“Concealment makes the soul a swamp. Confession is how you drain it.” —Charles M. Blow They have treated the wound of my people carelessly. They acted shamefully, they committed abomination, yet they did not know how to blush. —Jeremiah 6:14-15…
A pediatric chaplain offers five tips for talking with children about death and loss
Beneath the intensity of the fluorescent lights, the pediatric intensive care unit felt even more garish at 3 a.m. as I stood in the hallway with a patient’s dad who was tearful and afraid. His daughter’s nurse had called me…
Please pay attention to the plight of transgender children and their families
Here’s something I’ve learned along the way: Good people are too busy with their lives and the pandemic and watching the war in Ukraine to get involved in the plight of transgender children and their families under attack right now….
What I learned from delivering freshly baked cookies to 155 households in my church
In May 2020, I visited 155 households in my church. And dropped off thousands of homemade cookies. I had (some) help and (many) cups of flour to get the job done. And while I enjoy baking, even I hit my…
The recovery of prayer at the turn of the age
It is becoming clearer by the day that we are living at a turn of the age, as one era ends and another is beginning — religiously, socially, politically and globally. The words of the Irish poet W.B. Yeats in…
Is it an evolutionary impossibility for the pace of love to outstrip the pace of self-interest, technology and war?
If there’s intelligent life out there, it probably already has destroyed itself or is well on its way to doing so, as is our species on our own little planet. At least, that’s what a number of scientists who do…
The folly of naming a place you don’t understand
I started getting calls and emails a few months ago from a couple of development companies that were introducing new plans down the street. Their reps were looking for some combination of buy-in, or solidarity, or absolution, all of which…
How to pray for Vladimir Putin
I struggle to reconcile Jesus’ words in Matthew 5:44 with my desire to see Vladimir Putin and his minions annihilated. The Gospel text states: “But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” Two questions…
What a first grader learned about book-banning from an old-timey Baptist preacher
The recent ruckus about banning books from school libraries dredged up a vivid-yet-obscure memory from my early childhood. When I was in first grade, my father — a prototypical conservative Baptist pastor of his generation — surprised me by saying…
Church Conflict 101
It’s becoming a weekly conversation. I call it Church Conflict 101. A minister calls and immediately I hear the despair in his voice. “I can’t say anything from the pulpit without someone accusing me of being ‘too political’. What am…
Addressing war with those who don’t remember 9-11
I work with a variety of young people in a variety of settings. Today in a class in one of those settings, and on impulse, I told the class I wanted to take the temperature of the group. I said,…
Meditation on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine
I can almost smell the acrid, thick smoke of diesel engines powering Russian tanks, personnel carriers and trucks hauling heavy artillery into two eastern provinces of Ukraine’s border with Russia. Russian President Vladimir Putin declared the two provinces as “independent…