The God of second chances
The day after Christmas dawned gray and bleak. The forecast was snow, sleet, ice. Opened presents begged to be sorted and put away. There were clothes to try on, returns to make. Leftovers filled the ...
The Advent the church collapsed
In the Advent season, memories rise to the surface like so many twinkling lights on the tree. We remember those we love who have passed, the happy Christmases, the sad ones. We remember the house where ...
Thin places in November
Walking around my neighborhood this fall, I saw many skeletons. Bones seemed to protrude from every lawn. One evening, taking a walk in the encroaching darkness, a skeleton I hadn't spotted noticed ...
Make good trouble
The night after Donald Trump was elected president the first time, in 2016, the First Methodist Church in the town where I lived then, opened their doors for a vigil. The church offered a place for ...
Focus on God
There's a certain apprehension lying over the nation right now, a fear, an uneasiness, a sense of walking in the dark. It doesn't matter how you voted in the recent election. There are things ...
Reunions in graveyards
How do you lose a casket? My friend hasn't figured that out, but eventually, as Julian of Norwich assures us, all was well. We lived in Alaska then, and my friend's widowed mother had joined ...
Deer in the dusky evening
On a dusky fall evening, I take a walk down a familiar neighborhood street. Ahead of me, a small deer looks my way at the same moment I spot him. Freezing, I realize he's being followed by seven companions. ...
Underground Railroad
The window is closed, yet the roar of the New Jersey Turnpike just beyond the trees disturbs the stillness inside this old house, built in the woods of New Jersey around 1845 before automobiles or turnpikes ...
