Only One Thing
“Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things; there is need of only one thing.” Reflecting on the challenges of the modern-day Parenting Juggling Act, the assault of the entertainment and marketing industries, and the slipping-sliding-ever-changing landscape of the institutional church, this blog journeys through the headlines, the hurry and headaches to re-discover the ‘one thing’ of which our Saviour speaks.
Sweeter than honey
As a parent, I fight a losing battle with sugar. But sugar isn’t evil. It is a powerful gift. We can learn and re-learn on each fresh new day how to choose God’s abundant life, that finicky recipe of restraint and indulgence, recognizing our agency in choosing to not have something that we can have, and giving thanks for the sweet gifts received along the way. Continue reading
Change is the constant
The church’s own sense of instability can open us to a new compassion for all of those who experience themselves as lost and struggling. And that sense of instability invites us to be more aware, and more generous, with what God has actually given us to offer the world’s need. Continue reading
OJ Simpson an the power of the witness
My husband Dan and I have joined the masses these past few months in our tv obsession with The People vs. OJ Simpson. It’s a strange, and at times enlightening ride back over twenty years ago to “the trial of the century.” Continue reading
All dogs go to heaven?
Our dog died last month. I am not tempted in his death to gloss over his faults and claim he was a better dog than he was. His faults made him real. We loved him as the strange and unique and challenging dog that he was. Each one of Cliff Barnes’ eccentricities, each of the funny and lovely and obnoxious ways he had of being in this world, thunders its absence in our lives now that he is gone. He wasn’t some platonic ideal of a dog. He was very specifically our dog. And his specificity demanded that we encounter him and love him, not our idea of him. Continue reading
The Gospel according to Disney
I felt rejuvenated and refreshed by Disney. But where was prayer, and where was encounter, in my vacation? How very secular to claim renewal after a week of privileged consumerist pleasure. What is our responsibility as Christians living in and with the Empire anyway? Continue reading
Unprovoked act of kindness
Last week, I was on the receiving end of an act of unprovoked kindness. It made me uncomfortable. We count ourselves fundamentally unworthy. It is the basic state of affairs for the modern individual: to pride ourselves on being self-made… and to deep down consider ourselves fundamentally inadequate. Continue reading
Nail it to the cross
It is a terribly clichéd Christian statement, touted out as a quick and easy response to human suffering, or sometimes as a humorous barb at someone who is being too melodramatic about their difficulties. And yet… Continue reading
Confessions from a guilty working mother (and finding the grace to push back)
These cultural narratives touch me and worry me. I count my two children as the greatest blessings of my life. I desperately want to raise them to know generous and unconditional and ever-present love. I worry that I work too much, that I’m distracted too often, that I get too caught up in the busyness of life and responsibilities and that I am failing them as their mother. I am a guilty working mother. Continue reading
Becoming Real
What does it look like when the church embraces this version of baptismal life that takes us into the muck? When we are offered, not purity, but truth as the way to lift the burdens of guilt that we so naturally carry? Continue reading
In the beginning, the Spirit moved upon the waters
I hope that our federal government will invest in much-needed infrastructure so that all of our brothers and sisters might drink clean water NOW. I hope that it won’t take 40 Advent seasons for Pikangikum to be equipped with water, let alone the other 100+ communities in our country who have severe water needs. I hope that our federal government will invest in much-needed infrastructure so that all of our brothers and sisters might drink clean water NOW. I hope that it won’t take 40 Advent seasons for Pikangikum to be equipped with water, let alone the other 100+ communities in our country who have severe water needs. And I hope the Spirit isn’t done with us yet. Continue reading
