Here I am

Perhaps it's the daunting task of attempting to work through the cross. Perhaps it's the inadequacy I sense in myself. Whatever the case I sit at my desk, and... now the ears of my ears awake and now the eyes of my eyes are opened(e.e. cummings).
So it is at this time, almost at the mid point of my first semester at seminary, that I choose to continue in this exploration of the cross, of human suffering, of that which ties humanity together.
My professor is dying.
My professor, who walked through the idea of human suffering, the cross, the exploration of the cancer that runs ravenous throughout his body...my professor. My professor who looked at my questioning tear-filled eyes as I tried to wrestle with the sufferings of his soul- to make sense of the injustice of death, to try and hold on to something, anything I could do to understand...my mentor. In the caverns of his eyes were fear and pain and love and care...my elder.
And in the face of death I ask who is more adequate than I to explore the daunting cross? Who is more adequate than the whole of the human race...who suffers together...to live in the shadow of the cross, embraced by the only hope that there we are not alone?
Therefore, I continue to grieve, to remember, to reflect...and yet to begin the exploration of this thin tradition, the theologia crucis, the theological lens that the cross provides. As the water fills his lungs and threatens to wash away his life, I am reminded of the waters of my baptism- calling me to live in Christ, in the cross. We stand together in the shadows of death and life.
I will continue to submit pieces of my memories at Valparaiso University, scraps of a recent past, glimpses of moments with my professor...of moments that tied me to my community. They are raw, they are fresh, they cry out to the hope of the cross...the hope that God loves me for Christ's sake, and will never let me go.