrano, and a hospital chaplain. She will bring to this pilgrimage her passion for servant ministry and her compassion for those who overcome tremendous life challenges to live lives of strength, courage, and hope. Congratulations, Lisa!  Canon Williams receives Episcopal Evangelism Society grant for upcoming Chinese Convocation event We are also delighted to announce that on the week of February 2 Canon Bob Williams will be collaborating with the Rev. Dr. Thomas Ni, director of the Li Tim-Oi Center, to offer a special iteration of his "Media and Ministry" class for members of the Asian American ministries groups of the Episcopal Church. This class will take place during the Chinese Convocation of the Episcopal Church 2015 and will focus on highlighting both the basic information in Canon Williams' "Media and Ministry" class and also, with the help of Dr. Ni, providing particular information about Asian media platforms. All those engaged in Asian-American ministry across the church are invited to attend.  This class is made possible by a special grant from the Episcopal Evangelism Society. It will allow us to offer up to 25 full scholarships for those attending, so that there will be no charge for the class. If you are interested in attending, contact the Rev. Ada Wong-Nagata at Li Tim-Oi Center to register or contact us directly at bloyhouse@cst.edu. It is our hope, as well as that of EES, that this class can help launch a greater level of Episcopal engagement in English language resources that would be seen by English-speaking Asian Episcopalians and also a greater global presence for the Episcopal Church in Asian platforms across the world. |
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Congratulations to the new ordinands!
Ordination of Deacons
On Dec. 20 three Bloy House alumni and students were among those who were ordained to the diaconate. Congratulations to Paul Elder, Guy Leemhuis, and Dennis Sheridan! We know that all three of them will inspire us all to greater engagement with the needs of the world. Paul is currently the campus minister for St. Alban's, Westwood. Guy is finishing his M. Div. at Bloy House and was sponsored for ordination by Holy Faith, Inglewood. Dennis Sheridan offers his ministry as a professor at Azusa Pacific and as the deacon at St. Paul's, Pomona. Pictured above are Guy Leemhuis, Scott Taylor, Bishop J. Jon Bruno, Dennis Sheridan and Paul Elder. (Photo/Bob Williams) 
Ordination of priests
On Jan. 17 several Bloy House alumni were ordained to the priesthood. Congratulations to Allison Cornell, Annie Engstrom, Jim Prendergast, and Chitra Rao! Allison is currently serving as a hospital chaplain in San Diego. Annie is the associate rector at Trinity, Orange. Jim is the vice-chancellor of the diocese, and Chitra is a chaplain at UCLA hospital. Ordinands pictured above, with Bishop Suffragan Mary Glasspool and Bishop J. Jon Bruno, are, from left, Chitra Rao, Allison Cornell, Katherine Cadigan, Nathaniel Katz, Todd Blackham, James Prendergast, Ann Engstrom, Lorenzo Lebrija and Martha Dale Johns. We pray for God's continuing blessings on the vocations and ministries of all these Bloy House community members as they begin this new stage in their life journey.
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Canon Bob Williams to lead upcoming
'Media and Ministry' event
There are few skills more critical to successful ministry in the 21st century than learning how to use electronic media as an evangelical, a formational, and a pastoral tool that can allow us to reach far beyond the doors of our churches. If you have been considering taking Bob Williams' "Media and Ministry" class but just cannot find the time for a ten-week class, then please consider joining Bob for an introductory Media and Ministry EEL lecture on Saturday, Jan. 31. The EEL (Education for Episcopal Leadership) track at Bloy House is designed to allow lay leaders and clergy to broaden their knowledge and expertise in particular areas of ministry through retreats, lectures, and classes that are not taken for academic credit.
On January 31, Canon Williams will introduce those involved in communications ministries in their churches and institutions to some of the basics of how to create successful, accessible, and vibrant electronic communication ministries through Facebook, websites, and blogs. This short class will take place from 4 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. in Butler 201. The cost of the class is $15, which can be mailed to Bloy House at 1325 N. College Avenue, Claremont CA 91715. It is also possible to pay at the door. Registration is required; email to bloyhouse@cst.edu.
 Fresh Start for Lay Leaders
to begin Jan. 17 As a warden, a vestry member, a search committee member, a church treasurer, a Christian formation coordinator, or in one of many other lay leadership roles within the church you may find that there are issues, dynamics, and concerns that are a part of your ministry about which you wish you were more informed, particularly with regards to leadership skills, conflict management skills, polity issues, budget management skills, and a host of skills related to helping a congregation develop a clear sense of its mission and vision for the future. Fresh Start for Lay Leaders is a semester-long program designed to equip lay leaders in the church with just those skills. The class meets from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on the Saturdays of teaching weekends at Bloy House. In addition to taking part in the program, participants also have the opportunity to become part of the Bloy House seminarian community and participate in the rich worship life and fellowship of our community. If you've always wanted to know more about your faith and your church, come be a seminarian for a semester by taking part in Fresh Start. Those interested in attending must have the endorsement of their rector or vicar to participate. To learn more or to apply to attend fill out the EEL admissions application on the Bloy House website and contact Canon Joanna Satorius, who is the professor for this class. If you are not able to attend the Jan. 17 session, it is still possible to enter the class on Jan. 31.
