Our Albanian class is moving along.
Last week we selected debate topics and emailed them to our Albanian counterparts. We are looking to debate topics like Albania's entrance into the EU; what is he best type of civic education (cf: liberal vs scientific; Matthew Arnold vs Thomas Henry Huxley; English/Oxford vs German Research); what is happiness; whose responsibility is it to care for the poor and marginalized and to what extent; ought business ethics be legislated; what is the best way to encourage international investments...I'm debating the topic of Happiness. i'm going to approach it from the classical Cicero/Augustine view point of eternity. One of the main texts I think I'll draw from is Sheldon Vanauken's autobiography A Severe Mercy ((which everyone ought to read...its a beautiful love story between Sheldon and his wife Davy and how they came to know Christ together with the help of personal correspondences with CS Lewis. Great Great Great Book. Did I mention that is a great book? There is a wonderfully philosophic passage towards the end on grieving, heaven, identity, beauty and time)).
This week we started to work on what we are calling our worldviews. It is how we are going to share the Gospels in terms and ideas that will make sense to Albanians (understanding how to speak without our Christianese and how to recognize that to the Albanians, religion is like an identity (like whereas I'm from Colorado, they maybe be Muslim) Also, To the Albanians Christians are the ones that came into Bosnia...so...its interesting and challenging. For class this week we are writing our worldview shifts (Before Christ, meeting Christ, how life is now via a specific example) and are going to present them to eachother. It'll be good practise on sharing the gospel and our own stories (cause really, who is going to be persuaded to "pick up their cross and follow Christ" by theological debates? It is the story of Jesus and the story of Jesus in our individual lives, and the confrontation with His perfect love...it is in the moments when heaven meets earth that lives and hearts are changed and healed).
Pray for our finances--as a group we are getting close, but it is not too late to send money and support.
Pray for your group dynamics. We are starting to break through the surface in our interactions as a group. We are taking a weekend at The King's Cabin to pray and fellowship together before we go to work more on this.
Pray for our debate presentations. We have found over the past few King's Albania trips that the debates often lead to a lot of questions about God and morality, etc. pray that we are able to really represent The King that we go on behalf of.
Under the Mercy,
Caitie
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