Psst, you there, can I have a word? I’m talking to you, Ms. and Mr. ‘spiritual-not-religious.’” I know you think that everyone who participates in church, synagogue, mosque, or temple sees the … [Read more...]
More water stories
As I mentioned a few weeks ago, which means it must be on my mind, I have been preaching for forty years, I can’t believe it. I realize that to some of you, that’s nothing – heck, Sabins got … [Read more...]
Discovering Holes In Our Differences To Explore Our Commonness
DENIM SPIRIT: Just like a cat…or a sea slug This column first appeared in The Finger Lakes Times, May 11, 2016 and was posted at … [Read more...]
Finding Your Place
Few things are as obnoxious and boring as actors talking about acting or writers writing about writing, especially when they go on at length about their challenges. Oh, and college professors: they … [Read more...]
We won’t encounter God in the past or the future
Summer arrived in mid-August. Perhaps it was the severity and length of last winter that so raised the expectations for summer that even the most sublime growing season could not fill the empty space … [Read more...]
Adapt (even Ritual) or Die
Born in late April in northern Vermont, my puppy’s first year of life was dominated by the coldest winter in recent memory. It was last winter when even life-long Vermonters were getting edgy about … [Read more...]
It Begins with a Place
To say that everyone needs ‘a place’ in which to be spiritual sounds absurd, and yet we do. To say that we need a ‘sacred place’ is simply ridiculous and true. It was long believed, and still is by … [Read more...]
A Wednesday Rant: Spiritual practice has little to do with doctrine, rituals, stretching, or crystals
Spiritual practice has little to do with doctrine, rituals, stretching, or crystals “I like to find what’s not found at once, but lies within something of another nature…” From, “Pleasures” by … [Read more...]
Modernist Christian Spiritual Practice: Knowing the difference between ideas and God
From the moment Jesus breathed his last breath to 381 (probably three hundred and fifty years), Christianity was a highly conflicted movement of loosely affiliated followers of Jesus. As would happen … [Read more...]
A Word Rippening Inside
"A single word" by Yunus Emre, 13th century Sufi A single word can brighten the face of one who knows the value of words. Ripened in silence, a single word acquires a great energy for … [Read more...]