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Wait a Minute in Stressful Times: Addressing Stress from a Christian Perspective · Centrally Speaking

• 0:01
  SPEAKER_01: Centrally speaking, is the central choice of the church's podcast.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_01: It speaks about issues that would be of interest to our society.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_01: In particular, it addresses how a Christian worldview intersects with Western secular culture.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_01: In the spirit of the church's founder, we take the perspective of the middle way, which is in agreement with the historic Christian church.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_02: I'm Dr.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_02: Drake Williams, Minister of Mission and Theology of the Church.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_02: Our website is www.cscfamily.org.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_02: Welcome to Essentially Speaking.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_02: Our topic today is Wait a minute in stressful times, addressing stress from a Christian perspective.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_02: And we're very fortunate today to have Professor Dr.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_02: Josta Koch with us.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_02: He is the rector and professor of practical theology at Evangelische Theologische Faculteit in Loeven, Belgium.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_02: He completed his PhD at Radbaut Universiteit in Nijmegen in the Netherlands, where he wrote his thesis entitled Arranging Learning Environments for New Learning, Educational Theory, Practical Knowledge, and Everyday Practice.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_02: He has had extensive involvement in academic environments in the Netherlands and Belgium, including being involved in a research center for youth, church, and culture at the Protestant Theological University in Amsterdam.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_02: He recently had his inaugural lecture published entitled Wait a Minute in Stressful Times: A Practical Theological Account of Learning in Encounter.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_02: Josta Koch volunteered in many different ways in local congregations as a youth worker, catechist, and elder, and he is also a family man, happily married to his wife, Beliana, and he also has three daughters.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_02: Welcome to the show, Just.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_02: We're glad to have you with us.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you, Drake.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: Glad to be here.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_02: I'm wondering how you got interested in this topic on stress.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_02: There are many issues that a practical theologian can get involved with, though.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_02: Why did you choose to examine stress and its uh place in our world today?
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I chose that theme in preparation for my inaugural address.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_00: Well, as a practical theologian, I'm specialist, specialized in theology and religious education issues.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_00: So my main focus in all my research work is on young people growing up in society, but also raised in churches and Christian families.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: So this theme came to my mind as an observation, just an observation that I saw a lot of stress among young people nowadays in our societies, in well, at least in Western Europe, and in particular in the Netherlands and Belgium.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: Well, what did I observe and what do I still observe?
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: Stress for me has not to only to do with stress as a result of heavy jobs or too much work-to-do uh workload issues, you know.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: That's also a source for stress.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: But the stress I reflected on in my inaugural address has to do with stress that is rooted in the experience of being on the way to find out who you are, and at the same time to lack resources, to lack persons that can help you in that process of finding out who you are.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: And that means that while our societies are expecting a lot of young people to do it themselves, they are expected to do a lot themselves, but also when it comes to their identity development, there is a kind of tendency to let young people do it themselves.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_00: And uh well, that that's a kind of root experience or a root source for this experience of stress among young people.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: So that that's the first reason.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_00: The second reason is that well, in our institutes, whether it are churches or schools or institutes like the ETF, the Gehes Theodorse Faculty, and all kinds of other theological faculties where I was affiliated with, I well, I observed uh a lot of stress, you know, because there's so much uh expectations around us.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: And so it's uh it's a it has to do with a balance between, on the one hand, a kind of fundamental developmental process, finding out who you are, and on the other hand, the availability of resources to help you with that process of finding out who you are.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_02: Just for our listeners, when you talk about speaking to young people at the ETF in uh Lofen Belgium, you're talking about those 18, 22 or so?
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: Well, yes, the students at our institute at the ETF are 18, 19 years and older, also 60, 70 years sometimes.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_00: So young and old.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: But in my research on young people, then young people are children, two, three, four, five, six years old, adolescents, young adults, you know.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_00: So that's my main focus in my research.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_00: When it comes to stress, my interest has to do with these categories of young people, primary school, secondary school, aged people.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_02: Can you help us with distinguishing different aspects of stress or levels of stress?
