Two weeks from tomorrow is the first day of 2022. As I write this post, uncertainties and anxieties about the existing and new variants of covid-19 continue to cloud the new year outlook. Recently I’ve been reading an excellent book on the first three hundred years of the Christian Church, The Patient Ferment of the… Read More The Corrective of a Long View of History
The image with this blog post may be pretty disturbing, unless you love zombie and living undead movies. A hand reaching out from a grave. Perhaps I meant to publish this two weeks ago on Halloween and missed my timing? But as stark as it is, it resonates with a mental impression I had a… Read More Have we learned to grieve our losses and disappointments?
Ever get tired of an abundance of words? Of a lack of listening in a group or context you were in? Sometimes it may not only be a diarrhea of words, but also a lack of any meaning behind them. This can be troublesome for words on any subject, but perhaps especially so in religious… Read More Be careful of ‘God-talk’ without any meaning
It has often been on the margins in history, outside established power centers, that fresh social and religious movements have begun. This may be true again today globally as a world stricken by plague faces the shifting winds of sudden change. It was true in the fifth and sixth century onwards, as on the Western… Read More New life on the fringes/margins of Empire
I must confess to a weariness in hearing others say and saying myself, ‘I’m praying for you.’ That doesn’t mean that I will stop praying, or believing in prayer. But after eighteen months of a world with covid, including having the ‘long haul’ version myself, several situations of friends facing life changing tragedies or even… Read More Do you ever feel your prayers are meaningless?
Anyone notice a level of anger and even outrage increasing in society? Whether it is ‘road rage’ incidents on highways, or flight attendants facing unprecedented harassment and hostility, or restaurant employees dealing with boorish and overly demanding people, many of us are emerging from pandemic lockdowns with ugly attitudes. Where is this coming from? Certainly… Read More Are we living in anger and outrage?
Sometimes but not often I read a book several times. It could be a novel that I particularly enjoyed, or a history book that needs closer attention. Probably most often it is a book related to the journey of the inner life. A couple of weeks ago I picked up at a used bookstore a… Read More The Deeper Level of Letting Go
The future is a scary place. Especially when hope is scarce and fear is allowed to run rampant. I hear and read of so much fear right now. It comes from across the political spectrum, both from the right and from the left. And sadly the Church is caught up in it all, not often… Read More Dueling Nightmares of the Future from Right and Left
I was in Bangkok, Thailand in 2020 just a few weeks before Covid-19 shut everything down. After I did my business in the shopping mall men’s room, I noticed the front of the stall. It was a picture of an ‘elder’. I guess I had used the right one! (see photo). Elders can come in… Read More The Importance of ‘Elders’ Letting Go
How does the future look to you? In parts of the world like where I am at present, covid is retreating and life begins to return to ‘normal’. You may be reading this in a nation or region where life is anything but normal, instead perhaps in lockdown or curfew of some kind. In just… Read More The Future is as Bright as the Promises of God
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