Reflections

  • Fall as the Season of Hope

    Every year, the start of a new baseball season rallies optimism with a phrase from an Alexander Pope poem: Hope springs eternal.  This phrase was more fitting for me at […]

  • Be Still and Know that I am God! – Psalm 46:10

    I’ve had a lifetime of excellent spiritual directors (… I know, it hardly shows!)  Several of them had the same prescription for me: Be still!  I’ve gotten a little better […]

  • “Lord, Teach Us to Pray …”

    In the gospel of Luke (11:2-4) the disciples make this request after recovering Jesus from one of his many escapes from the crowd into private prayer.  Jesus gives them what […]

  • Blackbird Singing on a Morning Drive

    Usually, I listen to music or news in my car; the exception is early Sunday morning’s commute to church.   The silent drive provides me a fitting time for prayer and […]

  • Ministry of Presence

    My seminary training included a robust field education program.  In one semester two of us spent an afternoon/evening every week at a residential treatment center for girls.  These girls were […]

  • Sacred Times, Sacred Places

    As a young adult in seminary, I had an aversion for hospitals, its smells, and rows of debilitated people.  Simply entering one made me squeamish.  I couldn’t imagine myself attending […]

  • Newark Sunset

    It was to be nothing special: a fifteen-minute train ride from Newark Penn Station to New York Penn Station.  I had done it many times.  The late afternoon NJ Transit […]

  • Praying with the Eagle

    One summer evening I went out to pray.  I took my usual patio chair against the house facing the back of my yard.  Suddenly (what I think was) a golden […]

  • In Every Season

    My hard-working, faithful, and loving dad had a pessimism that was often comical.  Shortly after starting our summer vacation, he would soberly remark “Yeah, the days are getting shorter now,” […]

  • Let’s Dance!

    Bill Shakespeare, meet Chuck Berry. It’s like trying to tell a stranger about rock n’ roll. John Sebastian penned this memorable phrase in attempt to describe the exhilarating power of […]