Posts Tagged ‘Church’
Why I Stay
There are days when I wonder why I’m still in the Church. Days when I am so jaded by the politics and hypocrisy and scandals that too often haunt our Christian communities that I wonder if there is anything left of the Church worth staying for. Is there anything left for my children to learn,…
Read MoreWhy You Have To Go To Church
Why do you have to go to church, my child? I thought I wasn’t going to have to answer that question for a few more years. Maybe even a decade before you started stomping around with teenage eye rolls of disgust when I ask you to get dressed on Sunday morning, and not in those…
Read MoreBaby’s First Holy Week
Sweet boy, here we are. In the holiest of weeks. It all started on Palm Sunday. You solemnly gumming the long green palm in your father’s hands. Your brothers waving their palms wildly around the air (bonus points for whacking a sibling in the eye). Me watching all of you, half wondering why we bother to bring…
Read Morethis is church right now
Five minutes late (aren’t we always these days). Smudged nametags, courtesy of Crayola markers. Pile of coats on the end of the pew (will it ever be spring?). Loud whispers requesting books as soon as the lector starts to read. Why can’t we sing that psalm again – I like that one. Puzzle pieces scattered on…
Read Moresacrament, interrupted
I jostle one boy on my hip and nudge the other a step closer to the front of the line. Herding cats, I think as he wanders into the neighboring line of communion-goers. Using my one free hand I gently guide him back by the shoulder and whisper in his ear about trying to stay…
Read MoreGospel, Interrupted
How I heard Palm Sunday: When the hour came, Jesus took his place at table with the apostles. Mama, I need Polar Bear. Read Polar Bear. Read. Please. I tell you, Peter. Before the cock crows this day, you will deny three times that you know me. Polar Bear, Polar Bear, what do you hear? I hear…
Read Morethe jesus of the cry room
Ironically, they’re the easiest scenes in the Gospels for me to skip over. Yesterday at church we heard the version from Mark. Arguing disciples, who’s the greatest, elbowing each other on the road to Capernaum like bickering brothers: nuh-uh, I’m the favorite. Exasperated Jesus, here’s the least, plunking down the kid in the middle like…
Read Morea prayer for wrangling children at church
God of infinite patience, Help me not to lose my mind at church today. When my toddler falls off the pew for the umpteenth time and howls at me, let me not say I told you so! but I love you. When the baby gets so fussy that no one within six pews can hear…
Read MoreThe Footwashing
We are growing everyday in what it means to do the footwashing. A friend shared these words from Abbot John Klassen at Saint John’s Abbey, from a homily he gave on Holy Thursday a few years ago. Today these words came back to me as I thought about what we celebrate at the start of…
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