Full disclosure, I’m feeling more than a little salty that the primaries are set up the way they are and I didn’t even get to vote for any of the women in the field before they were out. It’s some nonsense that certain states’ votes get to count at this stage, and the rest of us minions vote the dregs several months after the fact. I’m sure Google could mansplain to me why that is, but I’m not in the... Read more
Temptation is a loaded word. Does it make you think first of standard-issue sin, like stealing, adultery, and murder? Or do you envision a laundry list of vices– fattening foods, alcohol, and luxury items you don’t “need” to buy? For Lent, maybe we can reframe the word to bring it closer to our everyday lives. Because most days, temptation is less about doing what is wrong; and more about doing what is easy. If y’all remember, I failed Lent last year. Big time.... Read more
Well I asked for it. I asked my Facebook on this Valentine’s Day morning for “the greatest love song of all time” and folks showed up for it. There’s something about a music convo that brings people out like nothing else. The responses I got were as varied as you might expect… which tells me, for one thing, there’s no accounting for taste. Some folks listed songs that are also on my all-time faves list, while others made me cringe... Read more
I didn’t watch the SOTU. I know I should watch to know what we’re resisting, but I don’t have the stomach for it. And I don’t need to hear the concentrated rhetoric to know the message that comes from this administration in daily, systemic ways– ways that affect the actual lives of real people, and destroy years of progress towards racial and gender equality. Did I get the gist? Is that what you heard last night? Which is to say,... Read more
Guest post: Rev. Laura Ann Phillips I love sports. I’m not great at playing any of them, and honestly prefer an elliptical or a yoga mat– but I love sports. When I turned 30 I celebrated by sharing 30 blog posts of 30 things that had shaped my upbringing, influenced me, or that I was proud of, in 30 years. My first blog post was about… sports. I went to my first baseball game when I was six-weeks old, so... Read more
We are so blessed. Or maybe I should say, we are so “blessed.” The problem with “blessed” [picture air quotes here] is that we so utterly misunderstand and misinterpret what that means. Here in the richest country in the world, we authors of the prosperity gospel have come to equate “blessing” with the physical and the material. God has blessed us with a really nice house/car/retirement fund… or else, with good health, and access to all of the amenities (gym,... Read more
It’s a rainy, gray Saturday morning, and I’m dropping my daughter off at the theater academy in a hip neighborhood. This is our new routine. Even the rain, which seems to have decided that January weekends are the cool place to be. When we moved here from Kansas City last year, this girl child decided she didn’t want to do ballet anymore. Which is FINE I’M TOTALLY FINE, even though she is built for it like I never was, she... Read more
It was not rare to have visitors in my office. But it was extremely rare to have a visitor fly in through the door behind me, make a few loops around the ceiling, and peruse my selection of theology books before settling on the top shelf. This flaming red cardinal lived in the bird sanctuary on the church grounds, right outside my office door. But who knows why he chose that particular morning to come on in and make himself... Read more
Maybe it’s the schedule full of festivities, the time spent with friends and family you don’t see that often, or the looming end of the calendar year. Maybe it’s just that everything is cold and dark outside so we spend more time sitting around and… thinking. But something about the season makes us look around and take stock. Make lists. Make priorities. Maybe even make a change. A friend asked me for advice the other day. He has an incredible... Read more
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down, that the mountains would tremble before you! As when fire sets twigs ablaze and causes water to boil, come down to make your name known to your enemies and cause the nations to quake before you! For when you did awesome things that we did not expect, you came down, and the mountains trembled before you. Since ancient times no one has heard, no ear has perceived, no eye has seen any God besides you, who... Read more
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