ANNOUNCEMENTS    “The Death of St. Jerome” The Belles Heures of John, Duke of Berry

THIS is the Announcements page. It will be the first thing you see each time you log on to this webcourse.  The other sections of the course may be accessed through the navigation bar to the left, (the panel with the praying lady at the top). If you click any of the blue-colored links on the navigation panel, this central panel will be replaced by the section of the course you have chosen. You may always return to this original configuration by clicking on the red course title in the center of the banner (the panel at the top of this page). You will not need to use the grey links on the banner: they will take you places you do not need to go.

WHEN you have finished reading this introductory material you should go to the Lectures and Assignments section, where you will find five tasks awaiting you (and please forgive me if this sounds like some sort of medieval quest!).  In that section you will find each week's work listed under the date of the Sunday that begins each of the fifteen weeks of our course.  The first week's work consists of:

A) Making sure you can play audio-lectures;

B) Reviewing the Course Syllabus;

C) Introducing yourself in the Introductory Discussion Forum

D) Reading the texts and listening to the first four audio-lectures for Section One of the course.

E) Answering questions and sharing reflections in Discussion Forum One.

THE question was recently raised when papers (/research projects) are due.  The last week of classes begins May 3; and I believe I have to submit grades by the following week.  So I would be grateful if you could have your projects in to me by May 11 at the latest.  Remember, if you elect to do a PowerPoint or WebPage based presentation, I need the narrative that accompanies it, either written out as text, or recorded.  Feel free to submit the voice recording by e-mail as a .wma or .mp3 file.  Or, the spoken text may be included within the presentation, if you are comfortable doing that.  Please let me know if you have any questions,

April 24, 2007

AND WELCOME to our final week!  This week we will look - all to superficially - at the intertwined vices of vainglory and pride, concluding with a glance at St. Benedict, (which should surprise no one given the persuasions of both the institution and the professor).  INEVITABLY the question of extensions for papers arises about this time.  I am willing to grant extensions; but I need an explanation and a firm and realistic date by which the paper will be in.  If the paper is not submitted by at least a week before the date by which I am required to submit grades, then I am required by the academic office to submit an incomplete, which can be changed when the paper has been graded.  Please let me know if you have any questions.

April 24, 2007

WELCOME to our second-to-last week of class!  This week our discussion will be on acedia and holy zeal; and next week's discussion of vainglory and pride will, sadly, be our last.  I have very much enjoyed reading all your postings: please keep up the excellent work.

April 11, 2007

WELCOME back!  I hope you all had a restful and fruitful Holy Week.  We are up and running again, and I have opened our next discussion forum.

March 30, 2007

HAPPY (almost) Palm Sunday to you all!  Holy week will be a holiday as far as this course is concerned.  I won't be opening the next discussion forum until after the Triduum; so have a wonderful rest.

March 13, 2007

SEVERAL of you have asked when the paper is due.  I will need to have it in either printed or electronic (e-mail attachment) form - whichever you prefer - by the last day of the course, May 4^th.

YOU may have noticed that the text for this week by Smaragdus on fasting is not yet available.  I must confess that including Smaragdus among our course readings is something I have hoped for but not yet achieved.  It is not an essential piece of reading, but it is a bit fun, and interesting from the monastic standpoint.  Please regard it is optional if I am able to sneak it in by the end of the week: until then, Cassian and Evagrius should offer you plenty of scope for reading and reflection!

February 22, 2007

CONGRATULATIONS to you all on your spirited discussion of apophatic and kataphatic prayer in last week's discussion forum.  We will continue to discuss the need for balance between these poles in our section on lectio divina that will begin next week.

MANY thanks to those who have shared with me their plans for papers and presentations. I look forward to hearing from the rest soon.

February 7, 2007

IT was suggested that some participants in our class would appreciate printable "text-only" versions of the webpages we are studying.  I have prepared these for Weeks Four through Eight: they are available to download or open in the Course Documents section of the course. Please note that these do in any sense replace the webpages, and that they cannot be used effectively with the lectures, since I often refer during lectures to the colored bars and images on the webpages.  Please let me know if you find these "text-only" pages useful, or if you have any other comments or suggestions.

A QUESTION has been raised about the expected level of participation in the discussion forums. As you will have noticed in the Syllabus, there is no midterm or final for this course: the Discussion Forums take the place of exams. I presume everyone will respond (but not necessarily restrict themselves) to the questions I pose at the beginning of each forum.  Whether your reflections on these questions takes the form of an original posting or a response to another posting is up to you. Keep up the good work!

February 2, 2007

ALL seems to have gone well with the transition to the new site (see the note below if you are not sure what that is about). I need to apologize in advance for the amount of material we will need to work through next week.  Please note that in the discussion forum I do not expect you to respond to ALL the questions: they are simply intended to help you formulate your response.  In general, this is the maximum number of lectures we will have during a week; so if you survive this fourth week, you will survive anything!

I HAVE opened next week's discussion forum early for those who may wish to begin working ahead.  Again, please let me know if you are having any difficulties.

February 1, 2007

WELCOME to our third week of class! If you are reading this text you have successfully found your way to the new location for our webcourse site.  Everything should look and work the same as it did in the former site.  Please let me know if you have problems of any kind ( ldysinger@stjohnsem.edu ) I won't bore you with the technical reasons for this change; but if all goes well it should not happen again.

