Brugge

My trip to Brugge is the first of my Spring Break Trips. I had planned a longer excursion, but am settling for several shorter trips. Brugge was the first of these trips. It is about 1.5 hrs west of Leuven - near the west coast of Belgium. It is one of the oldest cities, and best preserved. There was a moat around the old city, which still exists and has mainly tour boat traffic. I didn't take the boat tour, but I'm sure I will next time I come. I walked from the Station to the Center of town, which took about an hour since I was taking in sites along the way. Then I ate in the square, an headed out.

The skyline is so medieval - very cool. Everywhere you look there are cool old buildings. Leuven took more of a beating during the world wars, and while we have old buildings, we also have newer buildings interspersed. Also, the canals are everywhere, and there are boats on them. I went in one church and it was really out of control ornate. Beautiful, but out of control. It makes me understand how the younger generations here in Europe see that and get turned off of the Church. I'm sure it was a devotional thing, making all the beauty in the Church. But it is also a counter witness to simplicity and care for the poor.

I remembered all Pat Quinn's tales of her and Kate Regan's side trip to Brugge - too bad I didn't know the exact places, I could have followed in their footsteps. I came home in time for a conference call this evening (early afternoon in the states). When I got back to Leuven, I saw some sun - it had been overcast all the time I was in Brugge. So I'll probably stay home and work/study Thursday, then on Saturday, I'm going to meet a CSJ who is working in Brussels. That will be fun. I'm not sure if I'll try to take in another city before that.

I'll probably do a travel log of my adventures for the next couple of weeks, so I hope I don't wear out my readers.

Peace,
Amy

SNOW!!!

We have had snow for the last few days! It's the first time I've seen snow since I've been here. But it is snow Belgian - style, i.e. it will snow furiously for 10 minutes; then the sun will shine brightly for a bit; then some clouds, and back to a snow storm. This entry is just to give some pictures and movies, I hope it works - there seems to be loud sound on the videos - so you might want to turn down your sound.

שלומ

I had to laugh as I looked across my table - it's actually my kitchen table, my dining room table, and my work table. In any case, there were assorted papers in English, a newspaper in Dutch, some copies from the Bible in Hebrew, a few canonical documents in Latin, and some articles I'm reading in Spanish and Italian.

So a language report - I'm doing okay around town with Dutch, but it's a little rough when we get beyond the basics. I've been to Mass a few times in Dutch, there's a little church really close to me. Latin is coming along - I'm okay with figuring out what stuff means, but when you have to get to the technical fine points, it's a little tricky. Apparently they are planning to do another semester of Latin for us next year - I'll be ready to chat with Cicero; but it won't help me much talking with the dear neighbor.

If I decide to concentrate in Scripture for the Theology program, I'll have to do Greek and Hebrew. I'm already somewhat into Hebrew, but Greek is - well - Greek to me. So I'll have some work to do there.

I finished classes for my Spring Break. I had originally planned to try to do a longer trip somewhere, but then tried shorter trips, and now I have nothing planned. So I'll probably just go around in Belgium. I have some friends here that might be interested, otherwise, I'll take off for day trips by myself. I certainly can keep myself busy studying, etc. But it will be good to get out.

We have had nice Holy Week services at the International Parish - and we'll have the Easter Vigil tonight, and tomorrow morning the choir is singing again for morning mass. That is always a nice group to hang out with, and the liturgies are always good. During the washing of the feet, for example, we had it where we all wash each other's feet - it was particularly moving with people from all over the world participating. The international element continues to be one of the greatest sources of enrichment of being here. So I guess that gets us back to language.

peace - frieden - paz - paix - pace - vrede - pokój - שלומ,
Amy

Easter, Folk Dancing and Jerusalem Artichokes

I can't believe it is already Holy Week - here, we are having all classes through good friday, then we have two weeks off. Interesting. However, there is a folk festival coming to town, they arrive on holy thursday and the festival is friday through monday. Interesting. So the photos are from the ads online, and there are notices in the paper, etc. I'll get live pictures on the real thing. I'll probably go there on the way back from Mass on Sunday. Especially since the festival is about half-way between my place and the Church where I'll be.

I like this group - they are Slovakian and seem fairly energetic. The weather here has also gotten better. It really hasn't been ever as bad as I thought it might be. But now, the sun is high enough in the sky to shine in my front windows - over the buildings across the street. That is very nice since it gives me a lot of sun in the front window in the morning. It has been warm enough that I have opened the windows for short periods of time.

