We all have life-shaping mega-stories—or traditions—that have shaped us since childhood. And most often we don’t “fix them to our hearts and bind them to our foreheads.” Instead, they operate outside of conscious awareness. In my own life, powerful evidence of a mega-story first emerged when I was in middle school. It began in seventh [...]
“The problem with the world is that we draw our family circle too small.” Mother Teresa Until the age of ten, I lived like many American kids of the ‘70s, in a primly geometric neighborhood, cross-hatched with pavement, with matchbook yards and immature plantings. More than any tree, the television towered over my childhood. Sweltering [...]
Mark 11:20-25. In the morning, as they went along, they saw the fig tree withered from the roots. Peter remembered and said to Jesus, “Rabbi, look! The fig tree you cursed has withered!” “Have faith in God,” Jesus answered. “Truly I tell you, if anyone says to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ [...]
Mark 16:9-12: Now after he rose early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, from whom he had cast out seven demons. She went out and told those who had been with him, while they were mourning and weeping. But when they heard that he was alive and had [...]
In the northwest coastal forest where I live, it is again the season of rebirth. Out of a blanket of leaf mold sprout oxalis and salmonberry shoots and dozens of other leafy species who call this woods home. Some residents stay only for days, like the tri-fold trillium, and others have lingered for a [...]
Among my vivid early memories is a betrayal. I was in seventh grade, at a middle-school Halloween dance, dressed in the football uniform I’d borrowed from the boy I liked. The year prior, my best friend—the most cherished friend of my youth—moved away. But that weekend she was in town and showed up at the [...]
In the weeks since the explosions of ‘Me Too’, I’ve taken time to reflect on my own recollections. Though I’m fortunate to have not experienced sexual harassment in my professional life, I have experienced abuse in personal relationships—and have written about that elsewhere. In my professional life what I have witnessed are ways men acknowledge [...]
{This poem about "pre-middle" age seems to resonate with the times we are in—so much slipping away, so much being learned. I wrote the poem back in my 30s, though now I am squarely "middle."} Pre-Middle If childhood is a cradle of universal arms and middle age a turning back—needy or humbly surrendered; if [...]
We have again arrived at Ash Wednesday and the penitential season called Lent, when some in the Christian tradition focus on sin. Others, especially post-Christians harboring a gripe with the faith, characterize Lent as a time for flagellating ourselves while simplistically ascribing to Jesus the once-for-all, necessary fix: dying as a sacrifice to “save people [...]
Have you noticed how beautiful everyone’s lives have become? People’s homes and families, vacations and outings are so artfully photographed and presented they look straight out of Martha Stewart. The trappings of fashion, or dressing up, we see in these photos have always been there. But something is new in how carefully staged we are, [...]
To envision the way “the powers” operate in our lives (see Part One for an explanation of this theological concept), it is useful to consider some concrete scenarios. For example, imagine an energetic, entrepreneurial woman decides she wants to design and make clothing, but in a way that does not exploit workers sewing the clothing, [...]
When I was a college undergraduate, my ethics teacher taught that ethics come down to this: being able to see clearly. We can engage in all sorts of philosophizing, all sorts of ethical calisthenics when we get into a quandary, but when it comes to a situation where we must make a difficult ethical decision, [...]
Last week I proceeded to share on Facebook a link to my blog “Theology of Resistance,” as I do every week or so. As with many writers, Facebook is how I reach my readers—that diverse, wonderful, readerly, thoughtful, far-flung tribe of people with the same quirky interests I have. Thanks to social media, I can [...]
Back when I was young, full of spit and fury, I relished the New Testament book of James. It is so didactic and ethical and uncompromising, and I loved it the way I might have loved an Occupy Wall Street speech. Still today, there is much I find engaging in James’ appeal to economic justice, [...]
Among global literature, few narratives are as a baldly subversive and anti-imperial as the Christmas stories, while at the same time so neutralized. The gospel writers of Matthew and Luke (the only canonical gospels with birth narratives) each in their own unique way set up a stark confrontation between Jesus and the Roman Caesars, [...]
I have conflicted feelings about effort. As a young adult, effort was my mantra. And effort, coupled with an adolescent zest to save the world, was perilous. In my early 20s, I stumbled my way through so many “good deeds,” it is painful to look back. The [...]
Economists be damned, the GOP tax plan constructed on the debunked scaffolding of trickle-down economics, keeps plodding forward. We are to believe that giving a massive tax cut to corporations and business owners will put needed cash in the pockets of poor and middle-class families because the corporations will uncharacteristically choose to invest their [...]
As I often do, I turned for inspiration for this essay to the lectionary readings of the day. Among them: two vengeance Psalms, a grisly murder narrative from Esther, and a fire-and-brimstone ditty from the Gospel of Matthew, with its characteristic presaging of weeping and the oddly outmoded gnashing of teeth. Among them, not one [...]
“The purpose of life is to be continually defeated by ever greater things.” ~Rainier Maria Rilke Fall arrives and my walk takes me past Foley Creek, the stream quickened after a week of heavy rain. The loud splash of a salmon stops me in my tracks. At several points around my neighborhood, roadway meets creek, but at this [...]
In the intriguing book Sapiens, Yuval Harari makes the case that homo sapiens dominated all other species and left behind other early-humans because we were able to pass on shared mythologies, or sacred stories. Prior to the ability to build group cohesion in this way, through shared concepts and values, groups tended to reach a [...]
Lately I’ve stumbled upon articles, books, and interviews about the origin of belief, about why we believe what we believe. It seems to be a conversation in the air these days at a time marked by denial of human-caused climate-change, or the apparently widespread belief that mass shootings have nothing to do with gun access. Many [...]
In American culture, success is defined by money. Now can we just agree that the success = money paradigm has serious flaws? For have you noticed that the most financially successful people are often lacking the traits that create great human beings? Take just one list of such traits from the Christian tradition: love, joy, peace, patience, [...]
Throughout his ministry, Jesus challenged every boundary people used to define and separate themselves—ethnic boundaries, geographical boundaries, purity boundaries, moral-legal boundaries, relational boundaries, boundaries between humans and animals, adults and children, men and women. Jesus didn’t stop at material boundaries, but went on to demonstrate with his life that everything is spiritual—there is no [...]
This week much has rightfully been said about gun control and the NRA, and much energy expended in the debate. It is natural in times of tragedy to want to funnel grief into constructive actions. In fact, it may be an important way to survive collective trauma. Researchers find that people who respond to calamities [...]
Mark 11:20-25. In the morning, as they went along, they saw the fig tree withered from the roots. Peter remembered and said to Jesus, “Rabbi, look! The fig tree you cursed has withered!" “Have faith in God,” Jesus answered. “Truly I tell you, if anyone says to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ [...]