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, there's the stress of I have an exam that's coming up, or there's the stress of my mother is about ready to enter into life and death surgery.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_02: It seems to me that there are several levels that one can experience as stress.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_02: Can you can you speak to this?
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_02: And when does stress become too much in any of these levels?
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, well, that that's a good question.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: And uh there is, of course, stress is a neutral term in a way, it is a usual phenomenon in the life of people.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_00: So it's neutral in the sense that it's not negative pussy or it is not positive pussy, but there are positive examples of stress and negative examples of stress and neutral forms of stress.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: The way I reflect on stress has to do with a more negative understanding of stress, which is not the whole understanding, of course, but that's this is what I mean with stress, a kind of negative thing, and it has both an emotional and a physiological component.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_00: One can be uh emotionally hurt by stress, and one can be physiologically hurt by stress or a combination.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: But in all of the situations, it occurs as individuals try uh to adjust or to deal with environmental circumstances that disrupt their daily functioning.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: So this is at the heart of how I understand stress.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: It is a reaction to circumstances that disrupt your functioning.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: So that is what I mean with a lack of resources that's disrupting.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: Because for identity development, also for religious identity development or faith development, we need resources in terms of people who can show you what it is to be a Christian.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: More generally, you need people who can show how it is to live a healthy life in the particular community you are living in.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: And when these people are lacking or they are not functioning in that regard, then that's disrupting.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_00: So that's how I understand stress.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_02: You've talked several times about lack of resources.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_02: Can you speak about that uh in uh your environment at uh ETF in uh in Belgium?
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_02: What do you mean by lack of resources?
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: Well, it it has to do with uh several things.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_00: Let's start with uh the the example of the the family, the home family.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: My inaugural address was not only on stress but also on learning in encounter.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: To develop oneself, you need encounters with people.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_00: And encounters ask for time and attention.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_00: And what we often uh see in families, and that's at least a tendency I observe, is that the time and the quality time available in home families to sit together and just to be together in one room, just to be together in one room in a relaxing way, just to be there close to each other, to have this opportunity to ask a question, to listen to one another, to experience each other, to observe each other.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_00: That's lacking more and more.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_00: That's one example.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: That's what I mean with uh lacking resources.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_00: In this example, it's lacking time or sometimes lacking a place to be together with other people.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_00: One other example is in uh in the school environment where schools are developing to kind of fabrics, only uh interested in uh discourse in different subjects, and also only the you know the cognitive development of young people, or the preparation of young people for what is called the economic markets to find a good job, you know.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: So it's fantastic that that education is preparing young people to find jobs.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: That's one of the core functions of education, but there are more functions of education, but it's also they also have a formational uh function for young people, and what I observe is that this formational function in terms of identity development that also needs time and places in schools and encounters between young people and between people and teachers.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: That's another example, but so it's not that abstract, it's about two core uh issues time and the place, and of course, other people that's the third one time, place, and other people, and in particular in uh multicultural, multireligious, but also international contexts in Western Europe.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_00: What is also important is that the encounters are with others in terms of other cultures, other religions, other uh international backgrounds, you know.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: And why is this important?
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_00: That's the third example.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_00: I see a lot of misunderstanding at the level of society, whether it is in the public sphere or it is in the political debate.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_00: There's a lot a lot of misunderstanding, not understanding each other and not seeing each other because of we do not know each other.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_00: And that's also a source for stress, because then you can have then people have the reflex to isolate themselves as a group or as an individual because the other group is dangerous because you do not know them very well.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_00: That's another example where also educational institutes, well, in particular important, to facilitate these encounters with others, not only to get known with others, but it is in knowing the other that you are learning about yourself.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_00: So that's a fundamental developmental issue in this regard.