Save the date: "Lay Leadership in Worship"
on Saturday, April 11, 4:15 to 5:45 p.m.
You are cordially invited to join us on April 11 for the second of our Education for Episcopal Leadership lectures of the semester. On the 11th Dean Sweeney will be offering a short program designed to acquaint lay and ordained worship leaders and worship designers with important principles related to effective liturgical leadership and particularly multi-sensory worship. To learn more about what it means to lead vital creative worship in the 21st century, come be a part of this class. Cost is $15, which can be mailed to Bloy House or paid at the time of the class. Pre-registration is required. See the March Bloy House News for more information about this class.
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Bloy House welcomes two new faculty members
Neither of these individuals is new to Bloy House, but we are delighted to announce that two Bloy House alums will be returning to Bloy House now in the capacity of professor rather than student.
Dr. Jonathan Burke (class of 2011) served as teaching assistant to Dr. Ted Fisher in his last semester of teaching Greek in fall of this academic year. Now Dr. Burke will be taking the reins and helping Bloy House students to navigate the waters of Koine Greek. In addition to teaching for Bloy House, Dr. Burke is an active lay leader at Church of Our Savior, San Gabriel.
Karri Backer (class of 2010) is a doctoral student in Claremont School of Theology's Practical Theology degree program, and a licensed therapist. Karri will be teaching "Spiritual Care and Counseling" this semester, offering students an opportunity to work in the rich interdisciplinary world of pastoral care, spiritual care, and spiritual counseling. In addition to her studies and her teaching, Karri is director of Christian formation at St. Andrew's Church, Fullerton.
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 The Invention of Wings
by Sue Monk Kidd
Headline Book Publishing, 2014
448 pages
Some things are so true they can only be spoken of through story. Christians know that and they know that the truth is somehow more present, more apprehensible to future generations when it is passed down in ways that reach beyond the known, the literal, and the provable. It's hard to find a good story these days. We live in a world where mass production is such a part of all our lives that breaking loose to imagine something that is not formulaic and predictable grows markedly more difficult.
The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd is a fiction work that is both a wonderful and unpredictable story and also full of the kind of depth of message that makes it stay with you long after you put it down. It is a tale built on history, the story of the famous abolitionist and suffragette Sarah Grimke and the young slave girl she was "given" as a 12th birthday present. Little is actually known of the South Carolina slave that Sarah was presented with except that Sarah did, indeed, teach her to read despite the fact that to do so was against the law. In the story she is given a name, Handful, and the book revolves around the lives of these two women as they seek to respond to the profoundly human call God has placed upon their lives, the call to courage and to freedom.
Whether we come for an afternoon or for years, few of us when we come to seminary to pursue our callings know what saying yes to that call will mean for our lives. We know it will cost us something, but there is no way to predict how much saying yes to God will require of us in the end. This beautiful story of two women who said yes to dignity, yes to faith, yes to hope, and yes to courage is a reminder to us all that ultimately what God longs for for all of us is lives of freedom, of compassion, and of joy. I commend this book to you to illumine your Epiphany or to stir you to faith during Lent.
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Liminality:
Living betwixt and between
By Sylvia Sweeney
This sermon was preached on Jan. 17 at the first chapel Eucharist of the new semester at Bloy House. It is based upon the lessons for Epiphany II, the call of Samuel and Psalm 139.
Liminality: It's a great word that describes those betwixt and between places in our lives. I think that if anyone "gets" liminality, it's the people in this chapel. Seminarians are, by nature, liminal creatures betwixt and between who they have been in the past and who they are becoming. Most of the time it feels as if in the process of becoming something new, one is not quite anything for a time. That's not true, of course. You are, all of you, already fully empowered, fully formed Christian persons and ministers of the church. But some days living this disrupted life of books and classes, exams and papers, conflicting goods, and conflicting demands upon your time and your soul, I know, it doesn't really feel that way. Seminary life is often an exacting and unbalancing state of being.
Illness also can make us liminal creatures, stuck between death and wholeness and waiting to see which side the coin will land on ... heads? Or tails? You know it is astounding to me how long a coin can take to rotate to the ground!
I had my own small liminal experience last week. Those of you who were around last semester know that we have been for some time praying for my friend Jamie, who has been dying of breast cancer that had metastasized to her liver and her brain. Jamie died between Christmas and New Year's Day and her funeral was just last Sunday on the day of Resurrection during the Sunday morning service, a journey come full circle from baptism to burial.
