Push Us Into The Truth

When fear is dominating the dynamic and nothing else feels capable of working, it seems to me the church is uniquely positioned to demonstrate what it means to be human and to lead work on human issues...like racism.

But, will it?

The church will not be a leading example in racial healing until we feel the weight of communal guilt and shame and then allow it to push us into the truth.

-- Latasha Morrison

God’s followers are asked to model a community of mutuality and solidarity.

Centuries of [New Testament] interpretation have attempted to spiritualize or minimize this good news for the poor, hiding the reality that the Bible is a book by, about, and for poor and marginalized people. It not only says that God blesses and loves the poor, but also that the poor are God’s agents and leaders in rejecting and dismantling kingdoms built upon oppression and inequality. . . . It is the vision of society the early Christians sought to create on earth, and that we who follow Jesus today are commanded to strive for as well.

-- Richard Rohr

Language of the Unheard

A riot is the language of the unheard.

-- Martin Luther King, Jr.

Will we let that sink in...and listen to what is being said?

Affects Our Ability

In any needed conversation, including the one referenced yesterday:

Fear affects our ability to be present in a conversation, to connect with other people, to be able to trust.

-- Mary Shores


...stop making pious, sentimental, and individualistic gestures, and risk an act of love.

-- Paulo Freire

Until A Pattern Is Broken

What do you think about this observation?

If I added this, what about now? 

Which image above pricks us the most?  Why?  

Doesn't it seem a little too convenient to react to the method, and not respond to the message?

Does the right to free speech include the right to not listen to any perspectives other than our own?  If so, it appears that what we continue to see from both sides is the only alternative and an ineffectual one at that.   

How about some real personal reflection? And then some real collective dialogue, starting with whichever image provokes us the most and work together from there? 

Reflection, discussion...things that need to lead to action or the pattern will just continue.

Though it shouldn't matter whether George Floyd was a 'good person' or not (aren't all people made in the image of God?), here is link to some information about his life and the kind of person he chose to be.

Cuts & Resonates

Sometimes it is the crispness of a truth that cuts to the chase.

Other times, it is the illustration of truth that enables it to resonate.

Pre-Conceived Notions

Ever noticed...how many times people are asking questions only to confirm their pre-conceived notions?  ...not because they are really interested or curious.

LT: Refusing To Quit

Ambition is refusing to quit on ourselves. Leadership is refusing to quit on others.

-- Simon Sinek

It seems there are many contexts for the truth of this observation. 

Whether it is memorializing what others have sacrificed for us in the context of our nation; how we treat others in the workplace, support those in our society, love our families; or how God relates to us -- all are opportunities to reflect what not quitting can look like.

Evolving Faith

The very nature of faith assumes that it changes, grows, and evolves.  I think this is by design and is consistent with all forms of life.

Obviously, there are constants.  The beauty is that those constants continue  to develop—personally, collectively, historically.

Thankfully, some things we've thought about God (in each of the dimensions mentioned above) are NOT true and other things we’ve never imagined ARE.

Being Good

Instagram: hillaryliannamcbride

I don't think 'being good' is anything other than being.

-- Hillary McBride

Let everything happen to you

A poetic version of the below? -- "Let everything happen to you":

Let everything happen to you
Beauty and terror
Just keep going
No feeling is final

-- Rainer Maria Rilke

Cannot Hold On, Con't

...you cannot hold on to the past (con't).

It's not that the past doesn't (didn't), in some sense, exist.  But, you have to let go of the form it took, so that which does live (did in the past, does in the present, will in the future) can be re-born.

Getting that (the living part) confused and holding onto the past prevents growth in the present—the re-generation of that life in the current time.  In fact, not releasing the past kills the living part of it that remains.

This is why it has been said, to have eternal life, you must be born again.

I think this is true at all levels—from the personal to the collective.

...you cannot hold on to the past.

Cannot Hold On

You cannot hold on to the past.

The more you try to do so, the more you inhibit the present, which is the doorway to the future.

