Good morning... We left the hotel in the dark of night, around 3:45 am Jerusalem time, which was seven hours earlier than our time zone in the states. Flying through Paris, we returned to Atlanta in the dark of night, around 8:00 pm on Sunday evening. My tired brain could not even compute how many groggy hours it [...]
Good morning... Yesterday an unusual word repeated itself. Pilgrimage. "In his morning writings Richard Rohr has been talking about pilgrimage, about taking time to consciously process the steps we are taking in our daily lives," said a friend on our bus traveling through Israel. Within a few hours, my husband Steve used the uncommon word in his teaching [...]
Good morning... Like Dorothy who left Kansas, we are not in Galilee anymore. We have left the calm, connective beauty. The lush, lavish land. The soulful serenity of the Sea of Galilee with its history of miracles. In Jerusalem, we have driven on thin streets with unbelievable traffic jams. [...]
Good morning... Waking in Jerusalem beneath the bright fullness of the moon, I think of the first line of a poem texted yesterday by a friend. "Why do people keep asking to see God's identity papers when the darkness opening into the morning is more than enough?" I ponder the thought. This darkness opening into this morning in [...]
Good morning... As I sit outside 2:00 am in a plastic hotel chair beside the Sea of Galilee, the air is dark, calm, cool. I collect my thoughts. I reflect back on another amazing day in Israel, in the region where Jesus, a beloved young Jewish rabbi, fed God's agape love to everybody, prostitutes, tax collectors, those labeled [...]
Good morning... As a group of thirty of us are in Israel, guided by my husband Steve, we have traveled two days in the desert, learning essential lessons. When we are stripped down to the core of our being during dry, deserted times, we savor any "strange graces" we happen upon. Small things become big. Breath. Breeze. Shrubs. [...]
Good morning... I met a powerful poem, a poem I have shared repeatedly this week. In person and over the phone. With our small groups and with a few soul friends. Reading slowly, reading twice, we have noticed together the words which touch us most deeply. Like Moses leading beloved followers through the wilderness, today might this poem [...]
Good morning... "A soul friend is a person you trust enough to share some of the deepest matters of your heart, someone who will listen to what you share without any kind of judgement, without trying to "fix" anything, and without flattering or criticizing you," writes Margaret Silf on page 47 of Simple Faith. "He or she will, [...]
Good morning... Meeting for the first time in Lent, our therapeutic community group began with our normal feelings check-in with creative blob-figures. I chose to share about our son's engagement, how I feel like the green figure below, diving into totally new territory, leaning into the friends (in yellow) who are skilled at swimming the waters of expanding [...]
Good morning... The sentence that flavored my first week of Lent came from a friend who said, "For Lent, I am giving up trying." Trying to fix. Trying to win. Trying to force. Trying to define. Trying to direct. Trying to appease. Trying to control. Trying to predict. Trying to impress. Trying to persuade. Trying to understand. Trying [...]
