Getting ready for Holy Week, I’m struck, as always, by how jarring the Palm Sunday liturgy is. One minute we’re all shouting “hosanna, hosanna!” (Greek for “save us”) and then the next thing we know, we’re shouting “Crucify him.” It’s emotionally wrenching; hope and expectation give way to fury and fear. No settling in, no probing depths. Our liturgy moves us from place to place, scarcely able to take a breath.
I’ve been attending yoga classes at my local studio for about a year. I’m into yoga for the stretching and centering, so when Zoe announced that the theme of the Wednesday class was going to be hard work, I immediately got nervous.
My mom is a retired high school English teacher, and in her retirement, she works part-time at a well-established location of a pretty popular Texas-specific chain of market/gas station for highway travelers.
Last Sunday I had to bat cleanup after my own sermon. Sometime during the Nicene Creed, I realized that I’d left something out. It was an important point with significant pastoral implications.
What is parenting if not equipping our children with the ability to function in the world?
During a women’s bible study in which I recently took part, we were given the simple task of inserting our names into a certain key verse, John 3:16.
Despite my best attempts, we struggle committing to a formal Christian education time or daily devotion in our house of chaos. I couldn’t quite put my finger on exactly why, but it was likely the four busy, beautiful daughters I call my own.
Due to procrastination and a lack of communication I was anxious and alone on an otherwise serene night. The anxiety became anger and then in my anger, I sinned.
During a recent children’s time in church, one of our priests gave each child a slip of four star foil stickers – the ones that typically accompany a good grade on a worksheet from school – colored red, silver, gold, green, and blue.
Sitting around the breakfast table last year, I read through the story of the Annunciation with my children. We paused at the illustration and took in the details. Dirt floor. No windows. I asked, “Does this look like a poor person’s house or a rich person’s house?
