Let us begin, brothers, to serve the Lord God – for up until now, we have done little or nothing.
Francis of Assisi spoke these words not at the beginning of his ministry, but near its end. They are not a statement of faux humility or harsh self-criticism. Rather, they tell us that doing God's will is a constant process of renewal.
This blog was created to be a means of promoting a new divine revelation. After I left teaching, however, it somehow morphed into a way for me to continue my classroom ministry. Perhaps such a development was natural, but it was also misguided. I have not been given a divine curriculum to share with you, nor have I been called to create one. My years as a teacher were wonderful; I was able to do good things. But it is time to let go of that experience, as God has other things for me to do.
"I will sing your praises. I will be your voice. I will be your prophet. I will be whoever you wish me to be. Not my will, but yours be done. I am yours."
On a practical level, this means a few modifications are necessary:
- The Faith Development pages have been deleted. They were my most direct attempts at creating an online version of my old course. I failed to complete them, because that kind of systematic approach to faith made no sense outside the confines of my old classroom. I plan to repost some of the content as a series of reflections, not lessons, during Lent.
- The Monthly Reading Links posts have been discontinued. They began to feel like a set of reading assignments. And too many of the selections were merely interesting or educational, rather than truly illuminating. While I will continue to share articles within posts and via Twitter, I plan to be a bit more discriminating with my recommendations from now on.
- And I have resumed publishing posts on a weekly basis. The plan is to do so on Wednesdays, but as this post demonstrates, that plan is subject to the whims of divine inspiration and human bewilderment.
In my first post nearly two years ago, I wrote that I was not exactly sure where this blog would go, but that it was an adventure I needed to undertake. That is still very much the case today. It is a truth both maddening and glorious. So let us begin this adventure once again, for up until now, we have barely gone anywhere.