Joanna Harader
What do you do?
“So, Joanna, what do you do?”
My comfort level with this question depends on the context.
People who want to be included
I've always assumed that the revelation here is that Jews should let the gentiles into the community. But perhaps the revelation is at least as much the fact that the gentiles want to be included.
Let the children serve
On a shelf in our church library you can find a “Reading Guide” made by a fourth grader. It lists the types of books appropriate for different age groups and advises: “Remember--Kids (8-12) when you start the Bible, go at your own pace. It's a long book!”
January 3, Epiphany Sunday: Matthew 2:1-12; Isaiah 60:1-6
If all it took was a star to compel a person to Bethlehem, the Magi would arrive to see a multitude.
December 27, First Sunday after Christmas Day: 1 Samuel 2:18-20, 26; Luke 2:41-52
Which mother, I wonder, has more heartbreak. Hannah sacrifices the dailiness of raising her first-born son. Mary keeps her son with her, but as he grows she can surely see that he is heading down a dangerous path.
How many candles?
Sunday morning at the beginning of worship, I lit our peace lamp and then I lit four white candles: for Paris, Beirut, Aleppo, and Baghdad.
...Words of hope and other words too
The lectionary readings for All Saints Day and All Souls Day include lovely words and images of God’s care for us and the Divine's promise of eternal life. In the face of death, these are the promises we cling to as Christian people. And they are good promises. True promises.
And, to be quite honest, annoying promises to have repeated to you over and over and over again when you are in the midst of deep grief.
My daughters are not distracting
A friend of mine recently posed this question on Facebook: Junior high girls braiding each other’s hair in church: appropriate or not? Considering this friend has never been a junior-high girl nor parented a junior-high girl, the question seemed sincere and did not bother me.
What did bother me, however, was the frequency with which one particular word kept popping up in the comments: distracting.
On sacrifice and suffering
Lent was a fairly new concept for me when I was in college, and one year I decided to make the ultimate sacrifice—chocolate. I still remember standing in the ice cream parlor, looking at the luscious rocky road and chocolate swirl and brownie chunk ice cream–and choosing butter pecan. Butter pecan. Such is the suffering I was willing to endure for Jesus.
I think now that the whole endeavor was a bit melodramatic.
Thin places in this week’s readings
In the Celtic spiritual tradition, people refer to “thin places”—spaces where the veil between the Divine and the earthly is especially thin; places where you can easily have a sense of the holy, a feeling of connection to God.
There are places commonly recognized as thin, as holy.
On public writing and polarization
I recently helped write a letter to leaders of my denomination, Mennonite Church USA....
Dancing with the elephant
In one of my Mennonite Facebook groups recently, someone asked who would be the first to blog about the “elephant in the room.”
...
So much for unity
I used to read Ephesians 4 and get that vague, warm glow we Mennonites feel when we see the word peace. Now the passage stops me cold.
Story-shaped theology
Recently I came across this beautiful question in a sermon from Randy Newswanger:
...Holy communion
My family shared communion bread in my father’s hospice room before he died. We blessed it, broke it, and ate it....
Operation Streamline
They are brought into the Tucson, Arizona, courtroom 70 at a time. Brown-skinned people, mostly men. Dusty jeans. Faded t-shirts. Calloused hands. Muscled arms. Weary faces.
...On the Cleveland kidnappings
Yes. It is horrible that a man held three women and a child captive in his home for years.
...Creflo Dollar, Cindy Crawford and salvation
At the gym recently, I found myself on the elliptical machine with two television options in front of me....