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The Congregation as a Place of Spiritual Formation
by Robert Duggan We Americans like to take care of things neatly and efficiently, preferably from a prepackaged solution that can get quick results with a minimum of hassle. Our cultural bias towards action and our get-the-job-done outlook impacts our approach to spiritual formation as much as it does a variety of other areas of life. Communities or individuals who…
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The Holy in the Ordinary
by Ann Siddall It is early morning at Stillpoint Spirituality Centre in the Adelaide Hills in South Australia. A cool breeze stirs the gum trees, the kookaburras are laughing joyously, and the earth is fragrant after the first soaking rain for three months. As I set up for a small retreat, check the diary, and respond to e-mails, a…
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Present Moment Ponderings
by Martha Campbell I awakened from sleep early this morning with a deep awareness: I am immersed in a world, a culture, a life situation in the throes of change. Claiming the anxiety I feel as my truth, I open to prayer. I acknowledge that, everywhere I turn, I see a dying process at work. Structures that I thought…
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Horizons
by Greg Cochran Although not nearly as dramatic as Jesus being whisked away to the pinnacle of the temple or to the top of a very high mountain where temptation was waiting, in my recent imagination, I have been taken back to the Southwest high desert—in particular to a natural formation called Shiprock. And more specifically to the natural…
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The Imprint of God’s Fingers
by Bill Dietrich “It is not you who shapes God, it is God who shapes you. If then you are the work of God, await the hand of the artist Who does all things in due season. Offer God your heart, soft and tractable, And keep the form in which the artist has fashioned you. Let your clay…
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Through a Mirror Dimly
By Maureen Watson In 1895, Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen was surprised by what he saw. A screen on the opposite side of his lab began to glow. When he held something up between his experiment and the screen, he saw all the bones in his hand projected on the wall. Seven weeks later, Roentgen introduced the world to X-rays. As…