As promised, this week starts a new guest post series under the theme of “Listen, Learn and Listen Some More.” You’ll still hear from me, of course, but every Tuesday you’ll be invited into story from some writers who have something to teach the rest of us. As such, I’m so excited for you to get to know Andrew Taylor-Troutman today; his short story, “You Sit on My Heart” is sure to make you take pause about the things that... Read more
A couple of nights ago, the four of us sat around the scratched and worn dining room table, a bounty of food before us. A huge bowl of sticky white rice sat beside a stack of nori sheets. Slices of avocado, cucumber and carrots decorated one cutting board, while thinly sliced raw salmon and fresh-from-the-frying-pan tempura shrimp decorated another. A bottle of soy sauce, a jar of sesame seeds and a small bowl of water completed the picture, for this... Read more
A lot of the work I do is around equipping parents and caregivers to talk to their children about race. Whether these conversations happen on a stage, in a school cafeteria or at a private backyard event, engaging in the conversation “early, often and honestly” is key – for all of us and for all of our children. This is part 3 of a 5-part series based on a series of workshops. — Sometimes I think it’s obvious, but then I... Read more
Hope. It’s a thing with feathers, or so Emily Dickinson once wrote. It can be a thing that lives within us, just as it can be a thing that gives us life, that becomes our breath. It can become a thing we pray for when the life raft on which we float starts to deflate one crashing, crushing wave at a time. Of course, the optimist in me oftentimes wants to believe that hope itself is a one and done type... Read more
A lot of the work I do is around equipping parents and caregivers to talk to their children about race. Whether these conversations happen on a stage, in a school cafeteria or at a private backyard event, engaging in the conversation “early, often and honestly” is key – for all of us and for all of our children. This is part 2 of a 5-part series based on a series of workshops. — Just as the first post reminded us to... Read more
A lot of the work I do is around equipping parents and caregivers to talk to their children about race. Whether these conversations happen on a stage, in a school cafeteria or at a private backyard event, engaging in the conversation “early, often and honestly” is key – for all of us and for all of our children. This is part 1 of a 5-part series based on a series of workshops. — Perhaps like you, I oftentimes feel like I... Read more
Yesterday, I stood on stage at a Covenant church in Santa Cruz, California and preached the gospel. Three days ago, I led a conversation on talking to kids about race with a small group of women and men on the San Francisco Peninsula. Today, I listened to an audio recording of conservative theologian John MacArthur deliver a succinct two-word statement when he was asked to respond to to the name, “Beth Moore.” His response, in addition to further interpretations of... Read more
Ever since my book came out, I started adding a new word to my bio: conversationalist. In addition to being a writer, a speaker and an author, I wanted a word that spoke to the power of the stories we were having around my book – after all, when The Color of Life launched into this world, it wasn’t about the white lady getting up on stage to talk about issues of race. No, if and when that happened, not only would... Read more
The scene looked rather familiar: with less than twenty minutes to go before the Sunday morning service, a small group of us gathered in the back room to pray. We held hands, sweaty palms part and parcel the glue that bound us. We closed our eyes, as one naturally ends to do in prayer, but at one point I looked up. My eyes darted from side to side as I looked the faces of the saints around me. I thought... Read more
It happened again the other day: when a friend call me on the phone and I answered her call, she apologized for calling me in the first place. I don’t think I would have noticed had it been the first time it happened, coming both from my lips but also from the lips of others. Just as pithy memes remind folks to never dial the phone (let alone to never leave a voicemail) again, but to just send a text already, something... Read more
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