My time at Harvard Divinity School, now more than forty years ago, lasted only a short while, but I retain many lasting memories from that period. I had some unforgettable professors, of course (Henri Nouwen, for example, Krister Stendahl, for another), but that said, I found the smugly elitist and self-congratulatory “liberal” atmosphere not to my liking, and I was happy, when the time came, to leave it far behind. I went from HDS directly to a seminary planted, quite on purpose, in a Rust Belt town on the Ohio River, where pretentiousness wasn’t to be found in such great supply as it had been (and still is) in the hallowed halls of Harvard. I have always had a nose for pretentiousness, both in others and in myself. When I detect it, I want to scrub it away, with disinfectant if possible. Which puts me in mind of a dinner in my small apartment during my days at Harvard (the year would have been 1983), with another HDS student and his wife, who lived next door.
"God concepts," the "impersonal transcendent," and "superstitious" babushkas
