Sacrifice

Published April 6, 2008 in Christian. 0 Comments

I heard Maya Angelou interviewed this morning on NPR, which was fantastic. My husband took the kids to church so I could grade some papers and her interview was an unexpected spiritual moment.

She talked about finding what you love and being willing to sacrifice for it. What do you love? What are you willing to do anything for? Where do you spend your money, time and daydreams? This is what you love.

She also explained that she lives life as a Christian because it asks life to be lived. To love and find joy and work hard - it reminded me of the Benedictine principals that have found renewed popularity in the past few years. Work and play. And, be grateful.

Now, I’m distracted and can’t focus on grading papers! I wish I were with my family at church…

Win a copy of The Unlikely Missionary!

Published April 5, 2008 in Writing. 0 Comments

If you haven’t already been to The Dabbling Mum now is the time to check it out! Alyice Edrich offers practical writing tips from a variety of interesting contributors and lots of fun prizes to win. I recently won some fun prizes and sent Alyice my book to use as a prize this month. Just go here and ask a question, that’s it!

Audio Book - Prologue

Published April 5, 2008 in Unlikely Missionary. 2 Comments

Starting immediately I will begin offering an audio version of the novel The Unlikely Missionary. I will make chapters available every other week until the whole novel is complete. There will be no charge, I just ask that you let others know about this site and the novel.

Subscribe via iTunesYou may either listen to the chapters from within each post, download from the link included in the post, or receive an automatic update by subscribing to the podcast via iTunes.

The first chapter available is the Prologue.

Enjoy!

 
icon for podpress  Prologue: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Starbucks-free Lent continues

Published March 14, 2008 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments

My biggest mistake in this ridiculous Lenten process was telling my children. I can’t approach the drive-thru without loud reminders of my commitment! Ah, well.

Some days I drive by Starbucks and think that it was a wimpy exercise, of course I can stay away from Starbucks. Then, 10 days later I feel resentful that I’ve missed a ritual I enjoy and I pull into the drive-thru with gusto.

We’re nearing the end of Lent and I’m happy to say that I picked the right discipline. It has been a challenge to me, for the same reasons any spiritual discipline is a challenge. There is no one there to pat you on the back. But, somehow, someway, the daily discipline of prayer and journaling keeps other things on my mind besides me. It is at times exhausting and irritating. And, at times, I receive a nudge to pray for someone or phone someone that I could only know through prayer. Those moments keep me believing that there is value to soldier on.

Starbucks & Lent

Published February 19, 2008 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments

I decided to give up going to Starbucks every afternoon after teaching, before picking up my son from school, for Lent. It’s a ritual that I enjoy and I find it nearly impossible to give it up!

Here in State College there is one drive thru Starbucks, the rest of them you actually have to get out of the warm car and walk inside. Since Lent, I have been getting out of the car and walking in under the auspices of purchasing Valentine’s Gifts, buying whole beans for the troops and other things that would be obnoxious from the drive thru.

Am I sensing Jesus’ sacrifice more keenly when I deny myself this daily treat? I don’t know! But my head is killing me from caffeine withdrawals.

Today, I passed by twice, but I could still smell it.

ERD announces arrival of 2008 Lenten devotional

Published January 7, 2008 in ECUSA, Mission and Relief & Development. 0 Comments

If you are preparing to prepare for Good Friday, ECUSA is here to help. (No kidding, their material is usually very good.)

ERD announces arrival of 2008 Lenten devotional

Episcopal Relief and Development (ERD) has published its 2008 Lenten devotional booklet, titled “Seeking to Serve: A Lenten Exploration of the Millennium Development Goals.”

Also, Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori has declared February 10, 2008 — the First Sunday in Lent — as Episcopal Relief and Development Sunday.

(Via Episcopal News Service.)

Betting on Helping New Orleans

Published January 4, 2008 in ECUSA and New Orleans. 0 Comments

This story is from the NOLA Times-Picayune. It reminds everyone of the good work still being done by the church in New Orleans.

