Navigating the Intersections of Faith, Knowledge, and Reason.
I boarded a plane in Seattle yesterday afternoon and arrived in London early this morning after a 10-hour flight. The first day It is always hard to walk away from the hotel on the first day. With only a few hours sleep and a stolen eight hours of night time, I am so tired! Today,…
Years of traveling has made me a very efficient packer. I use packing cubes to sort my clothing. When I first arrive, I like to have a single outfit ready to change into after a very long flight. Packing cubes makes it easy to grab necessities, even when I have to check my suitcase at…
My final Oxford adventure was to visit a coffee roaster a few blocks south of my AirBnB in East Oxford. It was called “The Missing Bean” and delivered a fine cup of coffee. I enjoyed it quite well. My walk back to pick up my luggage was sidetracked by an incredible old cemetery where the…
Having rushed around the last few days to see the major attractions of the city, I spent Thursday in a more leisurely manner. Here is near Addison’s Walk at Magdalene college. For years I have been struck by the story C. S. Lewis tells in a letter to a friend, since published, about how a…
Famously this library has appeared in a number of films, including Harry Potter (more to come on that). It houses the book that inspired J. R. R. Tolkien’s Red Book of Westmarch about the Lord of the Rings, The Red Book of Hergest. It is also the main study library of Oxford. The old building,…
Museum hopping this afternoon. First to the Ashmolean Museum for some cuneiform and ancient Near Eastern culture, including the Sumerian King list, some Persian tiles, and Assyrian reliefs. The Natural History Museum Where Charles Darwin argued for his Origins work in 1860. Dino’s and the Extinct Dodo Emma’s elephant (who is traveling with me) discovered…
I feel close to being back on a normal schedule today. I am up before 6am, drinking coffee I made with my aero press and working through edits on my dissertation. I have a lovely view from the kitchen table in my AirBnB host home. Then, I walked into town this morning to start my…
I jumped off the train at Oxford and ran for the bus, stashed my luggage at my AirBnB before meeting Dr. John Goldingay at the Queen’s Lane bus stop. We went on to the Bodleian Library where I applied for admission and received my access card. I got a quick tour of the old round…
After a very restless night mixed with deep sleep and wide awakeness (thank you, jet lag!), I am up and having a lovely little spot of tea at breakfast in the Alhambra Hotel. It is a bit cloudy this morning, but it may get burn off into a nice sunny afternoon like yesterday. Although I…
Sunday crept up on me as I crossed the Atlantic Ocean. I believe I managed about five hours of sleep on my nine-hour flight. When I arrived in London, there was a massive line for border control. However, I made it through, and then another hour train ride to Kings Cross / St. Pancras station,…