How did the colloquium at Notre Dame go? Well, I think it was okay. I should have organized my presentation better — it inclined heavily to the miscellaneous — and I’ll have to whip my ideas into a more orderly shape before next week’s lecture.
The driving to and from South Bend wore me right out, especially since I’d been sleeping poorly as I tried to imagine how to present my notions about biblical theology to a roomful of sharp, critical grad students and faculty. Everyone was polite, though, and a number of people seemed to have appreciated the presentation. In conversation after dinner, I got the sense that UND has been trying to help their grad students integrate a degree of theological alertness to their already-strong historical skills; my sorts of argument should at least enrich the discussion, even if I wasn’t coherently persuasive.
Meanwhile, Pippa was hard at work, painting a picture of Bea lying under the table, making me a series of bookmarks, constructing a paper carrot and a cork-and-twist-tie figure, and making dinner for Si.
And in Biblical Theology class, one of my students proposed a graphic summary of the biblical perspective on peace and conflict in salvation history; that was a lovely complement to a vigorous, thoughtful discussion of the topic among the three other presenters.