CCblogs Network
Look, mama, look—do you see?
In a world of whittled attention spans, perhaps the greatest gift I can offer my children is also the simplest.
Reading a Samurai code alongside Howard Thurman’s meditations on nonviolence
Tsunetomo and Thurman both say death is not to be feared for those who understand their purpose in life.
Seeing things that no one else can see
He shows me a ceramic ram, duck, and eagle: “At night I see them wrestling with each other.”
Lent won’t save you
Perhaps no one really believes giving up coffee or cookies forgives their sins. But do we see a Lenten discipline as an act of will?
Remembering a 19th-century lynching near my church
A historian contacted us about a tour of sites where mobs had lynched people—including the locust tree across from our sanctuary.
Sin is about not knowing who we are
Mystics understand what moralists do not: God pulls us like a magnet to our essence.
Talking about religious decline with a Buddhist priest
The local clergy conversation turned to nostalgia about our so-called Christian past. I asked the Buddhist priest next to me what he thought.
Why do extremely wealthy people hate the idea of higher marginal tax rates?
It's not like paying more taxes would change a billionaire’s quality of life.
Sheltered by God
The psalmist takes cover in God like a stranded hiker seeking refuge beneath an overturned tree.
Life’s persistent questions
I don’t want to reach the end of life having complied with external demands instead of listening to the internal, eternal voice.
Watching the winter sun
Like the sun, God seems distant sometimes.
How Jerry Falwell Jr. made me wrestle with my own sin
When I read Falwell’s comments devaluing people who are poor, I thought of my encounters with Ted.
What Christmas cards don’t say
Why can’t our image-conscious letters include family fights, foreclosures, and job anxiety?
How I learned to love the “vengeful Old Testament God”
My class had struggled with the psalmists calling on God to kick in the teeth of their opponents. Then we got to the 94th Psalm.
Do you hear what I hear?
Having my birthday in Advent makes me wonder: What if Jesus had grown old and dealt with changes like hearing loss?
Anti-Semitism is Christianity’s original sin
Attacks on Jewish people, like attacks on African Americans, place a mirror in front of our culture and religion.
Going to church yesterday as a Christian who was raised Jewish
My visceral grief after the murders in Pittsburgh made me feel like a stranger in my own congregation.
Nature is my sanctuary, but Jesus keeps dragging me back to church
I blunder through life in selfish and stupid ways that no mountain scene—however inspiring—can heal, forgive, or reorient.
Silence in an evil time
An enigmatic verse from the prophet Amos stuck in my soul’s craw.
Believing survivors without physical evidence
I wish the risen Christ hadn’t shown Thomas proof. Women had already testified to the resurrection.