Heavens! Bishops taking game bets

But proceeds to go to Katrina relief
Friday, January 04, 2008
By Bruce Nolan
The Good Book states the battle is not always to the strong, nor the race always to the swift, but dubious Episcopal bishops in Louisiana and Ohio nonetheless are betting on the power and speed of their opposing Tigers and Buckeyes, inviting their flocks to join in — and promising the proceeds to Hurricane Katrina relief.

That said, there isn’t much smack talk involved — not yet at least, these being Episcopalian clergy.

But there is a promise by Bishop Thomas Breidenthal to put up $250 for every Ohio State touchdown and $100 for every Buckeye field goal in Monday’s Bowl Championship Series game. He is inviting more than 25,000 Episcopalians in his Diocese of Southern Ohio to make similar pledges.

Breidenthal’s call went out Sunday to 82 Episcopal congregations, including those in Columbus, Ohio State’s hometown. Diocesan spokeswoman Richelle Thompson said the invitation likely will be widened in the next few days to target Buckeye Episcopalians wherever they might be found.

In response, Bishop Charles Jenkins of the Diocese of Louisiana has called on Tiger fans to pledge similar dollars for LSU points. That announcement will go out from 54 Episcopal pulpits Sunday, the day before the game, but the call to ante up pledges against Ohio State is posted on the Louisiana diocese Web site now.

The bishops said all the money will go to Katrina relief administered by Jenkins’ diocese in southeastern Louisiana. The Louisiana diocese raises money for Bundles of Hope, with donation levels of $20 to $1,000 that buy goods and relief services in metropolitan New Orleans.

Breidenthal is new to Ohio. His biography suggests a cerebral churchman who last served as a chaplain at Princeton and before that as a seminary professor in New York.

“St. Paul tells us we are called to outdo each other in doing good,” he said. “Competition is sanctified when it does good things for communities and brings people together.”

In truth, though, the idea for the challenge came from a Breidenthal aide “who’s a big Buckeye fan,” Thompson said.

“Clearly, the Buckeyes are going to win. This is just going to make it a little easier for Louisiana to bear,” she said. “If you want smack, we’ll just leave it at that.”

Jenkins, a Louisiana native whose wife, Louise, once taught agronomy at LSU, said he willingly took the bet.

“I am concerned Buckeye fans won’t have to buy very many Bundles of Hope,” the Louisiana bishop said. “We know they will have a hard time scoring any points against our Tiger defense.”

. . . . . . .

The Diocese of Louisiana Web site is www.edola.org. The Diocese of Southern Ohio Web site is www.episcopal-dso.org.

Bruce Nolan can be reached at bnolan@timespicayune.com or (504) 826-3344.

Humor from the CHE: Berkeley Tree-Sitter Falls, Breaks 2Limbs

Published November 13, 2007 in Humor. 0 Comments

From CMMB:

The repsonses are great, so I thought I would share the whole thing.

Berkeley Tree-Sitter Falls, Breaks 2 Limbs - Chronicle.com

November 12, 2007

Berkeley Tree-Sitter Falls, Breaks 2 Limbs

A protester broke his arm and leg after plunging at least 30 feet Sunday night while trying to exit a tree in an oak grove that the University of California at Berkeley plans to raze, the San Jose Mercury News reported.

Nathaniel Hill, 24, mistakenly thought he was connected to a cable when he stepped from his perch to see his father, who had stopped by to visit. Mr. Hill was among a group of protesters who are living in the trees in hopes of blocking the university from felling them to make way for a $125-million athletics center. He is not the first protester to take a tumble; a woman broke her wrists in a fall earlier this year.

The university has been sued over the planned tree-cutting, and a court decision is anticipated as early as this week.

Dan Mogulof, a university spokesman, said Mr. Hill’s accident was “very regrettable but to state the obvious, completely avoidable.” —Don Troop

Posted on Monday November 12, 2007 | Permalink |

Comments

The headline (perhaps intentionally) did not say whether the tree-sitter broke his own limbs or the tree’s. Thank you for clarifying in the opening sentence.

