Finding God in All the Wrong People: Mr. All-Together Man - August 12, 2018

Finding-God-in-All-the-Wrong-People-Sq.png

Christian brotherhood is not an ideal which we must realize; it is rather a reality created by God in Christ in which we may participate. The more clearly we learn to recognize that the ground and strength and promise of all our fellowship is in Jesus Christ alone, the more serenely shall we think of our fellowship and pray and hope for it.

~ Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Church of the Living Dead - July 29, 2018

July 29 Resurrection-2.jpg

"I have looked our destruction, our miserable end, straight in the eye and accepted it into my life, and my love of life has not been diminished. I am not bitter or rebellious, or in any way discouraged… My life has been extended by death, by accepting destruction as part of life and no longer wasting my energies on fear of death or refusal to acknowledge its inevitability. It sounds paradoxical: by excluding death from our life we cannot live a full life, and by admitting death into our life we enlarge and enrich it."

~ Etty Hillesum

What to Wear? - July 15, 2018

july-15-what-to-wear.png

"I have the immense joy of being a [human being], a member of a race in which God became incarnate. As if the sorrows and stupidities of the human condition could overwhelm me, now I realize what we all are. And if only everybody could realize this! But it cannot be explained. There is no way of telling people that they are all walking around shining like the sun."

~ Thomas Merton

Trusting the Good Gift - July 8, 2018

June 8 trusting the good gift.jpg

"Contemplation is life itself, fully awake, fully active, fully aware that it is alive. It is spiritual wonder. It is spontaneous awe at the sacredness of life, of being. It is gratitude for life, for awareness, and for being. It is a vivid realization of the fact that life and being in us proceed from an invisible, transcendent and infinitely abundant Source. Contemplation is, above all, awareness of the reality of that Source."

~ Thomas Merton

Is There a Minister in the House? - June 10, 2018

Julie.png

To live content with small means;
to seek elegance rather than luxury,
and refinement rather than fashion;

to be worthy, not respectable,
and wealthy, not rich;
to study hard, think quietly,
talk gently, act frankly;

to listen to stars and birds,
to babes and sages with open heart;
to bear all cheerfully, do all bravely,
await occasions, hurrying never.

In a word, to let the spiritual,
unbidden and unconscious,
grow up through the common.
This is to be my symphony.

~ William Ellergy Channing (1780-1842)

Youth Sunday - June 3, 2018

Alyssa Youth Trio-sm sq.jpg

And this is it. This is the life we get here on earth.
We get to give away what we receive.
We get to believe in each other.
We get to forgive and be forgiven.
We get to love imperfectly.
And we never know what effect it will have for years to come.
And all of it…all of it is completely worth it.

~ Nadia Bolz-Weber

Practice Makes Perfect? - May 27, 2018

Charlie-IMG_5545.png

You hollow us out, God,
     so that we may carry you,
and you endlessly fill us
     only to be emptied again.
Make smooth our inward spaces and sturdy,
     that we may hold you with less resistance
and bear you with deeper grace.
 ~ Jan Richardson

The Impartial Spirit - May 20, 2018

Holy Spirit, giving life to all life, moving all creatures,
      root of all things, washing them clean,
wiping out their mistakes, healing their wounds,
      you are our true life, luminous, wonderful,
awakening the heart from its ancient sleep.

Hildegard of Bingen (1098 –1179)

Shaking a Fist at God (Into the Wild: Adventures in Prayer) - May 13, 2018

If I could, I’d confess.
     Good and loud, nice and slow;
Get this load off my chest; Yes,
     But how, Lord? I don’t know.

What I say, I don’t feel;
     What I feel, I don’t show;
     What I show isn’t real;
What is real, Lord?
     I don’t know.        
~ Leonard Bernstein (1918-1990) “Mass”

Ditching Decorum (Into the Wild: Adventures in Prayer) - May 6, 2018

INto-the-Wild--FB-square.png

“Go and find Jesus when your patience and strength give out and you feel alone and helpless. He is waiting for you… Say to him, ‘Jesus, you know exactly what is going on. You are all I have, and you know all.  Come to my help.’ And then go and don’t worry about how you are going to manage. That you have told God about it is enough.  He has a good memory.”

~Jeanne Jugan (1792-1879)
Founder, Little Sisters of the Poor

Prayer 101 (Into the Wild: Adventures in Prayer) - April 15, 2018

“…prayer can only become unceasing communion when all our thoughts—beautiful or ugly, high or low, proud or shameful, sorrowful or joyful—can be thought in the presence of the One who dwells in us and surrounds us. To pray unceasingly means to think and live in the presence of Love…To pray unceasingly is to channel our thoughts out of their fearful isolation into a fearless conversation with God.”

~ Henri J. M. Nouwen