Harder To Hate

I've learned that it's harder to hate up close.

-- Michelle Obama, Becoming

Most Human

I've noticed...that I am most human when my imagination is the greatest.

And, yes, I think the opposite is true as well.

Social Program of Jesus

The total social program that Jesus advocated was based on communion, friendship, distribution, and partnership. This contrasts with a social organization based on domination, exploitation, accumulation, and force.

-- Beatrice Bruteau


Holy Wisdom, Mother God, you hold my time in your hands. Your providence guides the stars and my cells. Your compassion opens my heart to healing in the midst of pain. Help me rest in you, trusting the future in your care and giving comfort to those who mourn, hurt, and face personal challenge. In Christ’s name. Amen.

-- Prayer of Awareness and Transformation

This Pandemic Hits Americans Where We’re Spiritually Weak

In a video chat last night, a friend admitted, “I’ve been crying a lot, and I’m not sure why.” COVID-19 has given us many reasons to weep. We’re out of our routines, the stock market has plunged, and we imagine millions dying. This virus and economic crisis punch us squarely where our spiritual armor is weakest: mortality, money, and our fear of missing out.

In 2 Corinthians 7, Paul distinguishes between two kinds of sorrow—a sorrow that “leads to death,” and a “godly sorrow.” The latter “brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret” (v. 10). Godly sorrow, he writes, produces “earnestness,” eagerness to repent, and a “longing” and “readiness to see justice done” (v. 11). The question the church faces now is which kind of sorrow COVID-19 will bring.

We are in the midst of the most widespread societal upheaval that many people alive today have ever experienced. Already our institutions, habits, relationships, and culture are shifting before our eyes. Frank M. Snowden, author of Epidemics and Society, shared with the New Yorker, “Epidemics are a category of disease that seem to hold up the mirror to human beings as to who we really are.” The question we are facing is not whether we will experience sorrow and change; the question is how. As biblical prophets walked with people through catastrophes, their advice was never to just endure until it ends. Instead they focused on proactively changing relationships with each other and with God.  Continue here....

-- Christine Jeske

If I were Donald Trump's speechwriter...

There’s a moment near the end of most sports movies when the coach gives a heartfelt pep talk right before the crucial game. The coach will use words like “heart,” “honor,” and “teamwork”. Everything that happens on the court or field after that is a bit of a letdown because victory – whether on the scoreboard or of the spirit – seems inevitable after the speech. To movie audiences, these moments may seem corny, but in real life, when someone you admire and respect speaks, their words can have a great impact. I certainly listened when coaches I respected, such as John Wooden, spoke at crucial points during my career. Inspiring people to be their best is what great coaches – and great politicians – do. It’s one of the qualities that makes them great.

One thing we could use right now is a passionate rallying speech from our president that inspires us all to do the right thing, not just for ourselves, but for our country. It is the speech Trump should deliver, not because he wants to be reelected, but because it would address the country’s major concerns, end the political squabbling, provide a reasonable plan going forward, and give Americans confidence that their government is working to protect their health and economic concerns. It needs to be the speech of a statesman not a, well, Trump. If I were Trump’s speechwriter, using the lessons I learned from great talks I heard in my basketball career, this is what I would give him to deliver...continue here.

-- Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

Visual: Framed

Visual - "Framed":

Painful Emotions

After years of being taught that the way to deal with painful emotions is to get rid of them, it can take a lot of reschooling to learn to sit with them instead.

-- Barbara Brown Taylor

(Personal) Effectiveness

What makes someone effective, in personal ways? 

Obviously, there are a few things to unpack around such a question.  What, in fact, are we really talking about?

In general, we occasionally recognize someone who is just plain effective—at getting things done, at what they do, at who they are.  We might say, they have a way about them.  They move things forward, as a function of their resources (personality, organization, inter-personal style, instinct, etc.).  The net result often is that we feel drawn to them—their authenticity, their integrity, their winsomeness, whatever it is about them that we appreciate.