Now for the Jerusalem Artichokes. I've never met one before - at least no so far as I know. They are called aardperen in Dutch - that means ground pears - like potatos are called aardappelen - ground apples. I got some in my Veggie Bag this week. (That is the bag of veggies that I get for 5 euros every Monday.) I cooked them up - yummy - Smaakelijk!!! They have a mild nutty taste, tastier than a potato, but about the same consistency - also, they are really knarled, so harder to peal. You can see my education is quite well rounded - dance, veggies, etc.

I was thinking of titling this entry: My Life with the Penguin. You see, the Linux mascot is a penguin. Linux is a free operating system for the computer - so you don't have to pay for the Microsoft products. It is open-source which means it was developed by people all over the world working in collaboration for the good of all. I've been using it for about a month. So far I'm mainly very happy. However, as with learning any new system, I have had a few mishaps and lost documents. Ugh. But it's getting better and I'm learning a lot. One of the political science people over here thinks that Open Source software is the source of hope that people can work together and build peace. That is a pretty good reason to get on board.

I also had some initial contacts with a CSJ who is working in Brussels - english-speaking. Hopefully over the Easter Break, we'll be able to connect. She is working on fair trade between Africa and Europe.

Blessings and Peace for Holy Week and Easter,
Amy

Another Weekend at the Castle

The canon law department took off again for the hills of southern Belgium for a concentrated weekend. Believe me it was intense. Accoring to the original schedule one session was supposed to go from 9:30pm to 11:00pm. Yes, that's pm. Thankfully one speaker didn't make it, so they moved that session into the open time slot. The subject was penalties - so it was a little intense from that point of view as well. We also had a guy from the Dutch Reform Church in South Africa who talked about how they handled the issue in their church. They have about 20 pages of 'Church Order' that describes the whole organization.
Another benefit of the program is it kept me off my knee for several days (and off my bike) which seems to have had good effect. I think it is well on the way to healing - I went for PT again yesterday.

My thesis topic has been approved - rights of members of religious institutes, Canons 662-672. Do you think that will make me popular with the new leadership team? Actually I'm looking at what is in the code, but also at sources - i.e. what Vatican II said, and what was left out from the former code. It should be interesting. And from my preliminary reading, the best thing about the current code of canon law is all that they left out from the last code.

I made initial contact with a Sister of St. Joseph in Brussels - hopefully we'll connect in the next few weeks. There are other CSJs there, but I haven't heard back from them yet. I got the contact information from the sisters at Le Puy. Maybe I'll give it another try this weekend.

Today is my big class day (6 hours), so I take it a little easy in the morning. I think folks have heard that Henry is home - he and Julie are adjusting to life. Also, my nephew Graham continues to have health problems - he just had surgery to relieve pressure on the brain. So please keep him in your prayers.

Peace,
Amy

Interesting Interaction

All is well here, fairly busy. I just had a week long seminar, but most of it was canceled, except about 6 hours of lectures in Dutch. I finished my beginning dutch class, but it certainly wasn't enough for this. So I had my computer and searched the names of the speaker to see if I could find out what they might be speaking about. Anyway, it was an interesting experience.

I have been taking some theology classes, and just got the go ahead for a theology program. So now I'm official. One of the classes, and it is interesting because we have about 1/3 Asians, 1/3 Africans and 1/3 Europeans. I think I'm the only one from the Americas.

We had a German guy who is doing the church in Asia. At one point he was talking about the Asian churches' attempt to develop a culturally Asian theology, much the way the west has developed it's own theology. He was explaining that many of the concepts in western theology aren't meaningful in Asia. One interesting point is that the professor did his doctoral dissertation under Karl Rahner, and occasionally brings up a story from that, and Rahner's critique of western theology.

Anyway at one point during our last lecture, one of the Nigerian students said that he understood the problem in Asia - he said that he teaches about the Trinity in Nigeria, and he said that it makes no sense to the people there. He said that the European concept of person makes no sense to his people and so when you try to explain the Trinity, it is just impossible. It is a concept that has been articulated and explored in western concepts that don't make sense to his people.

Then a slovakian responded that of course it makes sense - it's logical, it makes complete sense. The professor then smiled and said that is exactly the problem. In the west, our theology is so consonant with our culture, philosophy and mental constructs, that we can't imagine that there are other mental frameworks in which it doesn't work. Asians and Africans have different culture, history and philosophy, so when they reflect on revelation within their context, they will have a theology that will work for them, but may not make sense to us. And just the way the west has been exporting theology, expecting it to enrich other cultures, in the future if these other cultures are given the freedom to develop their theologies, we in the west may one day be enriched by them.

It is quite interesting to hear the experience of these vibrant churches in various parts of the world.

One other cool thing was that I was able to participate in the Denver sectional (CSJ Community Meeting) via Skype. That was great since I'll be away for three years, I wouldn't want to be completely out of touch. So Mary McGlone logged me in and I could hear all of them and participate as well.
Peace,
Amy