Month: May 2014

taste and see

  What a wonderful thing is a good cheese board, late at night with good friends! This one was on offer after dinner last night with a group of very, very old friends on the roof of a Manhattan sky scraper. Old cheeses and old friends and some wine are...

next to it

  This is a lectern in Rome in a Jesuit church.  Sometimes we use form to express meaning and indeed art in churches can do a lot to make meaning visual. I love the way the gorgeous wood has been ripped open to reveal a golden crack.  The image is...

preposterous

Sometimes the best thing to do is hug a dog.  They don't mind.  They understand how hard life can be and they just take it laying down.  Like it's their job or something. When Kai is trying to get one of his 15 naps in, I will crawl up behind...

Rest

friends, I  am resting.  The daily sip will resume on Tuesday. Charles

blessing each other

Tonight the people of the congregation will gather for our annual volunteer dinner. There will be two central acts.  We will cook a great meal at the stove and serve it warm and delicious.  And we will bless each other with holy oil ingratitude for our love of each other...

goodness and beauty

I followed this peacock in a friend's garden for hours one day.  I was noticing how very beautiful the tail colors of the peacock are when the light hits them.  The feathers get their beauty not only from the coloring pigment but also from the actual structure of the feathers...

heaven now

I love this image of a friend's garden gate.  It seems mysterious and welcoming and frightening and enticing.  It reminds me of the many scriptural references to opening our heart's door to God and to the shepherd as the gate rot the sheep. People sometimes ask me what it was...

time to see and time for tea

In Luke 12, Jesus tells us not to worry about our lives.  That is hard for me.  I think it is hard for anyone raised in the home of alcoholics or any parental dysfunction.  There is a lot of abuse of children out there. Most of it out there is...

What if we lightened up and had some butter-cream cake?

  What if God is not angry at us at all?  What if God is not as furious as we project onto God?  What if it is we who are the angry ones - we humans? What if God is loving, gentle, kind, generous, compassionate, forgiving, understanding of failings.  What...

Allium

  When I see this photo of a friend's garden I smile a little.  The flowers, Allium, related as they are to onions, make me smile a little.  They have a Dr. Seuss quality about them.  They are not ugly, nor are they gorgeous.  They were favorites of mine in...