One of the things that I've been wondering about is, how much of this effectiveness is secured or leveraged by the person's sense of the parts of themselves that make them ineffective?  Is it all just pure instinctualness?  Or, is it also a function of what they have learned...about themselves, that frees up more of who they are naturally?  People who have healthy awareness of these kinds of things seem, at least in part, more effective because they don't create as many distractions for themselves (and others), as a function of their self-knowledge, self-regulation, self-development.

Results & Consequences

The problem is that results often occur before consequences.

Take business, for example; sometimes, you can make money faster than you can see some of the consequences of making that money.  When money is involved, one is generally not motivated to consider the consequences as much (or before) as the desired results.

As An Imperfection

Ever noticed...how often anger is viewed as an imperfection (if not a sin)?

The Motherly Love of a Wrathful God

What if, instead of ignoring the great theme of motherly compassion because we see some wrathful, vengeful, Old Covenant deity who is somehow not the same God revealed in Christ Jesus, our churches took a yearlong walking tour of these 150 occurrences and motherly compassion became a part of our steady nourishment from Scripture?

...our churches would become even more the places of welcome to broken humanity that God intends them to be. When we see every place in the Old Testament where God expresses motherly compassion—and the people of Israel follow suit—wouldn’t we be moved to get past our too-easy self-righteousness and past our too-easy denigration of enemies and to open our communities to all God’s children in compassionate welcome? Wouldn’t we be moved to protect the lives threatened by death in our cities and communities?

Maybe we would realize that we let first impressions mislead us and that the God of the Old Testament is more complex and vibrant and, well, motherly, than we knew. Maybe we would quit saying “God of the Old Testament” and simply say “our God.”  Continue here....

-- Robert Foster

Re-Opening from COVID-19

COVID-19 're-opening’ is happening—the question is, to what?

In the midst of the social distancing necessitated by this pandemic, people have nevertheless come together in creative and loving ways. Some have called this virus a massive “trigger event” with the potential to change everything. As individuals and communities, we can respond with justice and compassion, or we can double down on the pursuit of accumulation and power, with no more than a return to business as usual.

-- Richard Rohr

Alone

'Poem selection' for the week -- "Alone":

Lying, thinking
Last night
How to find my soul a home
Where water is not thirsty
And bread loaf is not stone
I came up with one thing
And I don't believe I'm wrong
That nobody,
But nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone.

There are some millionaires
With money they can't use
Their wives run round like banshees
Their children sing the blues
They've got expensive doctors
To cure their hearts of stone.
But nobody
No, nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Now if you listen closely
I'll tell you what I know
Storm clouds are gathering
The wind is gonna blow
The race of man is suffering
And I can hear the moan,
'Cause nobody,
But nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone.

-- Maya Angelou

Deepened

Wisdom is knowledge deepened by love.

-- IIia Delio

Sneaky Time

This is a sneaky time.

In other words, things are happening inside us that we don't recognize until they sometimes show up unannounced—these can be surprisingly bad or good.  An opportunity, either way.

Despair

Despair is the belief that tomorrow will be just like today.

-- Rob Bell

Understood

I've noticed...that I hardly ever feel understood, at least completely.

This doesn't feel to me like a complaint, as much as an observation.  It is more likely that it just isn't possible; even unreasonable...to expect of someone else.

This doesn't mean that no one understands me.  What is to be understood about us, is simply not the function of just one other person.

I believe I am well understood.  What stands out to me is how often I feel I am not.

More Accurate Reflection

One of the more confusing things about God are the people who say they believe in him:

Instagram: nakedpastor

Instagram: bobgoff

Our problem following Jesus is we're trying to be a better version of us, rather than a more accurate reflection of Him.

-- Bob Goff

Calm Also Has A Coefficient

Panic loves company.

And yet calm is our practical, efficient, rational alternative.

If you’re on a crowded plane and one person is freaking out about turbulence, the panic will eventually peter out. If, on the other hand, six people are freaking out, it’s entirely possible that it will spread and overtake the rest of the plane. Panic needs multiple nodes to spread.