On Saturday after New Student Orientation, I got ready to take the last flight from Burbank to Missoula, Montana, so that I could attend the funeral. But there were mechanical difficulties and after they retrieved a new plane for us to take, there was virtually no time left between when I was to arrive in Seattle and when I was to get on the next plane, the very last plane that would get me to Missoula before the funeral.
And so I was standing at the gate as we were boarding and the ticket agent said, "You might make it, and you might not. There's a 50/50 chance. You decide if you want to risk it, or if you want to cancel your reservation, and I'll see if I can get you a full refund. If you go and you can't get out of Seattle, they'll have a note from me saying to give you a motel room for overnight. You decide." You decide if you are going, even though you may never reach your final destination; or if you are staying put, which has its own kind of costs.
I stared at her and I thought about which would be worse...to go and potentially be stuck overnight in a Seattle airport hotel far from home while my family and friends were at the funeral ... or to not even try to go and to just give up and return home defeated. And in my mind's eye, I just kept watching as that coin flipped through the air and wondering whether it would land on heads or tails. And then she said, "Now I do see there is a little red on the screen for your next flight, so it is possible it will be a little late, too."
Okay, now maybe the odds had moved to 60/40 and I decided to go. And during the flight the flight attendant on the plane tried to be reassuring, but kept looking at me with that "We are helpless to help you" kind of look. All the way from Burbank to Seattle I sat there trying to convince myself that even if I didn't make it, at least I had tried to get there. At least I'd tried to say goodbye to Jamie. At least I hadn't given up.
I sat in a dark plane with dim eyesight waiting, waiting in that betwixt and between liminal place, waiting to see where life and Alaska Airlines would take me. And in that time and in that space and in that out-of-control condition, I let the full weight of my grief wash over me. A grief that I could no longer protect myself from in this betwixt and between waiting-for-the-coin-to-land place.
Liminality does that to us too. It opens us to everything inside we have been trying not to see. When we are betwixt and between we can sense the Spirit prowling within our bodies and our souls, as the Psalmist wrote, "searching and knowing all that is hidden within us."
Eli, I think was in just such a liminal space too. Waiting to see what God would bring. His vision was dim, and he was living in a world where the Word of the Lord was rare, even as it so often seems to be in our day. His vision was dim enough that it took him a while to catch on to what God was doing.
It took him a while to realize when the moment arrived that he had so yearned for and feared, when the coin landed with a thud...and the final verdict was delivered and his time as a prophet was ended.
We are, all of us, living in the margins of liminality, waiting for what will come next. We are a part of a church that we know is becoming something new, but we don't know yet what that will look like. We are part of a world that is being reshaped by technological, economic, environmental, and cultural forces in ways that muddy our vision of what is yet to come. We are living, we intuit, on some new frontier in a land on which both humanity and the church have never before set foot.
We are all waiting for the new thing God is doing in the church. We are waiting for the new thing God is doing in the world. We are waiting for the new thing God is doing within us. We are waiting for justice. We are waiting for healing. We are waiting for a future that we cannot yet imagine. With awe and fear and trembling, we are waiting. Like Eli waiting for Samuel to come of age.
But please know this. This time, this liminal time is sacred time! It is God's time, when God is busy making all things ready. God is transforming dusk into dawn. God is at work in us, while the coin is flipping, while the plane is flying, while the chemo is acting, while the Commission on Ministry is deciding, while the GOE readers are reading, while the classes are meeting. While we are making our pilgrimage, our final destination is being made ready for us, and through the journey we will have been transformed and made ready for what we find when we get there.
And when the day comes that we arrive at that destination, whether the one we expected or some new and unexpected place. When we arrive it will be Christ who meets us there, bringing light to the dim places, bringing vision, bringing blessing. Live now in the betwixt and between knowing that the God who knit you together in your mother's womb, that God is busy right now. God is busy making all things new!
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Your support is appreciated
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Financial contributions to support the work of Bloy House are appreciated year-round. Thank you for your consideration and generosity. Gifts may be mailed to Bloy House, the Episcopal Theological School at Claremont, 1325 N. College Avenue, Claremont, CA 91711.
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In this issue: Please scroll down for more on upcoming courses and student and faculty activities.
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An easy way to support Bloy House, ETSC
Support Bloy House by shopping at Amazon! It is very easy. Just go through this link, or go through Amazon smile. Log in using your existing Amazon account and then search "The Episcopal Theological School at Claremont" as your charity of choice. Bloy House gets 5% of all proceeds!
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Bloy Bling
Just a reminder that Bloy House polo shirts (in Bloy House Blue with the Bloy House seal) and Bloy House coffee mugs are still available through the Bloy House office. Cost of the polo shirts is $26 and mugs are $10. Bloy House tippet seals are available through the office for $20.
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