One of the best things about having very talented writing colleagues and friends is that when I’m taking a few days of from posting original content here, I can always find great material to which to link. As I continue to take this week to work on other projects, here’s another gem for you to ponder and share. Jana Riess, my stellar book editor and author of the funny, thoughtful memoir Flunking Sainthood, writes in the Huffington Post today about... Read more
I am still pondering article proposals and book ideas and the wealth of wisdom and advice I gained from a mere 30 minutes with Stanley Hauerwas last week. (Short summary: We are both passionate about the different stories people and our culture tell about life with genetic conditions and disabilities. We both spend lots of time in the difficult, tense space between the stories of disability as illness to be fixed and the stories of disability as identity to be... Read more
One of the biggest struggles with being a writer who blogs is that the time and thought required to post regular blog entries can make it difficult to give adequate time and thought to other writing endeavors. I have some ideas percolating for possible print articles and even a couple of book ideas, but they always get shoved to the bottom of the list. So, because I’d like to spend some time pondering these larger projects, and because my kids... Read more
This is a slightly edited version of a post originally published in July 2011 on my former blog. I thought it worth a revisit given that Mumford and Sons’s popularity has exploded since I wrote this post (such a cultural bellwether I am), and that some readers are taken aback when I occasionally use profanity in a post. In the winter of 2010-2011, when I was being treated for breast cancer, I created a new iPod playlist titled simply “Cancer.”... Read more
Love and Salt: A Spiritual Friendship in Letters is the kind of book that you start recommending to other people before you’ve even finished it. It will also get you thinking about your own spiritual friendships—those rare, treasured relationships with people whose company you enjoy and with whom you can discuss theological notions and the most difficult spiritual questions. Love and Salt co-authors Amy Andrews and Jessica Mesman Griffith have this sort of friendship, in which questions about God and... Read more
Sugar is the last thing you need, given the gummy “fruit” snacks and cookie-topped yogurts I put in your lunchboxes, against my better judgment. And presents. You don’t need those either. The Shrinky Dink bracelet kit you started just after Christmas still sits on the dining room table, unfinished. The Barbies and American Girls have more clothes and accessories than I do. Even so, tomorrow morning you will each find a heart-shaped box of chocolates, and a small gift on... Read more
A lobbyist for a Wisconsin gun owners’ association reportedly told supporters at a local NRA meeting that they have a strong upcoming lobbying agenda, but that progress might be delayed due to the “Connecticut effect.” In other words, this lobbyist views revitalized national interest in stronger gun laws as a temporary blip in response to the December 14, 2012 massacre of schoolchildren and teachers in Newtown, Conn.—an inconvenience that will delay but not damage the gun lobby’s efforts. The Sandy... Read more
Roger Olson, an evangelical blogger here on Patheos, wrote a post last week on “Why I Am Not a Liberal Christian.” He offered six criteria by which to evaluate whether someone is a liberal or conservative Christian. For example, a conservative Christian believes in the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ, whereas a liberal Christian might see the resurrection as a symbol for how Jesus’s disciples recognized the eternal nature of Christ’s wisdom. For the most part, I think Olson’s six... Read more
Before buying the house we live in now, we lived in a tiny five-room ranch house. When we bought that house, we had one child and expected to end up with two. Instead we ended up with three, which is what eventually sent us out looking for larger quarters. I brought two of my three babies home to that little ranch house. From that house, our oldest daughter first boarded the bus to her public preschool across town, and later... Read more
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Should We All Give Up Reading the Comments Section…Forever?
Two of my friends, both of whom are writers with plenty of experience in the comment section trenches, have given up reading comments for Lent. Another friend with years of writing/blogging experience ended an email offering me some advice on a sticky professional situation with this nugget: Do your best not to read comments. Not on your posts, not on anybody’s posts. So many commenters are pathological freaks. While I am SURE she would disqualify all of my faithful commenters... Read more