News from the SEI
Core staff and Associate Tutors gathered last month in the Conforti Institute,
Coatbridge for the annual Staff Residential, a 24-hour event which seeks to
feed the staff team by the provision of theologically challenging input and
also to increase the pedagogical competence of us all.
Both aims were amply satisfied this year, thanks to the good organisation of
Dr Hull, SEI’s Director of Studies, and the quality of input from the two
speakers. Dr Eric Stoddart, Lecturer in the School of Divinity, St Mary’s
College, presented a paper entitled ‘Surveillance from the Cross’ in which he
sought not only to flip our understanding of the concept of surveillance,
reframing the practice in terms which cohere to the being of God, but also to
demonstrate a method of working which can be deployed with regard to any
issue of contemporary public concern.
This superbly challenging input was complemented by the three sessions
which Dr Karen O’Donnell then offered: ‘What is digital culture?’ ’Doing
theology in a digital age’ and ‘What is digital culture?’
Dr O’Donnell, Co-ordinator for the Centre for Contemporary Spirituality at
Sarum College, was previously Research Fellow in Digital Pedagogy at
Durham University’s CODEC Research Centre, working with the Common
Awards team on the relationships between theological learning and the
digital world. Dr O’Donnell stretched our thinking considerably and also gave
us tools to guide us as we seek to explore those relationships ever more
faithfully.
Ecumenical working: Megan Cambridge (left) spent her Final Year
placement working in and with the local Church of Scotland parish in Keith:
Keith North, Newmill, Boharm and
Rothiemay together with Keith St
Rufus, Botriphnie and Grange.
Since being licensed as a Lay
Reader last autumn, she and the
SEC congregation in Keith under
the Revd Canon Michael Last
have continued to foster these
links.
She writes: ‘I had the great
privilege of leading worship at
Keith St Rufus in the first of their
week-long celebrations for the
200th anniversary. We had the
Keith and District Silver band playing which gave us a rousing start.’
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