Often, our brothers and sisters living with mental illness feel far away from their very surroundings, so it is no surprise that God also feels far away. They have no words to pray. Life is blank. Or: life is chaos. Where is God in the blankness and the chaos, I wonder? These are the treasures of the Church given to us in our time and place. What they seek is hospitality and belonging and hope. And that, my friends, is what we do. Continue reading
Our intergenerational communities are a treasure not found in many other places today. Where else might we watch a wealthy business woman caring for the child of a single mom, a homeless man sitting with suburban teenagers, or a surgeon serving a clerk from Giant Tiger? Continue reading
I have been guilty during Advent of presuming that I am the only one who waits, as if I alone represent the whole earth longing for renewal. Continue reading
There is a term I hear regularly among college chaplains called “loitering with intent.” With so many students and so little time, it is a practice which most of us find remarkably difficult but undoubtedly necessary. Intentional hanging around, it seems, is the best formula for building relationships. Continue reading
My colleagues in parish ministry hear comments from time to time such as, “You don’t understand what it’s like in the real world. It’s much harder to be a Christian out there.” And, to a certain extent, they’re right. At the very least, working in the Church brings different kinds of challenges than the work of honouring Christ among people who, at best, have pretty different values and, at worst, think our faith is just a big joke. Continue reading
The Holy Spirit, it would seem, is up to something ridiculous. I’m beginning to notice a pattern: whenever I have a solid life plan in front of me, I suddenly find myself somewhere else entirely. Continue reading
Both individuals broke down, talked with great passion about how hard they were trying to stay faithful, how angry they were when they tried to pray… And so together we talked. We talked about the idea that sometimes keeping the faith means raging at God, how that means we refuse to give up on the idea of a God who loves us, we demand that God pay attention to what is going on. Continue reading
My office is usually filled with people. In fact, my office usually filled with undergraduates arguing about their assignments, debating political theory, gossiping about their relationships and asking questions about scripture and Jesus. Continue reading
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