While I originally wrote this story as an illustrated sermon, after the difficulty of getting my own children to listen as we were getting ready for bed tonight (sometimes, we are just too excited about the fact that raccoons are the “ninjas of the forrest”), I’d like to share with...
Note: After two conversations about why people should attend church and what makes a church welcoming, I’ve chosen to repost a post from my previous blog about a plan to help churches learn to care for people. Some congregations already care well – thanks be to God. Others need to...
Yesterday and Today Yesterday I started work on a post titled something like “Rene’ Girard and My Little Pony: Subversion of Sacrificial Mimetics”. Catchy title, I know. But between yesterday and today, something changed. This morning, I read an article about an 11 year-old boy in my former state of...
Today is a cloudy day. My brain feels cloudy too. Because I’ve been raised on a good protestant work ethic, I know to abhor the cloudy brain, to force it into clarity so that I can get stuff done. But then I remember (because my wife reminded me) of some...
On every level of life, from housework to heights of prayer, in all judgment and efforts to get things done, hurry and impatience are sure marks of the amateur. – Evelyn Underhill Sunday Stresses On Sunday morning my daughter insisted that she wanted to walk the dogs with me as...
As the snow has begun to melt and those stranded in the Birmingham area have begun to be able to return home, I was reminded of some flowers I saw last Spring. I had been driving through a gray day to visit someone when red flowers appeared in the median....
Note: This article appeared concurrently at ABPNews Blog. My last sermon of 2013 was named after a Pete Seeger song – “Turn! Turn! Turn!” Based on a Ecclesiastes 3, it is a text that I’ve mostly used for funerals. I wanted an opportunity to use the song in a non-funeral...
In honor of the people who, because of today’s snow storm, had to spend a good bit of time doing nothing, I thought I’d post this entry that originally appeared at the Religious Herald. In times when we are not able to do what we wish to be able to...
I just wanted to take a moment today and thank all the Liams in my life. Not that I know any personally, but my life has certainly been shaped by some Liams. And so, without much further ado, I present the top three Liams in my life and the lessons...
Note: This article originally appeared in the Religious Herald and on my former blog. However, in honor of the yoga class that meets at my church and the awesome way in which I just rocked my hip hop inspired cardio workout, I thought it an appropriate time for this post...