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_00: For understanding yourself, to feel safe with yourself, it's necessary to look in the mirror, and that mirror is formed by others who are different from you.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_00: So these are three examples of what I mean with the resources, it has to do with places, with time available, but also with different people available in these spaces and in these moments that you can encounter them.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_02: Well, you brought up a lot of things uh with that response and this answer.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_02: I'm wondering if you can then take some of these resources and then apply them to different stress levels.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_02: And since I spoke already about stress because of a test, or I'm stressed because there's a relative who's going to have a very serious operation.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_02: I wonder if you could elaborate on that.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_00: Stress for a test, that's not an identity issue most of the time.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes it is an identity issue when some someone defines himself or herself in terms of success, then the stress for a test is an identity issue.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_00: Otherwise, it's not at the very core, it's not an identity issue.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: So the stress is much more who am I as man, as a woman, as teenager, as young adult, but also who am I as Christian?
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_00: Who am I before the face of God?
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: Who am I?
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_00: So it's about who who am I?
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_00: Question.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_00: That's what at the very heart of this reflection on stress.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_00: And that does not mean that when you are when the stress level, when it comes to these identity challenges, is not that high, that does not mean that it automatically results in less stress for a test, for example.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: That that's quite another thing.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, but these identity issues uh at times are working their way out through these stressful situations, and hence uh the time, the place, or the people around you become very very important.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_02: So I agree with that.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_02: That's that's very helpful.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_02: In a recent devotional that you gave at ATF in Belgium, you asked the question do we live in times of anxiety or do we live in times of fear?
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_02: I wonder if you could comment on that.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_02: You concluded that we live in both times of anxiety and time of fear.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_02: What's the difference between these two and how is this helpful for us in thinking about stress?
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_00: Living in times of anxiety.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I that was the main theme of uh of my devotional during the doctoral week.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_00: And this is a doctoral week this time because of all these corona measures.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_00: We held our doctoral colloquium fully online, and the main theme of the doctoral colloquium was speaking about God in times of anxiety.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_00: And the times of anxiety referred to the times of corona because a lot of people are in uh well lacking uh safety became insecure mentally but also physically insecure, isolated sometimes, depressed, stressed.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_00: So the that word anxiety was the word to just to summarize all these kinds of feelings about depression and to be insecure and an irreliable uh environment, in a way.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_00: At that time, I was reading from the book of Proverbs, and it is in the first chapter of Proverbs that there is this concept of the fear of the Lord, which is the beginning of all wisdom and all knowledge.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_00: English is my second language, and for me, anxiety and fear are these these are synonyms in a way, but at least in the context of the Bible, fear uh has another dimension than anxiety.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_00: So, in a way, in well, maybe in the daily talks, anxiety and fear can be the same, that's possible.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_00: But uh when it comes to the biblical perspective, at least from the book of Proverbs, there's another thing with fear.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: Fear is uh understood as the reverent obedience to God.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_00: My main message in that devotion was that the Bible, and in particular the book of Proverbs, is speaking about both.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_00: It's speaking about anxiety and fear, because the book of Proverbs is not saying, well, the fear of the Lord is the end of anxiety, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: The book of Proverbs is quite realistic about our circumstances and our contexts.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_00: And the re uh the reality is that we are living in times of anxiety all the time, not not only now, during the corona pandemic, but also in the time the book of Proverbs was was written, and all along the way in between that time and our time.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_00: The clue in the book of Proverbs is to to develop oneself before the face of God in a way that you you know that you are living in times of anxiety and that that it is really possible to be anxious, but at the same time, you can fear the Lord, and the fear of the Lord can help you to fulfill your tasks and to hold on in these times, and probably also to a little bit understand these times.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_00: That's the book Proverbs also about to find wisdom, to find a kind of instruction and understanding.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_00: One of the pictures that is sketched in the book of Proverbs is that wisdom is something you should seek for, it is a treasure that you should look for.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's not just open your Bible and then you know how to challenge anxiety.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_00: You should be active searching for it, you know.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_00: So, my lesson was that we are living in times of anxiety, but as Christians, we're also in living in times of fear, and this is the fear of the Lord.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: It's quite helpful because I think also in terms of identity development and how we raise young people.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's too simplistic to say to young people, Well, we live in anxious times and and you are stressful, but know very well there is the Lord and He will help you through.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, you can say that, and in a way it's true, but you cannot compensate the one thing with the other.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_00: So simple.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_00: You should live with this challenge to hold on with both.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_02: Well, maybe you could say speak more about this.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_02: Uh we come to grasping the fear of the Lord, we come to uh a grasping of where we stand in uh the greater picture and settling matters of uh importance uh in our own hearts, and that leads to a decrease in stress.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_02: Would you agree with that?
