The young woman who sat down next to me on the Southwest Airlines flight volunteered that she was a student at a certain Baptist university, where I also had attended 30 years earlier. Intrigued, I asked more about what she…
Change is Good
When Fellowship Baptists met in Greensboro in June for their General Assembly, they embraced not only change but a clear future for the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship. As CBF moves along in its third decade of life, the General Assembly expressed…
Life lessons I learned in Sunday school
Recently a family visited our church from what they described as a more contemporary church in the community. When a person or family visits with us from another local church, I always thank them for visiting, commend their church, and…
Eva and the evening
With anticipatory excitement, we sat huddled at the end of the driveway – Eva, my husband Mark, and me. It was summer, it was near dark and we were sitting in fold-up metal and plastic-webbed chairs, almost in the street. …
Getting straight about that serpent-dove thing
Most readers of this blog would identify as moderate Baptists who view their more ideological brothers and sisters as well-intentioned, but misguided, extremists. Moderates are sensible mediators between extremes who eschew both conservative and liberal forms of group-think, political correctness,…
Mr. Irrelevant
Anyone who spends time with me eventually learns that I love football. I don’t like football. I love it. One of my favorite things about football is the NFL draft. For football players, the draft is the culmination of years…
My connection with the Rev. Will D. Campbell
In the fall of 2004, I was taking a seminary course on Thomas Merton. It was being taught by Merton friend and scholar E. Glenn Hinson. Dr. Hinson knew of my near-obsession with all things Will Campbell, and he helped…
Remembering Will Campbell, a spiritual brother
Some years ago, songwriter and poet Mickey Newbury sat down to pen a song about Cortelia Clark. With the background full of sounds of distant trains and despair dripping from the trees, he led with this verse . . ….
Time to count our blessings
My ministry “day job” is to give leadership to my church fellowship’s national disaster response. In this role with the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, I interact with our churches, other churches and faith-groups, NGO’s and voluntary organizations active in disasters. I…