Ryan Dueck
On "stomaching" the Bible
There are a handful of topics and themes that I can fairly reliably count on to cause questions or concerns in the life of the church....
"I wish God would just wipe it all away"
Every morning on my way to work I drive past the local prison. It is a surprisingly picturesque facility—lots of big trees for shade and well-manicured green grass, a nice lake beside it with...
The judge
Like most churches, we occasionally receive requests for money from people in our community. I suspect I am not alone when I say that I have come to dread these calls....
On faith and failure
A few weeks ago, I was part of a conversation with a group of seniors where we reflected upon the question, “Have you ever seen or personally experienced the failure of fa...
"I deserve a happy ending"
Occasionally, a word or a phrase
encountered in everyday discourse will jump out and lodge itself in my
...
The hospital
I have never liked hospitals. Hospitals
can so often seem to be places where we attempt to sequester the pain
...
This is baptism?
There is much about how religion and
Christianity are understood and publicly discussed in our post-Christian
Canadian context that produces a mixture of bemusement and genuine
puzzlement for me.
Mirrors of mercy
Summer sermons in our community have been focused on the parables and sayings of Jesus....
Death intrudes
My first “official” responsibility in my
new position took place a week or so earlier than schedule, as I
...
What place is mine?
Times of transition are tough. We
currently find ourselves up to our ears in boxes and and clutter and
...
Real ____ would never do that!
I just returned from a glorious five days
spent motorcycling through Washington and Oregon. We crossed the
...
Everything seems to be broken
It is an odd thing, I have discovered during my nearly three years as a pastor, to be entrusted with people’s pain. ...
I will wait
Today is Ash Wednesday, the beginning of
the season of Lent, the day when ashes are placed on foreheads, and the
...
Commending the Faith
This past Saturday, I attended John Stackhouse’s
lectures on faith, reason, and the new atheism down at the Vancouver...