One of the great pleasures of the past year has been getting to know Micha Boyett (a.k.a. “Mama Monk”), a writer, poet, and fellow blogger on Patheos. Micha has a series of guest posts titled “One Good Phrase,” in which she invites writers to explain a particular word or phrase that has power in their faith lives. I contributed a post on the word “Sophia”— the Greek word for the wisdom of God. My post begins: “Sophia” has become a... Read more
I recently reviewed Heather Kopp’s memoir, Sober Mercies: How Love Caught Up with a Christian Drunk for the Englewood Review of Books. My review begins: In a recent interview, popular blogger, author, and recovering alcoholic and bulimic Glennon Melton said this: I think addicts are the only really honest ones. Life is hard, and everyone thinks so, but we’re the ones who say we will not pretend…Through our recovery, we also tend to end up much more self-aware and grateful than... Read more
We fill our walls here on Oak Ridge Lane not with fine art (we have neither the money nor the passion for collecting), but with things that speak to the life we have built together—posters bought on trips to Italy and California; a limited edition print of the Washington National Cathedral (I lived in the Cathedral neighborhood for seven years, participated in a Cathedral-funded year-long volunteer program, and we were married at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church on the Cathedral grounds);... Read more
Oy. So much cynicism. Ever since Kate Middleton gave birth to the new prince, George Alexander Louis, earlier this week, the cynics have been having their day. My Facebook feed is thick with curmudgeonly rants about the inordinate attention given to a celebrity infant, along with smug affirmations from some that they, unlike their more frivolous friends and acquaintances, couldn’t give a rat’s tush about this newborn prince. More thoughtfully, fellow writers in the Christian blogosphere have used the hoopla over... Read more
Forty-eight hours. That’s how long I have without one. single. child. in my home requiring food or their missing sandal or an arbiter for sibling warfare or a warm body at which to aim a stream of nonstop chatter. Well, I had forty-eight hours as of 4 p.m. yesterday. I’m already down to 29 hours. Shoot. Yesterday, we dropped off our oldest and youngest at an Episcopal church camp about an hour away. The oldest, who has gone to camp... Read more
When I sit outside to write, my dog Sunday insists on being nearby, even when she doesn’t particularly want to be because it’s very hot, as it was when I took this photo. She crawls into the shade under the car or right under the bench where I sit, ready to bounce up and follow me should I make a move toward the cooler confines of the house. Sunday was something of a default dog; we adopted her after giving up... Read more
My friend and colleague Amy Julia Becker wrote a lovely post on the Christianity Today women’s blog making the simple but vital observation that life for people with Down syndrome is not tragic and hopeless, but rather just as full of “good and bad things” as other people’s lives. Besides offering a glimpse into life in her own household, where one of her three children has Down syndrome, Amy Julia focused on a story making the feel-good journalism rounds. According to the Washington... Read more
After reading Kate Taylor’s New York Times article on the culture of casual hookup sex at elite colleges, I had to fight the urge to call my two daughters into the room issuing dire warnings of the world that awaits them in college. The world Taylor describes, in which driven young women drink their anxieties away and have sex with young men whom they don’t necessarily even like, is one my daughters are likely to inhabit one day—a prospect that... Read more
Originally published on my previous blog on July 23, 2011. For two weeks, while the kids took swimming lessons every day at a local outdoor pool, a friend and I camped ourselves in a shady spot just next to the park’s wading pool. I had a front-row seat to the parade of infants, toddlers, and preschoolers arriving with their parents to get relief from the record-breaking heat. I became captivated by watching these little ones, and a little heartbroken too,... Read more
Jesus was crystal clear on the question of whether violence is an acceptable response to violence, on whether arming ourselves with fists or swords or guns is the way to protect ourselves from fists and swords and guns. Read more
Ellen Painter Dollar
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