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe that's true for some people, but I also see people who really fear the Lord.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_00: That there is not that uh solution for stress because of the existence of loss in their lives, because of all these dangers surrounding them.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_00: You know, when you see people who are fleeing, whether it be on Lesbos or in other parts of the world, should we say to them, Well, just fear the Lord and then your stress will decrease?
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_00: I do not think that that's the way it works.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_00: And well, the the the main thing here is that there's not one size fits all solution.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_00: And and I think that when it comes to how God works in the lives of people, there is not one size-fits-all way he does this.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_00: And we already learned this from just reading the Bible.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, certainly, and I'm not trying to suggest that uh one size fits all on this, but uh coming back to time and place and people and having resources, but one of those resources being an understanding of where one stands with a divine being can be a help, a contributor uh to lessening stress.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, well, that's true.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_00: But uh, the main thing knowing that there is well, knowing God, the most important thing with knowing God is that you understand yourself as someone who is living in in the reality of God, before the face of God.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_00: You can understand yourself as related to God, so it's about identity, about how you understand yourself in this world.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_00: It's not about knowing God, it's not about uh there is someone who always helps you.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_00: Of course, God helps people, but that's not the main thing from my perspective when it comes to why it is helpful to realize that God and how God reveals Himself in scripture and in in day-to-day experiences nowadays.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_00: The main thing is that it helps to understand yourself at a deeper level, and of course, that might uh result in less stress, of course.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but it's not an automatic result.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_02: You referenced youth earlier.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_02: Do you feel that uh youth in our day are growing up with more stress, uh a sense of a lack of identity?
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_02: Is there an increase of that uh in your research that you've done on this, Jos?
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, well, I that there are two answers.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_00: And the first one, and that's the main one, is that we cannot compare the stress levels of young people growing up in our society with 20, 30, 40 years ago.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_00: So I I do not have the research data that can help us to make that comparison.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_00: But the second answer is that what we observe within this generation is that there is increase of stress experienced in the lives of young people.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_00: We see it in the headlines of newspapers, so it's much more in the newspaper than it was 10, 20 years ago.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_00: But I also observe it in how youth workers also uh youth workers in churches and in schools are reporting on their experiences with young people.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_00: They report an increase of these kind of stress issues and identity issues among young people.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_00: So these are indicators for me that form a basis to state that there is a kind of increase of uh experiencing stress.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_00: But the question is where does that come from?
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_00: Is it because the the context is much more demanding?
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_00: Is it because there is something in young people that makes it much more difficult to handle the circumstances that are comparable with the circumstances 10, 20, 30 years ago?
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_00: Well, my answer to that question is it's it's a complicated picture, but it has all to do with the dynamics of all these levels because identity is not an individual issue.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_00: Identity has to do with has a social component, it has an individual component, it has a it is a social concept identity.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_00: So who you are also depends on others and the context.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and it has also a transcendental dimension, so it has also to do with how do I relate with transcendence?
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_00: Do I believe that I that that there is a relationship between me and something greater than me, uh bigger than me?
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_00: Uh is there a God?
