Theology is Boring - (or is it?) thoughts on study leave as I try to distract myself from reading.

I know, I know, I am a minister. Theology is the foundation of my vocation. I am not that type of minister I say. People look strangely at me and wonder, as if their world had tilted off its axis. It is not that I don’t like theology, but most who write about it feel the need to prove how educated they are with multisyllabic words  (see what I did there 😊). I read book after book. In reality it is more like slogging through it. Certainly some of it is my ongoing contemplation and argument with every line that I read. That can be exhausting. Why? How did you come to that conclusion? What does that mean? I debate myself in my own mind before I go  on to the next sentence. It makes reading a book a journey.  

In truth everything is theology. Every walk, every movie, every conversation, every event I attend is a view of the world from a theological perspective. What is the purpose of this or that. What meaning can be derived from the experience. What mystery of the universe can be unlocked from every observation. What is the metaphor of every interaction. It is exhausting and beautiful and just how my radio waves are tuned in. 

But reading one more book of the erudition of Spinoza’s ethics, (which is really just a way for him to hide his atheism) and Augustine’s Confessions (really next time keep it to yourself – its done so much damage just because you had to justify leaving the woman you loved and your son at your mother’s insistence to marry for position and power and that led to ongoing misogyny within the church) or even new challenging perspectives on the Scriptures (How long has it been and we still have not figured out “thou shall not kill” – its pretty simple) will make me catatonic. 

No I want to read a simple poem, see a beautiful flower, pet my cat (I really need to get a dog), roll on the floor with my grandchild, watch the sunset and hopefully rise the next day. This is my theology – Life and living it. (and of course writing and talking about it). Thanks for reading and listening to me.