The same is true with a cabin of 10-year-olds at summer camp. One homesick kid usually comes around and ends up enjoying the summer, because being surrounded by others who are okay makes us okay. But three or four homesick kids can change the entire dynamic.

While calm is a damping agent, it’s not nearly as effective at spreading itself as panic is.

The library is usually a quiet place because the dominant cultural narrative in the library is to be quiet. Because it’s dominant, the coefficient of its spread is sufficient to keep it that way. We have to expend effort to create environments of calm, because calm has a coefficient that can’t compete with panic when it comes to spreading.

And Twitter? Twitter has been engineered to maximize panic. Calm is penalized, panic is amplified. And if you are hanging out in real life with people who spend a lot of time on social media and news sites, you’ve invited all of those people into your circle as well.

We can find lots of reasons why fifty years of watching just three dominant TV networks wasn’t ideal. But the combination of oligopoly and the FCC meant that none of them spread panic. They weren’t built for it. When cable “news” showed up, they discovered that panic was a great way to make a profit. Not to make things better, simply to spread anger and fear.

If panic is helpful, of course you should bring it on. But it rarely is.

Instead:

Curate your incoming.

Stay off Twitter.

Do the work instead. Whatever needs doing most is better than panic.

Being up-to-date on the news is a trap and a scam. Five minutes a day is all you need.

-- Seth Godin, Calm also has a coefficient

For the Interim Time

There is a beauty in disruption—one that we often behold more in hindsight than in the moment, unless we can learn to see it differently:

Instagram: aaronieq

'Poem selection' for the week -- "For the Interim Time":

When near the end of day, life has drained
Out of light, and it is too soon
For the mind of night to have darkened things,
No place looks like itself, loss of outline
Makes everything look strangely in-between,
Unsure of what has been, or what might come.
In this wan light, even trees seem groundless.
In a while it will be night, but nothing
Here seems to believe the relief of darkness.
You are in the time of the imterim
Where everything seems withheld.
The path you took to get here has washed out;
The way forward is still concealed from you.
"The old is not old enough to have died away;
The new is still too young to b born." You
cannot lay claim to anything;
In this place of dusk,
Your eyes are blurred;
And there is no mirror.
Everyone else has lost sight of your heart
And you can see nowhere to put your trust;
You know yo have to make you own way
through.
As far as you can, hold your confidence.
Do not allow confusion to squander
This call which is loosening
Your roots in false ground,
That you might come free
From all you have outgrown.
What is being transfigured here in your mind,
And it is difficult and slow to become new.
The more faithfully you can endure here,
The more refined your heart will become
For your arrival in the new dawn.

-- John O'Donohue


It seems that it is only when what we are used to is taken away from us that we awaken to new possibilities, even if they were available all along.

-- Richard Rohr

Meaning Is Strength

In times of crisis, people reach for meaning. Meaning is strength. Our survival may depend on our seeking and finding it.

-- Viktor E. Frankl

Routine Disrupted

There appears to be a kind of comfort in routine.  So, it can be uncomfortable when routine is disrupted.  But, it seems, we invariably return to finding new patterns to re-establish routine, even if it is not the same.  While we like variation from time to time, predictability seems to be satisfying, too.

Are your routines changing during this COVID-19 period of disruption?  What other kinds of disruption have you experienced, that have led you to new routines?

How about this, what have your new routines allowed you to discover?

What They Want To Hear

Trust is built on telling the truth, not telling people what they want to hear.

-- Simon Sinek

This seems like a generally true maxim...and eerily timely for these days.

What Do You See?

Ever noticed...what's happening when one person sees a closed old gas station, while someone else sees a building with big doors to open and sell coffee and craft soda?

Seeing and vision can be two different things.  What factors influence the distinction the most?  Why do I see what I see?  What do you see?

Beat of the Sacred

Do we know that within each one of us is the unspeakably beautiful beat of the Sacred? Do we know that we can honor that Sacredness in one another and in everything that has being? And do we know that this combination—growing in awareness that we are bearers of Presence, along with a faithful commitment to honor that Presence in one another and in the earth—holds the key to transformation in our world?

