The Arrow's Path

Click to enlarge: Shaken, not stirred. -The Archer+

General Ordination Exams are officially over! There was one question this morning on concerning Holy Scripture and the use of psalms like psalm 58 and 59 in liturgy, given the rather problematic theology of God inherent in those scriptures. But, for all in all, I feel good about it and all my GOE answers. We celebrated with champagne and dinner at a faculty members house. I brought along a couple of home grown cigars (the tobacco not the cigars), which was quite possibly the finest cigar ever smoked. I will post more about this later, but 42 typed pages later, suffice is to say, "Ding Dong! The wicked witch is dead!"

Today went pretty well. If my brain were a nuclear reactor, it would be close to hitting critical mass, bit otherwise I am happy with the questions this far. I will reflect more at some later date, but here are today's questions: Morning Session on Theory and Practice of Ministry: CLOSED BOOK A terminally ill, 32-year old mother of two small children has been told by her physician that there is nothing more to be done to cure her cancer. After admitting her to the hospital for palliative care, the physician asks you, as the hospital chaplain on duty, to visit this woman. Upon entering her hospital room, you find a group of her friends insisting that she will be healed if only she has more faith and prays harder. It is clear that the woman is greatly distressed, and has questions about God's presence with her in this trauma. The friends, looking up and seeing you, tell the woman they will leave so that the pastor can affirm what they have been sharing with her. When you reach th...

Well, the second day of the bar exam General Ordination Exams is over. I am pretty happy with today, but not quite as thrilled as yesterday. The good news is that the broad question theme seems to be holding. Today's questions were Theology (bible and prayer book) and Contemporary Culture (bible and prayer book. The Theology question was a straight up scenario of a parishioner asking you want was the meaning and relevance of Council of Chalcedon and Definition of th Union of the Divine and Human Natures of Christ, as found in the BCP. I feel like I nailed that one, as Patristic theology is one of my interests. The second question in the afternoon, was a bit harder. It was not so much hard like "Dude, I have no idea what this means" but hard as in "Dude, this is so broad, how do I fit this into 3 pages and cover it all." The question was: "When a stranger sojourns with you in your land, you shall not do him wrong. The stranger who sojourns with you shall be...

Well, the day has come and gone, and I feel pretty good about the General Ordination Exam today. We had two sets of questions today, both in long essay form. Both sets were pretty straight forward. In fact, they were so straight forward, one wonders whats coming tomorrow. The first question set for the morning was a compare and contrast the Rite I BCP Eucharistic Prayer and the Enriching Our Worship Prayer 2. They basically asked about how the two prayers viewed 1. God, 2. Humanity, 3. Community, and 4. what is happening at the Eucharist. The history question was just a straight up question about the Crusades, their aspects, and how that plays out in the Post-Reformation era with examples from Christian churches, movements, or sects. I was just happy when I opened up the questions and I immediately recognized what the question was talking about. No Caroline Divines or last year's infamous ESP question "We're going to ask about the Social Gospel movement without actually sa...