I know you're all on the edge of your seats about the BUT IF NOT riddle. I didn't receive any e-mails or comments about it so I'll assume you didn't know (or just thought it was obvious) that it's a reference to Daniel. Daniel 3 (specifically verse 18) which is a story for you to read and interpret on your own. You could say it's a message of hope, or a message of fear, or a number of other different things, just don't call it a weather report. To the soldiers I imagine it simply meant they were ready to die for their country. For the record I don't think I would get along with many people in this era who have the ability to quote portions of Daniel from memory.

So, the good news is that three of my professors are incredibly engaging. The bad news is they teach the classes I would be curious about anyway. The fourth, my spiritual formation professor, lectures in a style that encourages immediate "meditation." There was a tangential discussion about dark periods in one's spiritual life where it was suggested that any parishioner who exhibits characteristics of depression is a risk for suicide. I can't say I agreed with that.

My new reference bible includes the apocryphal/deuterocanonical texts. I've never been exposed to them before so they have been distracting my attention. I also finally got my copy of the historical texts reader that includes Gnostic texts and other documents that read like scripture, but they are something different. I knew there would be more reading than I experienced as an undergrad, but I'm shocked that there have been several hundred pages assigned in only a few days and no one but me seems to mind. There is also the expectation that we be able to recite the book and chapter reference for any biblical narrative mentioned off the cuff in a lecture. And vice versa. I'm not even close to that level of familiarity, but plenty of other first-years are.

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