-- John Philip Newell

Listening To The Youngest

When I was young I always deferred to people older than me and thought they knew better. And now, I feel like I'm learning more from people younger than me. It's like the whole idea of mentorship has been flipped on its head. I think we really have to be listening to the youngest members of our society right now because they do represent the future.

-- Bina Venkataraman

In April

'Poem selection' for the week -- "In April":

Again the woods are odorous, the lark 
Lifts on upsoaring wings the heaven gray
That hung above the tree-tops, veiled and dark, 
Where branches bare disclosed the empty day. 

After long rainy afternoons an hour 
Comes with its shafts of golden light and flings 
Them at the windows in a radiant shower, 
And rain drops beat the panes like timorous wings. 

Then all is still. The stones are crooned to sleep
By the soft sound of rain that slowly dies; 
And cradled in the branches, hidden deep
In each bright bud, a slumbering silence lies.

-- Rainer Maria Rilke

Perspectives

It is just true that other people have perspectives that are just as good as mine—some are even better.

OK.  So, what's your point...?

Not acknowledging this, by putting myself (or keeping myself) in a position where I don't experience how this is true, tends to lead to the conclusion that it isn't—and that is a problem.

Earth Day 2020 - Nature of Economy

It's the 50th anniversary of Earth Day—the cause that drew 20 million people into the streets.

This was not an anti-litter campaign.  This was talking about fundamental changes in the nature of the American economy, in some ways much more profoundly radical than the anti-Vietnam War movement.  

-- Denis Hayes

Continue here...:

Hurt Feelings

Hurt feelings don't vanish on their own.  They don't heal themselves.  If we don't express our emotions, they pile up like a debt that will eventually come due.

-- Marc Brackett

In Others

I've noticed...sometimes I can see more of myself, when I see myself in others.

When The Ego Weeps

When the ego weeps for what it has lost, the spirit rejoices for what it has found.

-- Sufi Proverb

Visual: Between

Visual - "Between":

Winona Lake, IN

The Age of Worry

...a delightful cover that has musically captured some of our family imagination these days.

COVID-19: The Way Americans Spend Their Money & Restarting the Economy

A fascinating piece on some of the economic impacts of COVID-19:

An Adieu

‘Poem for the week' -- "An Adieu" (it looks like it will take one more day before April in Indiana will give up its Winter's Sorrow):

Sorrow, quit me for a while!
    Wintry days are over;
Hope again, with April smile,
    Violets sows and clover.

Pleasure follows in her path,
    Love itself flies after,
And the brook a music hath
    Sweet as childhood’s laughter.

Not a bird upon the bough
    Can repress its rapture,
Not a bud that blossoms now
    But doth beauty capture.

Sorrow, thou art Winter’s mate,
    Spring cannot regret thee;
Yet, ah, yet—my friend of late—
    I shall not forget thee!

-- Florence Earle Coates

Moving Through Us

Human Solidarity:

I am not alone in my tiredness or sickness or fears, but at one with millions of others from many centuries, and it is all part of life. 

-- Etty Hillesum 


It can be tempting when we are afraid, in grief, in stress, or ill, to experience our bodies as a liability, a vulnerability, or the place of pain.  But we have a choice in those moments to also experience our bodies as the place of divine "yes".  To see creation taking form as we move our hands across a page to make an image, pick up an instrument, write a poem, dance in our living rooms or on our balconies, or bake bread, we are reminded that God is moving through us, this flesh, in every moment.  While fear closes us up, makes us freeze or flee, creativity and expression keeps us open, soft, receptive.  When we are open, we can say Yes to the Holy moving through us, but we can also find a way to release things that could otherwise stay stuck inside.  Whatever you do today, may you feel God moving through you. And if that isn't the case, may you know that others can experience you that way, and believe it for you, even if you can't seem to feel that about yourself.

