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JG: Why didn't it work it out the way you had... or let me put it differently, what forces intervened, I guess, to push you to the decision that you were being called? Is it, it's an interesting question. I mean, what is it that, how do we identify that we're being called, and not just to a vocation, but this is, this is a unique vocation because it's divinely inspired, this call that's taking place. What forces intervened in your time at seminary that said, okay, "Yes, I am meant to be a minister"?

MN: The short answer is a lot of things. The longer answer is that it just, the seminary experience itself was a good overall experience. Now, I attended seminary up in Berkeley, in the Bay Area, which is something I thought I'd never do. Not... number one, I never thought I'd enter seminary, number two, I never thought I'd live in Berkeley of all places, but it was a great experience, and I say that as one coming from Los Angeles -- you know, you're a Los Angeles native, and you know, at least when it comes to sports, Los Angeles and the Bay Area, San Francisco, they just don't get along.

JG: And other things, too. [Laughs]

MN: Yeah, and I often thought, now, is that God's judgment on me or God's judgment on the Bay Area that I ended up living up there, but anyway, I ended up going to seminary in the Bay Area, at a seminary that was very, very open, if not liberal, Pacific School of Religion. And it was just a good atmosphere to be in that, again, gave me time to just open up and think things through. Obviously, it exposed me to a lot of things, a lot of people I didn't know before. The seminary experience itself really called me... it wasn't so much professors or instructors posing questions that I needed to respond to them so much as questions that I needed to respond to and answer just for myself. And I think that's one thing unique about at least my seminary experience, that it really was a time that enabled me but at the same time compelled me to answer some of the deeper questions of life that we just don't have opportunities to be asked or we just never think about. What is the meaning of life? What is my purpose here on Earth? What am, what is my role as a human, let alone someone who is being called by God? Those are the questions that I really thought about and that nudged me along the way.

As a matter of fact, I really, again, I really didn't decide to pursue ordained ministry 'til my final year in seminary, my third year. Other classmates of mine who were United Methodist at least began the ordination process our very first year in seminary. I didn't decide to start the process 'til my last year, but we all ended up being ordained and going through the process at the same time. Not that it was a race or anything, but I think the reason why I ended up getting ordained on or around the same time as they did, even though they had started the process a year or two before me is because, number one, it was a practical reason. Your first, second years in seminary, you're so busy focusing on coursework you have very little time to satisfy the ordination requirements, which involves some written papers, exams, those sorts of things. But also, I think by the time I had thought about it, or because I had taken time to think things through, by the time I had made my decision in the third year to begin the process, I had figured out which end was up and figured out that yes, this was what I wanted to do. And because of that I was just able to start the process and just to go through it without having to worry about finishing a lot of coursework and papers and things like that, whereas I know that some of my classmates who had started the ordination process early on, in addition to having to complete coursework requirements, were also having internal struggles, I think I can say, about whether or not this was the path that they had really wanted to go down, or that God had chosen them to. So again, it really wasn't until my third and final year in seminary that I actually made a, made the decision to enter the ordained ministry, so that was one of the factors.

I think another factor, another influencing factor, was that it was during seminary that my own ethnic identity was even more firmly grounded than it was prior to that, and I also was able to see a connection between the biblical texts, the Christian faith, and my own ethnic awareness and understanding as a Japanese American. Not that I didn't detect it before, but at least it was during my seminary experience that I was finally able, at least on some level, to articulate it. And that's when I began to see that, if I didn't consciously know it before, but that's, then I realized it then, that working within the Japanese American church was something that really was important, not just to the Japanese American community, but to the church, in my case the United Methodist Church. And once I figured that out, once I figured out that yeah, what I really wanted to do was something that involved me working in the community and that I could do this within the context of the church, then it was really easy for me to move forward.

<End Segment 11> - Copyright © 2010 Densho. All Rights Reserved.