A Narrative Journey Through Faith and Literacy

Introduction

At the outset of this chapter, the author troubles the notion of using third person language to refer to an experience that is personal and revelatory. To that end, I will use first-person pronouns and language as a means of discussing the topics of faith, diversity, inclusion, and literacy. In their work, The Spirit and the Mind: Essays in Informed Pentecostalism,Cross and Bowdle (2000) pointed to the false dichotomy between work of the mind and intellect and movements in the inner person – the spirit or Holy Spirit. It is this inner person which is tended, body and mind and soul, whether dichotomous or trichotomous in our ontological formulations of self. These ideas about self and ontology are hardly locked in as definite aspects of the individual, but what is actual is the presence of individuals in community. The sense of belonging, or lack of belonging, that a person feels in relationship to a classroom community is essential, no matter the mode of instruction (Hansen-Brown et al., 2022). The tending of this mind and engagement with study is part of the work of becoming a disciple, a term which might suggest a series of images or ideas based on one’s affiliation of lack of affiliation with a particular religious movement. It is the cultivated work of learning that is an aspect of informed spirituality, deepened religious practices, and an ongoing sense of what matters most in academic circles. It is to learning that we are dedicated and, along with this concept of learning, the learners themselves are central.

I was a student of Dr. Donald Bowdle and discovered in his work and manner the linking of a kind and gentle spirit and a fierce and precise intellect. I was a young twenty-something, majoring in Pastoral Ministry and navigating the early onset imposter syndrome of being a first-generation college student. In my interactions with Dr. Bowdle, I was encouraged and I would later pattern much of my way of being in the classroom. Bowdle was a teacher who demanded much of his students, but who also recognized that they would leading conversations about faith and theology in years and decades to come, well after his passing. I note that Bowdle would likely not want to be at the center of a chapter as an honored figure, and I further note that his inclusion as a figure in this chapter is done so in terms of honoring both his commitment to theology and his approach to kindness-centered pedagogy, both of which are concepts that are much larger than any one person.

In this chapter, I reflect on my intellectual and faith journey, and I draw upon notions of both narrative methodology (Clandinin & Connelly, 2004), as well as tenets of the personal exploration made possible in linking spirituality and autoethnography (Chang & Boyd, 2016). The linking of these two methodologies and not a means of permanently conflating them, but instead a note that the artifactual nature of autoethnography, which maintains the author/researcher as the subject of the project, is further afforded and enriched by the tenets of narrative inquiry. There is nothing neat and tidy about my faith development, but there is a central trajectory of learning and growing which marks the alignment of my faith and educational experiences as a narrative move that provides a reasonable throughline in this chapter.