Month: January 2014

looking past the stones

Looking up can result in bird poo in one's eye. But it can also remind one of the great expanse beyond the church.  Looking up can be a gentle reminder that it is not about the church.  It is about God. We love the church only because it is, we...

play

What I know of playfulness came from living in an elephant camp in Thailand.  After a three hour time of testing, one of the elephants chose me. That elephant, which I was charged with tending, washing, exercising and feeding was the most playful being I have encountered on this planet...

the art of waiting

This is my friend who taught me to think. He did not teach me how to think.  He simply taught me to think.  He taught me the importance of waiting.  He waited a lot.  He is a novice in a monastery in Chiang Mai and he sat in this position ,...

a grumpy day

  This is one of the carved faces on the cathedral.  It marks one of the door portals and it always seems to be a grumpy image when I walk by to walk Kai.  It gave me some comfort today. We all have grumpy days and today was one for...

cobwebs

  From time to time I notice that my housecleaning is not what it, perhaps, should be.  I notice these cobwebs on my lamp and wonder what in my heart and soul needs to be wiped off, spruced up or even cleaned. And yet I will never be perfect and...

letters

Jesus came to us as the Word.  I find that provocative. Why the Word? Clearly Jesus was a human and yet Jesus is frequently referred to as the Word. Not the notion.  Not the idea.  Not the initiative.  The Word. The identification of Jesus as the Word has huge implication...

women

There are so many of you. Women who serve. Women who suffer the pain of childbirth or the pains of men and their silly insecurities. Being made in the image of God is one thing but being made in God's image to the extent that life emerges from you and...

The 2014 Annual Meeting Opening Prayer

(The view from the writer's cabin at Cathedral Ridge)   The Opening Prayer - The 2014 Annual Meeting The Cathedral of Saint John in the Wilderness, Denver, Colorado   Lover of our souls; We, your beloved people, come to you now After a hard year of life, love, leadership and...

sabbath as moment

  In the glow of the Epiphany, light still intrigues and warms me.  And light through windows especially calls me to attention, as does the full moon which right now seems to announce a different kind of growth from that announced by the sun. One can feel the tides pulling...

light on an obscured path

My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean...