I know that Doug and many other preachers do not follow the lectionary. But for me, especially when I was preaching every Sunday, I found the lectionary a useful discipline. And relevant for today, fo...  Read More

Years ago my friend Dean Thompson told me the story of his visit with a parishioner of his, a professor from Cal Tech.  The man in the hospital was dying of AIDS.  He asked Dean to rehearse his faith ...  Read More

There is a wonderful, perhaps apocryphal, story among preachers that crystallizes the way in which we sometimes misuse scripture in our preaching.  It is about a preacher who reads a text about Paul t...  Read More

I appreciated Doug’s comments about Trinity in this week’s Chapel Bell. And while I don’t want to focus on the theological concept today, I do want us to keep in mind one aspect of Trinity – that of t...  Read More

Move 1 Origin Stories – More Benchmarks than HistoryAnniversaries and holidays are often anchored with stories of how it all began. Anthropologists call these “origin stories.” For marriages we f......  Read More

Most of my evenings end reading in my study.  I can never read a single book at a time so there are usually three or four books stacked on the wide windowsill by my old mission style rocking chair.  I...  Read More

Do you ever have one of those days?  You go to pour the milk for your cereal only to discover the carton is empty.  There is a fender bender traffic jam on the 64 and you are late getting to the offic...  Read More

Anybody worried about what I am going to do with this text?  I know, me too  It feels like only Anne Peacock could do something productive with all this endless talk of grain.  But let’s see how we do...  Read More

There is a topic I can make fifty arguments for and fifty arguments against each and every day.  Depending on the day and which way the wind blows I can land on one side or the other.  So, what is thi...  Read More

I wasn’t there, but I heard that Mark Davis made quite the “to do” about his high school graduation. He ascended the stairs to the stage in the gym. He received his diploma, he shook hands with the pr...  Read More

I have always loved the comic “Calvin and Hobbes” by Bill Watterson.  For those of you unfamiliar with it, it tells the story of a remarkably precocious, spiky-haired six-year-old boy named Calvin and...  Read More

“Spirit is life like a river unafraid of becoming the sea.”  These words are scripted in gold at the top of a thirty foot tall painting of a luminous and numinous, flowing river displayed in the sculp...  Read More