IT is not too early to begin thinking about subjects for your research papers or (PowerPoint/Webpage-based) presentations for this course.  If you have any questions or if you have already decided on a topic, please let me know.  I am very much enjoying our discussion forums: keep up the good work!

January 25, 2007

JUST a gentle reminder that we are now well into the second week of our class, and the lectures (§ 5-10) and Second Discussion forum have been open and available since Sunday. I presume no one is having any difficulty finding the appropriate lectures and texts: if so, please let me know.  Simply scroll down the page in Lectures and Assignments to the appropriate date and week number. I look forward to our discussion.

January 19, 2007

MANY thanks to all of you who have both introduced yourselves and made use of the First Discussion Forum in "Moodle".  All seems to be working well.  I will generally tend to hold back a bit in terms of my own participation in discussions so as not to push the discussion in one direction only; but I will certainly jump in from time to time.

YOU may have noticed that the Lectures and Assignments section now contains the lectures and texts for our first four weeks of work.  Some people like to work ahead; and you are more than welcome to do so.  However, I will not open the discussion forums until the beginning of the week for which they are intended.  Previous discussion forums will remain open throughout the course and may be revisited anytime.

January 17, 2007

THE discussion forums are ready for you to enjoy!  We will be using the SJU-CSB "Moodle" system for our forums.  If you click on the "MOODLE" DISCUSSION link on the navigation panel (dark blue, on the left, beneath the praying lady) you will be taken to the "Moodle" login page, where you will be asked for your SJU-CSB user name and password (the same ones you use to access e-mail minus "@csbsju.edu"). You will then be given a link (MONS 435 / SPIR 435: Christian Asceticism) to the site where the forums are posted and awaiting your pleasure. Your browser should open the Moodle discussion in a new window, which means that this page should still be available when you finish working in the discussion forums: there is also a link on that page that will return you here.

ONE or two final points: if the "MOODLE" DISCUSSION link does not take you to the right place, you probably need to press the "refresh" key on your browser to update the links on these pages.  Failing that, you can go directly to the Moodle login using this address https://moodle.csbsju.edu/login/index.php .  Please feel free to experiment wildly in the Introductory Forum and get the feel of both responding to the comments of others and posting your own "subjects" (sometimes called "threads").  Also, for the adventurous there's a way of adding your own picture (or any identifying picture you like) to replace the "smily face" in Moodle.  You will need to adjust your user profile: Patty Weishaar (PWEISHAAR@csbsju.edu) can put you in touch with the IT department if you need help with that or with any other aspect of using Moodle.

AND please feel free to contact me with any questions you may have: ldysinger@stjohnsem.edu .

THIS is the Announcements page. It will be the first thing you see each time you log on to this webcourse.  The other sections of the course may be accessed through the navigation bar to the left, (the panel with the praying lady at the top). If you click any of the blue-colored links on the navigation panel, this central panel will be replaced by the section of the course you have chosen. You may always return to this original configuration by clicking on the red course title in the center of the banner (the panel at the top of this page). You will not need to use the grey links on the banner: they will take you places you do not need to go.

WHEN you have finished reading this introductory material you should go to the Lectures and Assignments section, where you will find five tasks awaiting you (and please forgive me if this sounds like some sort of medieval quest!).  In that section you will find each week's work listed under the date of the Sunday that begins each of the fifteen weeks of our course.  The first week's work consists of:

A) Making sure you can play audio-lectures;

B) Reviewing the Course Syllabus;

C) Introducing yourself in the Introductory Discussion Forum (this forum should be up and running by Wednesday, January 14);

D) Reading the texts and listening to the first four audio-lectures for Section One of the course.

E) Answering questions and sharing reflections in Discussion Forum One. (this forum should be up and running by Wednesday, January 14);

AN ANNOUNCEMENT for those who may be interested in getting together face-to-face with their classmates:

On the weekend of March 27-29 I will be giving a workshop at my monastery (Saint Andrew's Abbey, Valyermo).  Any members of our class who are in a position to travel to Southern California for that weekend are most heartily invited and encouraged to participate.  We will focus on the place of psalmody in monastic ascetical/mystical theology; and the notion of the Psalter as a "mirror of the soul" plays a significant part in our study this semester.  This weekend-retreat is, of course, optional as far as our course is concerned.  Anyone interested in signing up needs to do so within the next two weeks: please contact the retreat office at the Abbey (661-944-2178 / retreats@valyermo.com ) for information on costs and bus transportation from LAX; and please let me know by e-mail that you plan to attend.

JUST one final point before you get started.  Please note that the Class Roster link will take you to a page that shows the names and e-mail addresses of all class participants.  I have been requested to use ONLY these e-mail addresses in communicating with class participants; so whenever you send me a note (and you are welcome to do so anytime!) please use ONLY your St. John’s e-mail address to send and receive messages in matters that concern this class.  If you are not sure what this means or have not yet worked out how to use the St. John’s webmail service, please contact Patty Weishaar ( PWEISHAAR@csbsju.edu ), the theology webcourse coordinator at SJU.

I look forward to working with and getting know all of you.

Fr. Luke Dysinger, OSB.
ldysinger@stjohnsem.edu 

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