Blog Archive
Contemplation in Action – Community – Prayer – Listening – Spiritual Direction – Nature
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Transforming the Heart
In these last turbulent weeks I have been strengthened by this passage from Ezekiel: “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you. I will remove your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.” To be human is to have a heart of stone. We fight, do violence, lie, destroy…
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Healing Prayer for the World
The article below is one I wrote in 2007 for the Shalem News. Now in March of 2022, with a war raging in the Ukraine, the threat of a nuclear war, climate change and other upheaval in our world, I ponder how to hold it all in prayer. I was led back to these reflections which still feel authentic…
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Spiritual Companionship at the Time of Death
The ministry of spiritual companionship can be so rewarding and evokes a sense of the reciprocity inherent in giving. Graduating from Shalem’s Nurturing the Call: Spiritual Guidance Program gave me the needed credentials to serve as a hospice chaplain with Louisiana Hospice & Palliative Care in Opelousas, LA. (Chaplain credentialing requirements vary among agencies.) I…
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New Rhythms of Grace
People are somewhat taken aback when I say I don’t want to be a menace to my family, employees, or friends. Parker Palmer got it right when he described a leader as “someone with the power to project either shadow or light onto some part of the world and onto the lives of the people…
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We are all meant to be Mothers of God
Luke 1: 39-45 from The Message Mary didn’t waste a minute. She got up and traveled to a town in Judah in the hill country, straight to Zachariah’s house, and greeted Elizabeth. When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby in her womb leaped. She was filled with the Holy Spirit, and sang out exuberantly, You’re…
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Beyond the List of “Shoulds”: Receiving God’s Invitation
“Many times today I will cross over a threshold. I hope I will catch a few of those times. I need to remember that my life is, in fact, a continuous series of thresholds: from one moment to the next, from one thought to the next, from one action to the next. Help me appreciate…