-- Hillary McBride

Knowing some about her holocaust diaries, adds dimension for me to Etty Hillesum's observation above.  Hillary McBride brings into perspective what I think it takes to survive (anything) in a healthy way.

Experience

Experience is our best teacher—the question is, what are we learning?

What are we learning, right now?  Time (or times like this) is not something just to get through, to some imagined better state in the future.  Time is something to be in right now.

If we aren't present to now, our teacher is ineffective, because we aren't actually experiencing this time—we are simply rushing through it (or, just waiting for it to be over).

Not Our Abilities

It is not our abilities that show who we really are, it is our choices.

-- Albus Dumbledore

Andrea Bocelli: Music For Hope

...sometimes music just shoots right through (whether you understand the words or not).

Easter: Jesus’ Resurrection

The larger-than-life, spiritually transformed people I have met have all died before they died.

It is true that you are going to die, and yet:

“neither death nor life . . . nothing can ever come between us and the love of God.”

-- Romans 8:38-39

Every small death in my life, has enlarged me.


Nothing is the same forever, says modern science. Ninety-eight percent of our bodies’ atoms are replaced every year. Geologists, with good evidence over millennia, can prove that no landscape is permanent. Water, fog, steam, and ice are all the same thing but at different stages and temperatures. “Resurrection” is another word for change, but particularly positive change—which we tend to see only in the long run. In the short run, change often looks like death. The Preface to the Catholic funeral liturgy says, “Life is not ended, but merely changed.” Science is now giving us helpful language for what religion rightly intuited and imaged with mythological language. Myth does not mean “not true,” which is the common misunderstanding; it actually refers to things that are always and deeply true!

God could not wait for modern science to give history hope. It was enough to believe that Jesus “was raised from the dead,” somehow planting the hope and possibility of resurrection in our deepest unconscious. Jesus’ incarnate life, his passing over into death, and his resurrection into the ongoing Christ life is the archetypal model for the entire pattern of creation. He is the microcosm for the whole cosmos, or the map of the whole journey, in case you need or want one.

Nowadays most folks do not seem to think they need that map, especially when they are young. But the vagaries and disappointments of life’s journey eventually make us long for some overall direction, purpose, or goal beyond getting through another day. All who hold any kind of unexplainable hope believe in resurrection, whether they are formal Christians or not, and even if they don’t believe Jesus was physically raised from the dead. I have met such people from all kinds of backgrounds, religious and nonreligious.

Personally, I do believe in the physical resurrection of Jesus because it affirms what the whole physical and biological universe is also saying—and grounds it in one personality. Resurrection must also be fully practical and material. If matter is inhabited by God, then matter is somehow eternal, and when the creed says, we believe in the “resurrection of the body,” it means our bodies too, not just Jesus’ body! As in him, so also in all of us. As in all of us, so also in him. So I am quite conservative and orthodox by most standards on this important issue, although I also realize it seems to be a very different kind of embodiment post-resurrection as suggested by the Gospel accounts.

-- Richard Rohr


Christianity can help us realize that death and resurrection are part of the evolutionary path toward wholeness; letting go of isolated existence for the sake of deeper union. Something dies but something new is born—which is why the chaos of our times is, in a strange way, a sign of hope; something new is being born within. Out of chaos, a star is born. Breakdown can be break through if we recognize a new pattern of life struggling to emerge.

-- Ilia Delio

Holy Saturday: Smashing Idols Through Pain

On what might have to (symbolically) be the darkest day of the year, Holy Saturday; a metaphor for the times in our lives when all hope seems dashed. There is, though often undetectable, something still very much alive—something we can only learn through what seems like death.

Divine Solidarity:

Instagram: aaronieq

If I will trust that what comes to me in life is for me, not against me...it breaks my idols, my isolation, my sense of independence.

-- Barbara Brown Taylor

Holy Friday: Suffering

On Holy Friday (original meaning of the 'good' in Good Friday), a reminder—even as much as we try to avoid it...suffering IS the path to transformation:

For more on the thoughts referenced above for each day noted, click here....


