Wednesday, March 13, 2019 | Message from Bishop Thompson
Week Two: Chapters 3 and 4 of Autopsy of a Deceased Church by Thom S. Rainer Slow Erosion I often tell people who are thinking about remarrying that if they don’t work on what caused the divorce from their first spouse, they just might marry their old spouse with a...
Wednesday, March 13, 2019 | Reflections
After church one Sunday, a fairly new member exclaimed to several of us, “I love this church! There are so many real born-again Christian people!” I do not match the criteria for what many people mean by born-again. “Oh,” ….(View this reading and more resources...
Tuesday, March 12, 2019 | Reflections
At a conference I attended, the leader of a gospel choir pointed out that many of us were clapping wrong. In gospel music—as in most African musical traditions and most of today’s popular music—the clap is on the off-beat, not the downbeat. After some practice, I...
Monday, March 11, 2019 | Reflections
It’s been a rough winter. The world is troubled, and there are messages from friends dealing with difficulties—illnesses and deaths, family crises, disappointing changes—so much grief. I’ve been fighting colds and allergies and currently have pink eye. My...
Sunday, March 10, 2019 | Reflections
For many years we were members of a neighborhood church with a rapidly growing Afro-Caribbean population. With the influx of West Indian Anglicans, we needed to build a larger space for worship. Our rector sadly told us that the diocesan committee had refused our...
Saturday, March 9, 2019 | Reflections
The phrase “toxic masculinity” has become part of the conversation about forms of violence in our society. Toxic masculinity excuses bad behavior with the adage “Boys will be boys.” This approach isn’t helpful for any of us, boys or otherwise, especially when it...
Friday, March 8, 2019 | Reflections
I was named Mary for my father’s mother, and my middle name is Miller, my maternal grandmother’s maiden name. Until I was five or six, I was called Mary Miller—which I hated. Like a number of women of my generation, I took my husband’s last name when we...
Thursday, March 7, 2019 | Uncategorized
Do you know your carbon footprint? The average American person produces 16.4 metric tons of CO2 per year. (Source: https://greenliving.lovetoknow.com/What_Is_the_Average_Carb…) What is a carbon footprint? It is the measure of greenhouse gases that one is...
Thursday, March 7, 2019 | Reflections
Most days I haven’t been out of bed very long before I catch sight of a headline on my phone or the front page of the newspaper and plunge headlong into fretting because of evildoers. This seems a particularly dark time in our country.Surely, we aren’t supposed to let...
Wednesday, March 6, 2019 | Message from Bishop Thompson
Week One: Chapters 1 and 2 of Autopsy of a Deceased Church by Thom S. Rainer “Anxiousness about the future destroys the life of a congregation. Out of this anxiousness the pastor and people try to control events. This is a tremendous waste of energy, and drains the...
