Gaining a heart of wisdom
Muttering under my breath, I cleaned up the mess that is called party food. Where to put it all? Refrigerator? Full! Cupboards? Full! My grouching escalated into a claustrophobic "ti-rage" about my cramped life until, in the quietness of loading the dishwasher, I realized that I had been complaining about one thing: abundance. Turn it… Continue reading Just One Thing: Powerless
Soon the Leprechaun traps will appear in our home, constructed from oatmeal containers, Legos, Lincoln logs, and an old cracker box painted green. They get a bit more sophisticated every year, but the bait is always the same: the golden Legos and anything else the boys can find that resembles gold. In the many years… Continue reading A Saint to Celebrate
When we named our four boys, we were careful to discover and to ponder the meaning of the names we were considering before making a final choice. Then, we looked at each newborn and asked ourselves if the name fit and if its meaning would be a blessing to him throughout his life. Names matter. In… Continue reading Names Matter
Rising In time to taste the last slice Of apricot haze before morning sunshine -- I thought -- To be the giver. Peanut butter syrup simmering on the stove and An industrious waffle iron manufacturing perfect chocolate grids: The gift of a warm breakfast before a cold day of snowy mountain fun. Lanky Redwood forest… Continue reading Saturday’s Gift
I did not intend to have a dog in my home who is so tall that he can rest his chin on the dining room table. It was never my intention to take walks with one hundred and fifty pounds of dog on the other end of a leash, and I certainly did not plan to love that long-haired slobber… Continue reading Sit. Stay. Abide.
According to commentators, the final syllable of the name Jerusalem suggests the words "peace" [shalom] and "prosperity" [shalvah]. We don't hear it in our English rendering, but try this instead: think "yer-u-sha-lay-im." (Hear it now?) At any rate, both peace and prosperity were in short supply during Nehemiah's tenure in Jerusalem, but he was a man… Continue reading Just One Thing: Peace
Going into a job interview, I used to worry about over-selling myself. At some point, I decided that I would rather lose out on a job opportunity than to suffer the indignity -- six months down the road -- of wondering if my boss was wishing she could find that stellar employee she had thought she was hiring. … Continue reading Intimacy 101
Another name has joined Father Tim and the Reverend John Ames in my directory of beloved fictional pastors. Rowdy Slater stands apart from the others (and from most real life pastors, I expect) in two important ways: 1. Neither Fr. Tim nor the Rev. Ames could look out over his congregation and say, "At one… Continue reading The Redemption of Rev. Rowdy
"May we so pass through things temporal that we lose not the things eternal." This was my daily prayer during the years when my boys were tiny, and even though I'm not from a tradition that uses prayer books or puts the emphasis on the first syllable in the word "collect," I've recently started praying these words again. I'm… Continue reading Just One Thing: Inconvenience
For years I celebrated Easter as if it were a stand-alone holiday, singing "Up from the Grave He Arose" without giving much thought to the horror of the Dying or the silence of the Dead. Providentially, my early efforts to incarnate and to enliven an invisible God in the hearts of four sweet boys found a way into the obtuse heart of… Continue reading One Weekend in History
Living Our Days 