“What does love look like on Zoom?”
by Claudia Pfiffner
What does love look like in our thinking, feeling, and willing?
This question came up at the end of Rev. Patrick Kennedy's presentation on the Trinity Epistle during a "Living with Christ" class.
I reflected upon this question and what came to mind is the current situation of considering whether to move from online back to in-person meetings.
Zoom meetings have become so familiar to us after having used that media for two or more years for some or many social, study, and business interactions. Some advantages of Zoom are that it is fairly easy to use, saves a lot of travel time, and no need to deal with the weather. If it were not for Zoom I would have missed a lot of interesting presentations, the seminary distance learning program, and my beloved Eurythmy classes.
What does love look like on Zoom?
Rev. Jonah Evans preparing for “Living with Christ” , a weekly Zoom and live audience event, March 2022
One interesting aspect of Zoom is the various options of keys that are provided, especially the 'audio off', 'video off', and 'end meeting' keys. Participants can use those at will if they don't like a presentation, want to cook, eat, or do exercises while listening. They can also interrupt the speaker to complain about sound and other technical glitches. The presenter can be quite vulnerable whereas the participants are not. And yes, we get to look at our own face all we want.
Lucifer and Ahriman seem to be waving.
In January, after having participated in many Zoom meetings, I started to attend in-person seminary classes. It was wonderful! Besides the great content I received, I got to BE with other people, we laughed, we hugged, we cried, we talked over each other, we were caught not having done the correct homework, we made mistakes that others witnessed, we had to concentrate in class and restrain the urge for coffee until the break, etc.
I loved it. It felt so alive. My heart space got a good work out. I became vulnerable and so were the others around me.
We had to respectfully listen to others' points of view before sharing our own.
We were led to develop deep compassion and love for our fellow human beings despite or because of their strength and challenges.
We became creative in developing win-win situations, so everybody felt included.
Should we remain on Zoom or get out there again and meet in person? Of course, everyone's situation is unique. If you asked me, I intend as much as I can to meet others again; laughter, tears, and all.
A conversation at the Foyer of the Christian Community of the Toronto Congregation, March 2022
Our Author:
Claudia Pfiffner
has been a teacher for most of her life, a Waldorf early childhood
educator for the last fifteen years.
Claudia has begun studies in the “Knowing Christ” program
in
the Seminary in Toronto.
This is a blog entry by a student at The Seminary of the Christian Community in North America. These are posted weekly by the student editorial team of Marc Delannoy and Silke Chatfield. For more information about our seminary, see the website: www.christiancommunityseminary.ca and for even more weekly podcast and video content check out the Seminary’s Patreon page: www.patreon.com/ccseminary/posts.
The views expressed in this blog entry do not necessarily represent the views of the Seminary, its directors or the Christian Community. They are the sole responsibility of its author.
