Saturday
I flew to MSP in between the storms that dumped 18+ inches of snow on Ohio and one of the admissions people picked me and another woman (also named Jen) up from the airport. Sara (the admissions chick) then drove us around the cities and showed us the highlights. We went to Chipotle for dinner. After that, we were dropped off at our dorm rooms and we had the rest of the evening to ourselves. I had a TV, so I checked in with my family members and watched Britcoms until I fell asleep.

Sunday
I went to church with Jen, Sara, and her friend Matthew, who was also going to be doing “A Day in the Life of Luther Seminary” with us. We attended Roseville Lutheran and it was a nice service, though more Baptist than Lutheran. We went to lunch at Subway afterwards and then Jen and I walked around the sem and the surrounding neighborhood (St. Anthony Park) and took pictures. We returned to our dorms and went to Northwestern Hall to register and get our name tags (which were our meal tickets for our time there). We met the other people who were doing the same program and sat through some talks on what the program was and on the “Top 10 Reasons Not To Go To Seminary”. After that, we had dinner and heard a lecture on the call of Moses given by an Old Testament professor, which was really good. We then met in small groups with students and talked about our calls and our experiences before going and doing Holden Evening Prayer. I *really* miss singing Holden, so I was a *very* happy Jen. We returned to our dorm and the 20somethings all stayed up late talking about calls and ministry things. The group seemed to be mostly youth/family ministry hopefuls, which was pretty interesting.

Monday
I woke up at 6:45 and showered, tossed back my hair into a ponytail, and dressed. I then went down to breakfast with the others and we ate with the admissions staff. We had tours after that and my ponytail froze. That was… an experience. We then had talks on admissions things and went down to chapel, which was wonderful. I really miss daily chapel and the music and preaching was fantastic. We had free time after that and I used it to talk to the housing people, the financial aid people, the admissions guru (who greeted me with a hug), stalk a few of my father-in-law’s buddies and got one (Craig Koester)in his office, and get pictures of the death mask of Martin Luther. (It’s sitting in a display case on the third floor. It’s kind of like a Lutheran relic.) I had lunch in a group with the admissions people and my other program mates. After lunch, we were able to sit in on classes and I chose to sit in on the class of Dr. James Nestingen who is a dear friend of my in-laws and the person I was mainly supposed to stalk. (My father-in-law had given me his phone number and told me to call him. I’m more of an email person and so I ended up leaving him an email and phone message. My mother-in-law joked about him tiptoeing around with a fake mustache to avoid the little 5’1″ female who was stalking him.) It was a class on the Renaissance and Reformation and we talked about the teachings of Thomas Aquinas and nominalism, which was the hermeneutic that followed his time. After that, we had the final events and most people left. I and another man were staying until the next morning, so I got some calls made and headed back to my room. Chris (the other man) and I went to dinner at 5:30 and talked for a long time. I then went back to my room and watched “Joe Millionare” (for the first time) and cheered as Zora was the one picked. I saw part of Letterman but missed Dr. Phil. (Thankfully, Jon taped it for me.)

Tuesday
I got up at 5:45, cleaned up, packed and headed to MSP. I got there muy early and had to clear security. I got some of the stuff in psych report fixed while I was waiting for my plane and I flew from MSP to Detroit and then Columbus.

Finally… something to blog about!

I just finished my psych testing for my entrance process. On Monday, I reported to Midwest Ministry Development Service in Upper Arlington and spent the morning with 5 other people talking about ourselves and interpreting pictures that we’d drawn. We all went out to lunch together and took the MMPI (Minnesota Multiphase Personality Inventory) when we returned. That was a weird test! It was a bunch of true/false statements like “people are trying to poison me” and “stealing things is how I keep sane”. After everyone had finished the test, Jay (who was leading all of this) went over the Enneagram with us and gave us our Meiers-Briggs readings. I’ve jumped from INFJ to ISFJ and I think it is mostly due to having studied theology.

On Tuesday, we were split in half. One half of the group went over questions we’d been given to talk about ourselves and the other half did a round robin of meeting with various people. I was part of the first round robin group and my first meeting was with the psychologist. I was really terrified going into it because of the fuss that had been made over my sexual harassment experience at my initial interview. Once I found out that it wasn’t going to be an issue for him, I calmed down and I told him about all the stuff he was pointing out on my medical history and in the results of my MMPI. I triggered the validity sensor which basically predicted that I wasn’t being truthful in order to present the best picture of myself possible. My over-controlled anger score was also pretty high, but that’s normal for clergy. After meeting with Dr. Bartha (the psychologist), I met with Jay and that seemed pretty un-productive other than getting my Enneagram reading. Then, I went with Carol and did the Glaser-Fox test (measuring critical thinking) and some other paper work. We all went out to lunch together again and in the afternoon, I was with Kristen and Jonathan (two other potential candidates who were my age). We went through the list of 10 questions and it was really eye-opening for me what my answers for myself were. (I’ll post them later.)

On Wednesday, we gave our answers to the 10 questions to the whole group and then went through some ministry scenarios. They were interesting and I answered a little differently than I think he wanted me to on two of them. Then we went to lunch. When we came back, we had a role-playing activity that was really nothing I would ever do, so it bombed for me. Then, Jay called us into his office individually to tell us his findings. Apparently, I bombed the Glaser-Fox test. (To be fair to me, it’s really only given to ministry candidates and we would probably score in the 90th percentile of the general populace. It’s also a left-brain test.) He said that he felt like I had a strong call to ministry but didn’t really know where to put me. It was news that was kind of good but also kind of bad since he couldn’t really see me in ordained ministry. (I think part of it is that I haven’t really developed a pastoral care identity since I’m not a parent and I haven’t had experiences like the ones Kristen had had the previous summer while working at a camp for 9/11 victim’s kids.) So… in three weeks, I get the results and I’ll see how things are with the report. I get a copy first so at least I have that before I go for my panel interview.

OK… I got the results of the interview today and I’ve been recommended for entrance into candidacy in the ELCA. My only weaknesses listed were the sexual harassment thing (which is pissing me off) and that I haven’t been Lutheran for long enough. Still… those things only dropped me to 4’s or 5’s (out of 6’s) in those categories so I really shouldn’t be obsessing too much.

Today was my first interview in the candidacy process. I was interviewed by a local pastor and I thought it went well… though I still need to see the paperwork he filled out on me. We talked about:
=my family: He was intrigued that my family isn’t Christian though he said that my parents weren’t that different from people in the pews.
=my sexual harassment experience in high school: He asked a lot about it, probably to see how utterly bitter I am (which I’m not). I was amazed that I could talk about it and not get utterly upset. I’m healing… slowly but surely.
=the politics in the ELCA: I think was to see how politically astute I am. I made the mistake of mentioning the Word Alone stuff and the Sexuality Study stuff. He then told me I was being too specific and asked if I was ok with the fact that the ELCA might not be around in 5 years. My response: I’ll worry about it then because it’s God’s church.
=my call to ministry: Gee… I can’t figure out why he asked me that. 🙂 This question actually caught me off guard as did the question on where I see myself in ministry. I was honest and I talked about preaching, about reading Luther’s teachings, about doing mission schtuff with IV, and I assured him that I knew what I was getting into with the whole ordained ministry thing. He liked my insight on the fact that I don’t know the type of ministries I’d have in my ideal church because every church is different.

I feel OK about it though I’m amazed that my devotional life didn’t come up and that they didn’t ask about my theology.