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_00: What what does that mean?
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_00: So it's quite complicated.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_02: You've talked several times about the importance of people to release or to cope with uh stress and anxiety.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_02: And of course, we've we're in the middle of uh coronavirus restrictions that have isolated people.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_02: I'm wonder if you could speak to that as to how that has caused stress to increase, and then maybe a coping strategy during this time of restrictions and and more isolation.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_00: Well, isolation is is a direct result of the corona pandemic and the measures taken by governments to lower these uh levels of the pandemic.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_00: Isolation is also a uh reflex as a reaction to stress.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_00: A lot of people uh nowadays are in isolation because uh governments are taking measures.
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_00: The thing is that isolation is also a kind of natural uh reflex uh as a reaction to stress.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_00: Well, one of the biggest problems for young people as a result of the corona pandemic is that they find themselves in isolation.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_00: There are fewer people and fewer places and fewer moments that they can speak out, and then and that they can be there in the presence of the other.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_00: They continuously are there in their own room, in their own house, together with some people.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_00: So what what they lacked mostly.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: In these times of isolation, are these places and moments that they can show themselves to others, that they can encounter others just to be together.
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_00: It's not only it's not that you miss football or you miss the playground or you miss your teacher.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_00: You are missing the chances to encounter and to speak out, to be seen by others.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_00: So I think that uh this is this is one of the challenges for educational institutes, uh, but also churches, in the phase where the pandemic is fading away in a way, and that measures are taking away, and that there is much more possible in terms of opening society for gatherings, opening schools, opening churches.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_00: So, this is one of the main challenges for uh educational institutes and also churches and also youth workers to be quiet, relax, just open your doors and come together and nothing special.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_00: It's just about that.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_00: That's a core issue.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_00: Well, next Monday we will have our opening the new academic year, and this will be my plea for the uh educational institutes in in Flanders to take up this challenge, and this has to do with the formational function of schools and educational institutes, also in higher education, to give space for being there, literally, and to have this encounter with others, to see each other in the eye, and just to be there.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_00: If that's that is done in a good way, that results in a s in a safe place where the stress levels can decrease.
• 23:37
  SPEAKER_00: That's very important.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_00: So, well, your question was what what is was the the main issue when it comes to the corona pandemic in terms of stress for young people?
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_00: Well, this is the main issue to to lack well, there's also lacking resources in terms of spaces to speak out, to come out, to show yourself in the presence of the other.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_02: How might a uh Christian community or community life, whether it be a church or another Christian organization, help in general to lower stress and anxiety and fear?
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_00: To have spaces and to have time available to encounter young people as they are.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_00: And this is an answer which is quite simple, but it is contrasting with lots of activities and expeditions and creative actions.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_00: I often see in churches when they are answering this question what to do to get young people engaged in the community.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_00: But most of the times, the fundamental thing is to do you have room, space, time available, people available to just listen to young people, to see them.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_00: And this has nothing to do with a choice for the one or other curriculum.
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_00: This has nothing to do with are we going out for biking, are we going out for a walk or an expedition or a camp or whatever?
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_00: And are we available to see young people not only to say something to them, but to listen to them and to learn from them?
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_00: Because when we are open to learn from them, then they are really seen.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_00: And if they experience that they are seen, then they feel safe, and then there is a chance that levels of stress can decrease.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_02: Maybe one final question uh to ask you Do you have any um individual strategies for decreasing stress?
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_02: Is there a way to let's say turn away from negative thoughts that might lead to stress that you might want to share at this point?
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_00: There's uh quite a correlation between these kinds of strategies and your personality structure.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_00: So what what I will say is well, works for me and not for everyone.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_00: But what works for me is one thing is is fundamental to uh to have to have a kind of grip on your own schedule and uh your own activities.
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_00: So this has to do with agency.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_00: So uh what works for me is to have a kind of agency, but also structure and purposes, uh personal aims.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_00: So there are a lot of in in positions like I have, there are a lot of things that have to be done.