And then, there is T.S. Eliot's version...The Sharp Compassion.

"Take your time...it's not your fault...there's no rush."

Dear friends, look at the real heroes who come to light in these days: they are not famous, rich and successful people; rather, they are those who are giving themselves in order to serve others.

-- Pope Francis

Instagram: kellycorrigan

"Take your time...it's not your fault...there's no rush."

Unwelcome

About a year ago, I experienced a little of what it feels like to be unwelcome.

I have to admit, I’d never known what that feels like, at a pervasively social level.  ...that says something, in and of itself (about me or, at least, my experience).

Unwelcomed-ness comes in many forms, but one of the most demoralizing is when it comes from those in power.  Because power, theoretically, should be the resource that is needed to enable the good that should be happening.  Too often, though, it is used for the opposite effect.

Often, institutions have power.  And, people often use power given to them by institutions.  And, sometimes those same people used to be friends.

Power can be maintained in a number of ways—based the color of your skin, the way you act, the way you talk, or just the way you look. But, perhaps most significantly—often in religious contexts (spiritual or otherwise)—it is maintained based on what you believe.

Does God make us feel welcome because of what we believe?  Didn't God love us 'while we were yet sinners'?  Why, then, would introducing 'unwelcome' based on belief after-the-fact feel like a necessary thing to do?  But, it often is.  And, unfortunately, the church often simply borrows the same methods of control, as society does, through the use of power—through the use of the social-power of a group.

I am sure that my experience of 'unwelcome' pales in significance compared to its many more brutal forms.  And, I am also sure that I have been complicit at times by extending it to others myself.  The memory of my experience of unwelcome towards me still lingers today...affecting how I view myself and impacting how I think about (treat) others.  Recognizing this, I am trying to allow it to reveal to me how I perpetuate unwelcome-ness.

Because, you are 'Unwelcome' here...is not the way of love.

LT: Dirty Hands

Leadership is a not a fancy quote, an academic understanding, or something you just talk about; it is something you actually do...on a daily basis.

Leaders don't just show up once in a while, for a few minutes when it's convenient.  People not only see leadership, they feel it—it is something they know because the leader is in the fray...doing the work of it, with them.

If there's dirt involved, a leader's hands have mud all over them.

More True

Ever noticed...that volume doesn't make things more true?

...neither does repetition.

...neither does passion.

...though, all of these can be used to drawn attention to what is true.

Completely Worth It

Instagram: sarcasticlutheran

And this is it.  This is the life we get here on earth.  We get to give away what we receive.  We get to believe in each other.  We get to forgive and be forgiven.  We get to love imperfectly.  And we never now what effect it will have for years to come.  And all of it...all of it is completely worth it.

-- Nadia Bolz-Weber

Epic Cell Phone Choir

Some Good News

Moods and Actions

The way we feel can be triggered by outside events.

And that can change how we act.

And the way we act can reinforce how we feel.

Of course, the opposite is true as well, and far more in our active control.

How we act always changes how we feel.

This is a perfect moment for upskilling. For a sprint in learning something that’s difficult to learn. Not because a teacher or a boss made us do it, but because we chose to. Not only do we get to keep that skill forever, but the act of taking control and expending the effort will change our mood.

And this is the perfect moment for generous connection. Going way beyond the news of the day, we have the chance to create intimate digital interactions that last.

It’s a significant posture shift, one which might change who you see when you look in the mirror.

We might not be able to do anything about external events, but we have control over our actions. Sometimes, it’s hard to stare right into that opportunity, because it comes with a lot of responsibility.

What will you learn today? Who will you teach?

-- Seth Godin, Moods and actions

...emphasis added.

Why vs What

Those who know WHAT they do tend to work harder. Those who know WHY tend to work smarter.

-- Simon Sinek

Finish Line, Q1 2020 - Whew!

Remember all this?

