So with the news of my move to Rhode Island now public, and people in Rhode Island understandably curious about who I am, I’m seeing a lot of new readers here on the blog. Welcome, I’m glad you’re poking around. I’ve been blogging for just about ten years now and there’s a lot to read. Some of it is even worthwhile.

But I probably should warn new readers that a few years ago, after General Convention in 2009, I decided to change the focus of my blogging. Up until that point I was writing occasional pieces about issues confronting the Episcopal Church at the broadest level. But in 2009 I decided that if I was going to write something in that area, I would do better to post it over on the Episcopal Café where it would get a much broader readership. (The Café sees about 50 to 100x more readers on a given day that I have here.)

This blog was originally started so that I could have a way to share my own thoughts about how I lived out my faith and my understandings of science. It was a common question my students asked when I was teaching at Lehigh and I just didn’t feel comfortable talking about my faith and my theology in a class where I was paid to teach physics or astronomy. I’m happy to talk about my faith, but it didn’t seem appropriate in that setting. So I created this online outlet. Most of the posts that deal with that area were labeled with both the science AND religion tag. At least until recently. Of late, having taken my initial vows as a member of the Society of Ordained Scientists, I’ve started tagging such posts with the “SOSc” tag.

The science posts are mostly things that I thought my students would find interesting. When I posted them I used the same “voice” as I did in the classroom, and I assumed a working knowledge of the basics of physics and/or astronomy. If you’re new here and reading those posts, they will probably seem a little wonky. But if you keep in mind who I was writing for, perhaps they won’t make me seem too obscurantist.

I’m planning on keeping the blog going even as I’m moving into a new phase ministry (assuming General Convention concurs next month with the decision of the electing convention in Rhode Island). I’m not exactly sure what I’m going to write about though. I’m probably going to be a little less “wonky” – I’m getting a different group of people reading my posts and writing in that more technical style wouldn’t be very helpful for most of them. I’ll probably still want to do some writing and “question asking” about how technology and scientific thought will be influencing the practice of Christianity in the 21st century, and in particular how they will influence the common life of the Episcopal Church.

And I might have a few other things to say about this and that… So stay tuned.

You might, by the way, be interested in following me on twitter (@wnknisely – see the button on the upper right). I’ve been posting a number of interesting items (to me at least) on Twitter that in the past might have been a blog post. Twitter seems an easier and faster way to share the ideas.

So, thanks for reading all this. Thanks for checking out this blog. And if you decide to keep on reading, don’t be shy about leaving a note in the comments if I say something you want to ask for clarification about, or just want to tell me you disagree. Over the years it’s been the comments here that have taught me a great deal about science, and about new ways to think theologically. And for all of you who’ve shared in that, I’m grateful.