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I carried one book with me across the country last week, Phyllis Tickle’s The Shaping of a Life: A Spiritual Landscape.  I stuffed it in the airplane carry-on with the children’s coloring books. I read it by cell phone light while the toddler snored next to me. I curled up with it on the hotel bed while the city hummed…

The sign-up sheet from church stared at me for months while I hemmed and hawed. What was the best day and time to pick for their religious education classes? Which one of us would drive and pick up? How would we fit it into the rest of the weekly calendar? Nothing worked perfectly. We talked…

Women don’t have chapters in their lives. They have seasons.  I listened to her as she pushed the stroller, worn plastic wheels swiveling over cracks in the concrete. Freshly planted pansies lined both sides of the sidewalk; I don’t know why I remember them, but I do. I must have realized in that moment that she was…

While I’m busy writing prayers for two new books – a book of prayers for pregnancy and a collection of prayers, blessings, and hymns to celebrate callings in congregations – I’ve been thinking lately about how we shape the words of our prayers. Prayer is how we speak to God and how we listen to God. As…

Today I will rise early. I will slip downstairs before anyone else stirs. I will open the front door slowly, without a creak. I will step out onto the dewy grass with bare feet. I will listen to bird song and tree wind. I will close my eyes and try to breathe. Tonight I will…

I’m writing a book of prayers for pregnancy. (Slowly. Painfully slowly. Almost like pregnancy itself…) I wanted to write this book partly because of my desire for a good (i.e., theologically sound, personally engaging, poetically written, honest and hopeful) guide to the spiritual side of pregnancy. But the main reason I felt called to write this book? Because strangers…

I plopped the baby on the ground beside me, mail already scattered across the grass like clumsy confetti. He lunged for the letters; I snatched them up and sighed. A long, muggy summer afternoon; too-hot kids whining about everything under the sultry sun and still hours to go before dinner. The baby grabbed the envelopes again.…

He slid three pamphlets across his desk toward us. “You have to pick one of these for your pre-wedding retreat.” They all looked the same. Glossy photos, smiling couples, cheesy quotes. I was tired from this tedious meeting of wedding planning and a long day of work. I really didn’t care which one we picked. “Most…

Most nights, my bedtime prayer with our two oldest boys begins like this: Be still and know that I am God. I can’t remember if it started when our litany of God-blesses maxed out into a mile-long list of everyone my kids knew: every teacher at their schools, every former babysitter, every relative they’ve never met, all the poor people and sick people…

Two big announcements today. (No, I am not pregnant!) But another kind of gestation. A pair of twins.  For my work with the Collegeville Institute Seminars, I’m at work on a book of prayers, blessings, poems, and hymns on vocation – a collection for congregations to celebrate the callings of all their members. I’m so excited…

God of love,Today we ask your blessing on all who give their lives with a father’s love. Bless new fathers and wise grandfathers.Bless loving uncles and caring godfathers. Bless fathers who await the birth of their child with joy.Bless men who did not expect or want to become fathers. Bless men who embrace fatherhood through adoption or foster…