Explicit Piñon/Pinyon

Trying to keep myself motivated as I finish writing my dissertation...

**I wrote this a few weeks ago in an attempt to motivate myself to keep going on my dissertation. The creative release has helped and I revisit these words before each writing session to pump myself up. Ha. Welcome to my inner turmoil… don’t stay too long.

Explicit Piñon/Pinyon

It is time, imperative really, to get back into the writing flow of my dissertation. Flow is not the word to best describe what it feels like to write a dissertation, it is merely aspirational. I’d love to flow in and out of the complexities of trinitarian theology, a description of our ecclesiological leadership crisis, the bane of the effects of the prominence of white evangelicalism, the way forward in mutuality focused on loving interrelationality. 

The challenge remains, how do I articulate my voice (sometimes heard by me, sometimes not) into the space of academic jargon, footnotes, and high level theological engagement? Once again I am reminding myself, imploring myself, to keep writing… to write my way through and out of this dissertation. Perhaps it will mean something in the greater scope of practical theology, but perhaps not, and those “perhaps” have me paralyzed more times than I would like to admit. The goal has not changed: complete the damn thing and become a doctor of ministry. 

Then write with any amount of flow I can muster as I tackle the spiritual speaking of the piñon, and the way the Pinyon Jay who shares its name, but not its spelling, collects cones year round, sometimes hoarding up to sixty in its throat at one time. And the way the water falling from the sky and mixing with the melting runoff of the mountains gathers in previously dry arroyos longing to be directed toward a meaningful end, or so I hope to think. 

But for now, I need to make some general sense of the in-depth writings of Jürgen Moltmann and Miraslov Volf and Leonardo Boff so I can convince the readers of my dissertation that these theologians have something to say about the very practical implications of church leadership. This is somewhat urgent, not because of the deadline that causes me sleepless nights, but because church leaders continue to act like dip shits. High on the horse (surely a white war horse) of ecclesial power men will look into a camera while divulging a rant to the stadium crowd about showing up late to his show, errrr, his Spirit inspired programming, errrr, his time to shine. See? This man, the former president of his historically unserious denomination, must learn that the way down is the only way up and to situate himself in mutuality with his members will, actually, be more of God than any fist pounding rant he can imagine. He, and his congregation, and those who read his books and listen to his podcasts, have not yet found the love present in emptying themselves for one another because they are too busy climbing over each other on the ladder to the top of the shitpile. 

Of course, I cannot write my dissertation with a plethora of swears, so I will leave them here. But dear reader, know this: all the curse-filled sentences are the fuel that drives the plodding and exhaustive flow toward the end of my theological education.