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_00: What really helps is to have your own agenda and the agenda of your institute.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_00: It's quite helpful to have a policy where you can read, okay, what is our mission?
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_00: What is the reason why we are in this world, and what are our strategies for the next year and the next five years?
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_00: So that helps to choose what to do and what not to do at the daily level.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_00: So that helps, and one other fundamental thing is to relativise, it's your job, and it of course it is your duty, but it is your job, and your job is embedded in your family life, your church life, and your street life.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_00: So, my own strategy is to always be in balance with attention for the family and attention for your own health, in terms of you know, I'm a long distance runner, so I choose blocking time in my schedule to go out for a long-distance running exercise several times a week, and that helps physically but also mentally.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_00: And and one other thing to add is when you feel that there is this feeling of stress continuously, speak out, go to a colleague or or your own wife, someone, and just share and ask the simple question what can I do?
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_00: But this is the same thing as you know where we started.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_00: Is that someone with whom you can talk and you can speak out just to mention that you are stressful and just mentioning it and explaining it is the first and the most important step in these kind of things.
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you very much for this conversation on uh uh waiting a minute and uh stressful times.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_02: I really appreciate uh you taking time to uh to speak with us today.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know if you have a word that you want to say about uh the ETF and uh Love in Belgium, just as a concluding piece for this.
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_00: Uh well, yeah.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_00: Well, for the the listeners to this podcast who are not very known with the Evangelisch Theologische Faculteit in Löwen, Belgium, it's it's good to know that we are recognized as an academic institution since 1983.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_00: And we offer bachelor and master uh of arts degrees in theology and religious studies, and we have also a high-quality international PhD program.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_00: So that's quite interesting for people not only in Belgium or in the Dutch-speaking regions.
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_00: It is an international program, and we are joined by quite a number of international students coming from all over the world who are interested in doing a PhD study in theology and religious studies in an environment which is evangelical and academic.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_00: So that's a special thing with our faculty that it's rooted in an international evangelical tradition, and at the same time, it's functioning at a high level together, cooperating with all these well-known theological faculties and institutes in Western Europe.
• 29:25
  SPEAKER_00: We have a Protestant uh evangelical identity, we have a denomination transcending orientation, so that's also quite important.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_00: We're not uh working for one special denomination or whatever.
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_00: Our orientation is broad, international, and well, one of our main uh special features is that we combine high-quality academic work for with attention to community building and spirituality.
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_00: I think this uh conversation on stress, the religious upbringing of young people, the role of the church is a good example.
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_00: So, this podcast is a good example of how we try to work at the ETF.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_00: So, at the one hand, we are uh puzzling with academic and theoretical issues and concepts and problems, and we publicate, uh we republish internationally on an academic level on these issues, and at the same time, we are dedicated to be in conversation with churches, and well, this is an example within in this podcast to be in conversation, to make it accessible for church life, and at the same time to learn from church life and to be inspired from church uh life in our academy.
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_00: So that's what we are, and I'm very proud that I'm I'm the rector of our institute.
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_00: I must say that I'm proud and it's a wonderful job because of our staff.
• 30:48
  SPEAKER_00: We have a highly qualified staff and dedicated staff members, and you, Drake, are one of them.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, you are really helping us to have this special international orientation in our program.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_00: So we do not say that we are international, but we are international in our roots because we have an international staff and we have an international student membership.
• 31:11
  SPEAKER_00: So that's amazing to work with.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_00: So that's um who we are, who I am, and uh, you know, so that's uh what Evangelische Telov's faculteit in Leuven stands for.
• 31:21
  SPEAKER_02: Pleased to be associated with you, and our prayers and best wishes uh go to you as you continue on in this uh very important work.
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_02: Thanks so much for um this conversation today, Jos.
• 31:32
  SPEAKER_02: Lord's blessing to you.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you, Drake.