Tag: teaching

1. Mósebók 15. kafli

Abram upplifir auð sinn til einskis, þar sem hann og Saraí eru barnlaus. Guð mætir honum og lofar því að hann muni eignast marga afkomendur, en segir honum jafnframt að niðjar hans verði hrepptir í þrældóm en muni losna þaðan með mikinn auð. Það er auðvelt að ímynda sér mikilvægi svoleiðis vilyrðis fyrir fólk í útlegð, hvort sem þessi frásögn nær flugi í Egyptalandi eða Babýlon. Vilyrði Guðs um að ástandið sé tímabundið og í lok kúgunarinnar geti þau snúið aftur til landsins sem Guð hafði lofað.

Opinberunin

Opinberunin, ef hún þá er til staðar, er opinberun á Kristi sjálfum, miklu fremur en opinberun þeirrar kennslu sem hann veitti. Sú trú sem fyrstu áhangendur hans töldu sig frelsast vegna, var ekki byggð á samþykki á staðhæfingum um Jesús sjálfan eða samþykki á öllu því sem hann hafði kennt í orðum um Guð og mannkyn, þrátt fyrir að það sé órofa hluti trúar þeirra. Trúin sem þau töldu veita frelsi var persónulegt traust á persónulega nálægð Jesús, kærleika hans og kraft. Kenningar og játningar gegndu mikilvægu hlutverki í að benda á hann, í trausti til hans sem veitt hafði áhangendum sínum frið. Kenningarnar og játningarnar voru ekki sjálfar opinberunin, heldur vörður sem leiðbeindu að þeim stað þar sem opinberunina var að finna. (William Temple, Nature, man and God; MacMillan & co. 1940: bls. 311-312)

Þýðing mín frá 1996.

Tættir þankar um fermingarfræðslu

Reglulega velti ég fyrir mér hvernig hægt er að nálgast fermingarfræðsluna í íslensku þjóðkirkjunni. Verkefnið er flókið, þar sem fermingarhefðin og foreldrakrafan um að “allir” unglingar fermist kallast á við áhuga kirkjunnar á að fá unglingana til að taka meðvitaða og upplýsta ákvörðun um ferminguna sína. Continue reading Tættir þankar um fermingarfræðslu

When I Say, “I am a Christian”

When I say, “I am a Christian” I don’t speak with human pride I’m confessing that I stumble – needing God to be my guide

This is a part of a poem by Carol Wimmer. I came across it on Pastor DJ Dent’s wall on Facebook and thought it was worth quoting here. The whole poem can be found on  Carol Wimmer’s website.

Tækifæri til nýrrar hugsunar

Ákvörðun mannréttindaráðs Reykjavíkurborgar að greina betur á milli kirkju- og skólastarfs er um margt áhugaverð og skapar spennandi tækifæri fyrir kirkjuna til að endurskoða aðferðafræði barna- og æskulýðsstarfs kirkjunnar. Á undanförnum árum hefur sífellt meiri áhersla verið lögð á sérfræðistarf í kirkjunni, þar sem sérfræðingar eru ráðnir til starfa af söfnuðunum til að mynda tengsl og bjóða upp á dagskrá fyrir börn og unglinga. Þetta starf hefur verið áberandi, líklega hafa aldrei fleiri börn og unglingar tekið þátt í kirkjustarfi og dagskráin er hönnuð og sett upp af mjög hæfileikaríku fólki. Continue reading Tækifæri til nýrrar hugsunar

Recruiting Volunteers

Recruiting volunteers still requires work, but the context has changed. Now there is awareness and pride where before was obligation. And that makes all the difference both for those who recruit and those who say "yes" to this opportunity for ministry.

From Leading Ideas: A Resource for Church Leaders.

