The occasional, often ill-considered thoughts of a Roman Catholic permanent deacon who is ever grateful to God for his existence. Despite the strangeness we encounter in this life, all the suffering we witness and endure, being is good, so good I am sometimes unable to contain my joy. Deo gratias!
Although I am an ordained deacon of the Catholic Church, the opinions expressed in this blog are my personal opinions. In offering these personal opinions I am not acting as a representative of the Church or any Church organization.
We had our third session of the course yesterday evening and, as usual, I went 15-20 minutes longer then advertised...but once again everyone stayed until the end.
Between 60 and 70 people attended, and I assume they found it interesting and enjoyable since, again, I escaped without wounds that say otherwise.
A rewarding moment (at least for me) came just before the start of the evening's session when one of the participants excitedly said that she had recognized the typology in the previous Sunday's readings and homily. It was something she had never before recognized and she believed it had truly enhanced her understanding of the passages chosen by the Church for the Sunday liturgy. How wonderful for her, and how good that our little course has not been without value.
This week we discussed the typology of Moses and Isaac, and also glanced at some of the prophets. The final piece was a brief study of typology in the Book of Job, all thanks to St. Gregory the Great who wrote extensively on the subject.
You can go directly to my Bible Study page and view the course presentations and other handout material: Bible Study Website.
Biblical Typology: Session 3
Last Wednesday I began teaching a parish adult faith formation course on Biblical Typology. The course will be conducted every Wednesday evening for four weeks and will offer an introductory overview of the subject. We will examine "type" links between the Old and New Testaments, the people and events in the Old that foreshadow greater things in the New Testament. I also hope to examine how we can apply typology to develop a better understanding of Sacred Scripture and its meaning for us today on our journey to salvation.
I expected perhaps 30 or 40 people to attend, but imagine my surprise when 82 people enrolled for the course. They filled the meeting room and even stayed for an extra 15 minutes because, as usual, I made the session longer than I should have.
Any handout material, along with each session's PowerPoint presentation will be placed on my very modest Bible Study website at the conclusion of each session. Here's the link: St. Vincent de Paul Parish Bible Study. You should be able to access the presentations of future sessions by Friday of each week.
But for those who just want to view the PowerPoint, here's a link to the Session 1 presentation: Typology Session 1