— CU Alum    Nov 12, 11:16 PM    #

Sounds like the young man suffered from premature ejection, which can happen when your Dad shows up unexpectedly. Quite embarrassing.

— S. Britchky    Nov 13, 03:29 AM    #

Forget the hippy. Is the tree ok?

— Jones2    Nov 13, 04:03 AM    #

Meh…Just burn the tree’s down with the tree hugging hippies in them, solve two problems at the same time.

— doriangrey    Nov 13, 10:45 AM    #

His dad just “stopped by”? He didn’t say – I don’t pay for college so you can do this crap! Get out of the tree you hippie moron!?

— woodman    Nov 13, 11:17 AM    #

Getting hurt to save oak trees? That’s not even a rare tree. Go camp in a bog or something.

— Chip    Nov 13, 11:29 AM    #

Isn’t he a little old to be climbing trees? At 24, he better have his doctorate by now. When are these hippies going to grow up?

— BW    Nov 13, 11:37 AM    #

For the the hippie-haters in the crowd who rejoice in the suffering of others, trees do have functions aside from being places to hang nooses.

— coal_train    Nov 13, 12:15 PM    #

coal_train:

Obviously they have more uses…. dog toilets, carbon-credits, nailing posters to… or, in your case, barking up the wrong one.

— practical_joe    Nov 13, 12:27 PM    #

If a tree-hugger falls in a forest…

— beefeater    Nov 13, 12:41 PM    #

How do you get a tree-hugger down from a tree? Wave to him.

— beefeater    Nov 13, 12:46 PM    #

…re-pave paradise, put up a wealthy donor’s wishes.

— marci    Nov 13, 02:39 PM    #

Since the injury was suffered on the job, can he apply for disability insurance?

— Lawrence S. Lerner    Nov 13, 03:29 PM    #

CU Alum:

The San Jose Mercury News did report this as “breaking news.”

— ironmite    Nov 13, 03:43 PM    #

Preparing for a sacramental day

Published October 16, 2007 in Uncategorized. 1 Comment

In Forward’s “Day by Day” Flannery O’Connor is attributed with saying that “when we know the truth it will make us odd.”

Well, my husband is going to be ordained on Saturday. And, that truth makes us odd.

But, I’m okay with that. As the sacramental moment approaches I have found myself more and more nervous. I don’t know why? This process has been bubbling along for years but now the day has arrived and I am afraid.

In our 14 years of married life we have shared sacramental moments. The first, our wedding. Most couples’ first lesson in that a wedding is a community event, that it is larger than ourselves. Also, the birth of a child and the death of a loved one, adds legs to the stool and kicks others out. But, their mark remains. The stool is always wobbley when someone leaves. They are always there in spirit.

The ordination is another sacrament. It is the larger church community coming together to affirm the gifts of this person.

Marriage has been under fire for years, but people still get married. The Episcopal Church is aching under its own weight, and yet people are still called. It says to me that there is still hope, hope in the best and for the best.

‘2 Years On’ and who can stand it?

Published August 27, 2007 in New Orleans. 0 Comments

I spoke to a friend in New Orleans this afternoon who left work early to go home and drink. She was so overwhelmed and depressed by the relentless “2 Years On” footage and anger she couldn’t function anymore.

What are we remembering by watching the footage, the trauma of that time? When a loved one passes away do we remember them by watching tapes of their bypass surgery? Or, do we watch video of the beautiful times? Photos of them healthy and alive, the way they would want to be remembered.

For me, I remember the strangest most exotic sensation of sitting in the French Quarter watching the tops of the cruise ships glide by. Because, lest we should forget, the city is 20 feet below sea level you actually have to walk up a few flight of stairs to see the Mississippi River. Once you are up on the River Walk there is usually a solo sax player and if you look to the right, the Crescent City Connection is lit up and there might even be a breeze along the river.

Just remembering you today, New Orleans.

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