Bæn

Um þessar mundir er ég að endurskoða efni fyrir fermingarnámskeið í Vatnaskógi. Ein af stundunum sem ég horfi til er kennslustund í kapellunni um bænina. Spurningin sem ég stend frammi fyrir er hvernig fjalla á um bænina/samtal við Guð fyrir unglinga. Klassíska kennsluhugmyndin um bænina sem fyrirspurnaþjónustu er að sjálfsögðu alls ófullnægjandi. Continue reading Bæn

Relational Youth Ministry

Andrew Root’s article “Reexamining Relational Youth Ministry: Implications from the Theology of Bonhoeffer” is an excellent reminder that youth ministry should not be about creating a place of influence but a place of sharing. The question the church must ask according to Root is:

Will we seek to hire young, magnetic individuals who can use relationships as a means to an end, or will we, all of us (youth workers, volunteers, and congregation members), bravely take the initiative to walk into the center of adolescents’ deepest sufferings and joys, standing with and for them, sharing their place? In this way relationships are an end, the concrete presence of Christ in the world.

Word & World –  Summer 2006.

Why We Should Learn the Language of Data

Of course, as anyone with any exposure to statistics knows, correlation is not causation. And individual stories don’t prove anything; when you examine data on the millions of vaccinated kids, even the correlation vanishes.

From Clive Thompson on Why We Should Learn the Language of Data via Derek Hoven.

First Call Congregations

The emphasis of the new project, “Vocation of First Call Congregations,” was to study the characteristics of congregations that do a good job supporting first call pastors as they start their ministry following completion of their seminary education.

via Vocation of First Call Congregations – Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

Merit of sources

When looking at merit of historical sources, there are five criteria that are of most importance.

  • Multiple Attestation – Do we have many independent sources?
  • Dissimilarity – Do our sources seem to support the writers agenda? If not its better!
  • Language and Environment – Does the language and the environment fit the setting it is supposed to fit?
  • Coherence – Does what we are researching fit what we already know?
  • Post-Enlightenment World View – Does it fit what we know about reality? For example, people don’t rise from dead.

Family Systems Approach to Premarital Work

We advocate the use of a family systems approach to premarital pastoral work, involving exploration of the families of origin of the intended spouses. Family systems theory argues that a marriage is like a merger of two corporations, each having its own stockholders; thus, adequate preparation for marriage involves coming to terms with the realities of one’s family of origin and that of one’s intended spouse. Exploratory techniques include genograms, house tours, family photo albums, and discussions of the rules and rituals in the respective families. Leaving father and mother is the central prerequisite to marriage.

via You Must Leave Before You Can Cleave: A Family Systems Approach to Premarital Pastoral Work.

This article does not fit well into the marriage culture in Iceland. Having said that, its focus on family of origin work, differentiation, and different views on relationships is valuable.

Religious Life

In her article “Creating a Spiritual World for Children to Inhabit,” Karen-Marie Yust talks about children’s formation and the role of practices, rituals, and ideas. She addresses especially how repetition enforces learning. She takes a helpful example.

An African American toddler boy who repeatedly watches cartoon videos in which the “good guys” with light-colored skin always beat the “bad guys” with dark-colored skin concludes from this observation that light-skinned people are good and dark-skinned people are bad. (A Caucasian child comes to a similar conclusion.) When he is four or five and becomes aware of his own skin color, he will likely experience a tension between his sense of himself as good and his cultural observation that dark-colored skin belongs to bad guys. His white peers will also be more likely to label him as bad when trouble erupts on the playground.

This also applies to gender-images. As part of the childhood culture those experiences that they see in “the adult world” are then “played out” or “tried on.” And here comes the connection to the Religious Life.

When adults act as if religious education is mainly a tool for children’s moral development, children quickly catch on to the irrelevance of religious culture for the grown-up world. They have no incentive for committing themselves to a particular spiritual identity on adolescence if faith is portrayed by adults as something one shed with childhood.

(The Article appeared in Family Ministry, Vol. 18, No. 4, Winter 2004)

Search Institute

Search Institute® is an independent, nonprofit, nonsectarian organization committed to helping create healthy communities for every young person. Because we believe that “all kids are our kids,” we create books and other materials that welcome and respect people of all races, ethnicities, cultures, genders, religions, economic backgrounds, sexual orientations, and abilities. Our Mission: To provide leadership, knowledge, and resources to promote healthy children, youth, and communities.

Search Institute: 50 Years of Discovering What Kids Need to Succeed | Search Institute.

Of special interest at Search Institute are the well known “Developmental Assets.” The Developmental Assets are 40 “qualities essential to raising successful young people.”