Ninety days ago we stepped into a new decade arguing over whether it was actually a new decade. Today, we’re in a much different world. As Q1 2020 reached the finish line, let’s take a collective breath and rewind:

January 
President Trump ordered a strike killing Iran's top commander, Qassem Soleimani. Oil prices and geopolitical tensions soared then fizzled out.

BlackRock CEO Larry Fink said the asset manager is doubling down on confronting climate change, a watershed moment for the environment's role in business decisions.

Trump signed a "phase one" trade deal with China, calming two years of tensions, as well as a North American trade deal. The U.K. finally Brexited. And China locked down 56 million people as the coronavirus spread. 

Kobe Bryant's surprise death on Jan. 26 united grieving fans from all over the world. 

February
The Iowa caucuses were a technological disaster. Tesla went on a stock run for the ages. Feb. 7, the Fed said coronavirus could pose a risk to the U.S. economy. 

Facebook changed its political ad policies in the wake of Bloomberg memegate. Weinstein was convicted. And Bob Iger abruptly stepped down as Disney CEO. 

By late February, China was slowly getting back to work after many weeks of quarantine, while the U.S. prepared for an outbreak.

March
Joe Biden took the lead in the Democratic primary, while competitors like Pete Buttigieg and Elizabeth Warren ended their campaigns.

Saudi Arabia started an oil price war, and the U.S. began acutely feeling the coronavirus. Companies started WFH. Sports were canceled. Universities closed. Trump's Oval Office address sent travelers scurrying home from Europe. 

In an emergency move to save the economy, the Fed cut rates half a percentage point. March 9, a stock plunge tripped the circuit breaker. Two days later, the Dow entered a bear market. March 16, it logged an almost 3,000 point loss. 

By mid-March, the private sector had mobilized into a wartime economy. Nonessential businesses were closing. 3.3 million Americans filed for unemployment in a week. And the government passed a record $2.2 trillion stimulus package.

Looking ahead...with 2.8+ billion people around the world under some kind of lockdown, many of us will experience Q2 from our living rooms.

-- Morning Brew

USNS Comfort

The USNS Comfort sailed into New York Harbor on yesterdayin the best grand entrance since Willy Wonka. The Navy's hospital ship, home to 1,000 beds and 1,200 medical staff, will be used to relieve some of the COVID-19 strain on the city's healthcare system. It will be treating patients today.

-- New York Times

De-sensitized

I've noticed...that it is rare for me to be de-sensitized to just one thing.

Reach The Divine

It is not in perfection that we reach the divine, but through the gateway of our mistakes and our suffering.

-- Mirabai Starr

Forgive Us Our Sins (And Theirs, Too)

As much as we’d like to believe that Jesus is the author of our Right Christian and Wrong Christian distinctions, we can’t because it is simply untrue. By pursuing us with great tenacity in spite of our differences with him, he shows us that he doesn’t have need for those distinctions.

-- Christena Cleveland


It’s never been easy for followers of Jesus to embrace that we’re all part of the same big family. And today, Christians who strike us as exhibiting un-Christlike behavior have a constant public platform on social media and elsewhere online. The power of their voices in shaping society’s understanding of the church makes us want to distance ourselves and scream that WE are not THEM.

What do we do when we know we’re called to unity but feel justifiably outraged by our brothers and sisters? How can we keep the peace and our integrity at the same time? And how do we hold the tension of addressing the shortcomings of others while at the same time remembering our own?

Entire movements and countless church plants trace their origins to a moment when insurmountable differences seemed to call for breaking fellowship. Today, we are at another cultural flashpoint, where divisions within the faith are particularly severe. And God-fearing people of all persuasions are certain they hold the moral high ground.

...

You do not have to read very much of the text to recognize the prayer as a confession. Daniel finds just about every way imaginable to ask for forgiveness. And he fully identifies himself with his people: We have sinned. We have rebelled. We have not listened. We have done wrong. We have been wicked. We have transgressed. We have turned away. We have been unfaithful. We have refused to obey. We have not sought the Lord. We have not turned from our sins. We have not given attention to your truth.  Continue here....

-- Jeff Peabody