Good morning... Wow! Yesterday was an incredible day. I started out at Mend Coffee with thirty friends from Northside's Morning Mission Circle. I took notes in the back of my Hope Heals book, as author Katherine Wolf told her life-changing story of narrowly surviving a massive brain stem stroke at age twenty-six. Forty days in the ICU. Disfiguring [...]
Good morning... My parents wake in Ohio awaiting Thursday's doctor visit, hoping for positive scan results and a clear treatment plan for my dad's prostate cancer. The DeShetler family and college friends wake at Notre Dame following last night's moving mass which honored the eternal life of Audrey. This morning, fifteen women recovering from homelessness and addiction wake [...]
Good morning... To the light of the full corn moon, let's ponder a poem shared by a friend. As we read it now, slowly and aloud, what word sparkles most? ***** Let me learn by paradox that the way down is the way up, that to be low is to be high, that the broken heart is the [...]
Good morning... My parents, my sister, and I made it through a good, hard day in Olmsted Falls, Ohio. Good because we were together for the day, me with my mom, my sister with my dad, then all of us together for dinner. Hard because being injected with dye and lying still for a PET scan was really, [...]
Good morning... The last time I was in Ohio visiting my parents in their senior living community, I took a prayer walk on behalf of Audrey DeShetler. That was a special part of my nine day visit in June. Last night at dusk, I took a prayer walk in honor of my dad. Yesterday, I flew in from [...]
Good morning... As I parked my car at PAWkids, my favorite non-profit downtown, I hesitated a moment. Looking down, I saw the word love living in the gravel. At a time in our world where turmoil abounds, I hesitated and noticed love. My mind now returns to a Mary Oliver poem. ****** Don't Hesitate If you suddenly and [...]
Good morning... "Hi Sue!" On Saturday, the Retreat and Program Director texted me from Ignatius House Retreat Center. "Our next ISP overnight retreat is September 9-10. Let me know if your group is available to make 15 welcome bags." "Yes, we are happy to create bags," I texted immediately. Then I reached out to a friend who generously [...]
Good morning... This day after Labor Day, summer is becoming fall. There are so many forms of natural becoming which surround us at all times. Clever cartoonist, Grant Snider, holds up a mirror to our daily lives, helping us to ponder, "Who am I becoming?" We become what we set our hearts on. And so we are transfigured...our [...]
Good morning... On a day set aside to celebrate the American worker, this is a hard Labor Day for many. Job loss. Unemployment. How to pay the bills? Instability. Threat of violence. Uncertainty about the future. Many feel torn apart, as discombobulated as this shadow photo taken by my artist friend Corinne Adams. "So many colleagues and amazing [...]
Good morning... The truth is sometimes hard to read. "you cannot cram the glory of God into something so thin as a fact," whisper the tiny words on this black central line. As we wholeheartedly say "YES" to the glory of God, gratitude becomes our way of living. Let us ground ourselves in the gift of grace, as [...]
