Looking Back on 2020

by Beth Langstaff

It is hard to believe that it is a full year since I first came face to face with the realities of the coronavirus pandemic – a conversation in late January 2020, after a Theological English class, with a South Korean student who was planning to fly back to Seoul within a matter of days. In Germany, COVID-19 was barely on the radar at that time; in Asia, by contrast, it was already a full-blown crisis, and the student was worried about her family and about the risks of travelling during a pandemic.

The past year has been challenging – shifting to "home office," as it is called here in Germany; navigating online meetings and new technology (on more than one occasion, I had to get my daughter's help to unmute my microphone); postponing and cancelling planned events and visits.

But there have also been bright sides . . .

• Birgit Hallmann and I have continued our weekly staff meetings online via Zoom with occasional meetings outside (in warmer weather).

• Birgit and I have been invited to attend the weekly TCM staff prayer meeting; it has meant a great deal to share the challenges and concerns, the joys and griefs of the past months with this online community.

• Online teaching has meant that the NT Colloquium can include speakers and attendees from all over the world, from as far away as India and the United States, and to meet online with old friends of the Colloquium.

• We've had time in the calendar to work on projects such as the volume of papers from the Symposium on the Lord's Prayer.

There have also been farewells during 2020. We were very sad to hear the news of Ottie Mearl Stuckenbruck's passing in September. I last saw Ottie Mearl at the EES Board meeting in 2016; we were able to sit and talk together, looking through photos of the Institute’s work in Tübingen through the decades. I am so thankful for her encouragement and support, not least for the cards she sent me while I was on medical leave. A photo of Ottie Mearl and Earl hangs just inside the entrance to the Institute, and that portrait has prompted more than one student or visitor to ask about them. It is good to tell their story!