Learning and leading

My friend/classmate/brother Amos has long had a passion for missions, and has wanted to see Uganda send missionaries to the field to preach the good news of Jesus.  At last, we are finally taking steps to bring this to fruition! We have sent two recent graduates, Caleb and Diana, to Nairobi for a year of training in missions.  They were back at UCU last week, and shared a bit of their experience.  

When I first saw Caleb, his eyes grew wide, and he told me, "I think I know how you feel being here... it's hard to be in a different culture.  You're trying to learn everything, and yet everyone expects you to be leading."

I was a bit amused by this; Kenya is just next door, and people here talk about being Africans (one people) more than they talk about being Ugandans.  Americans certainly do not share this kinship with Canadians, delightful though they are.  However, it's true that Kenyan culture is somewhat different from Ugandan.  It's been interesting to hear them share about the differences in food, dress, communication, how things work... all the things I comment on and deal with daily.

And yet, he's exactly right.  When I first returned to UCU as a lecturer, I had done quite a lot of my cultural training while I was here for two years as a seminary student.  But being staff was completely different.  My now-colleagues expected that I knew how things worked since I had recently graduated.  Students expected me to know how things worked since I had recently graduated.  I was painfully aware of how much I did not know, and yet I had to lead and pretend that I knew what I was doing.  Thankfully, God is gracious and He walked me through that first year gently.  Colleagues and students alike were kind and supportive (though the students still expected me to know way more than I did!).

I am still learning, though the leading is coming a bit easier.  After all, I am a lecturer.  I am also the archdeacon of our chapel, and the web mistress of the theology pages.  God's grace continues, and for that, I am perpetually grateful.

Library weeding

UCU's tagline is that it is the "centre of excellence in the heart of Africa."  One example of this is the Ham Mukasa Library, the huge building just up from the main gate, and where students flock to find resources for their courseworks.

However, the theology students are remaining with what was called the "old library," and I am trying to refer to it as the "theology library" in hopes of changing the perception that it is old, and therefore, of little value.  The building is old, that is true, and many of the volumes are also old, but theology has a library all to herself.  It is small, quiet, and other students use it as well.  All bachelor's students must take the five courses in Foundation Studies, which include Introduction to the Old Testament and Introduction to the New Testament, so the theology library gets plenty of use, even when we are off-session.

Since we are off-session, and since many of the volumes are old, and take up space (which precludes obtaining new volumes), one of the professors and I have been working with the theology library staff to weed out these old books.  We are being quite generous, and are automatically keeping volumes published since 1995, though we'd clearly prefer to be firmly in this century.  Professor and I then go through the pre-1995 volumes to determine which ones we want to retain, which to archive, and which go to the regional colleges.  They are getting the books of which we have copious numbers, and they are getting quite a load.

This is how one table looked at the beginning of our weeding:

Yes.  That is what we had to weed through from about five of those bookshelves (I couldn't get the entire bookcase in the frame).  

I am thrilled that we are doing this - it is long, long overdue.  Because of this, it's taking up much more time than we anticipated, but we are hoping and praying that by the time the theology students return in January, they will find a newly sorted library, with plenty of space to be filled with new acquisitions.