Seeking Authentic Voice

 A reflection on the readings for Proper 13C: ( Hosea 11:1-11; Luke 12:13-21)                         My recent trip to Salt Lake City included several days attending a stewardship conference called TENS, The Episcopal Network for Stewardship. If you have spent much time at conferences you know that there is no guarantee that the conference will be good or that it will satisfy your needs. This one was a mixed bag of information, some very good, other parts not so much. After the conference I spent about a week with my family. I was born in Salt Lake City and still have many family members who live there. My family gathered to celebrate the life of my brother David, who died in April.  We buried him in a cemetery on the side of the mountain in Salt Lake City, where my grandparents, an aunt, and my mother are buried. Elsewhere in that cemetery many a...

Our Friday Five is very simple today. Share five ways you've learned to care for yourself when life becomes overwhelming. What does the pastor do after a rough day in the office, or at meetings, or at a bedside, or even, in the pulpit? Share your best five self-care strategies, and, with any luck, we all will learn at least one or two new ones. 1. Yoga. I walk to a local yoga studio and take a yoga class four or five times a week. Yoga has for many years been one of my primary go-to's for self care.The classes I am taking now can be really strenuous but I feel amazing afterward: stronger, more centered, focused, peaceful. A few weeks ago I practiced yoga while on vacation in the Uinta's (mountains east of Salt Lake City, Utah), looking out over trees, a river, and the mountains. (See photo above). 2. Walking. I walk for exercise. I am blessed to live in a town where I can walk most any place I need or want to go - and I do. I walk to process life and think. ...

A reflection on the readings for Proper 12C : Hosea 1:2-10; Luke 11:1-13 Mechtild of Magdeburg, who lived in the thirteenth century, was the first German woman to write poetry and spiritual texts in Middle-High-German instead of Latin. Little is known about her except that she must have been of noble descent. Her adult life was spent with a group of unmarried women who lived together caring for the poor and the sick. Mechthild lived first in Magedeburg and then at a convent in Helfta. Here is one of her poems: How God speaks to the Soul And God said to the soul: I desired you before the world began. I desire you now As you desire me. And where the desires of two come together There love is perfected God speaking into the souls of human beings and in and through us is at the heart of our readings this morning. These earthy, bodily focused readings point us beyond ourselves to God who is ever faithful and always present. In the Hosea reading ...

When I was in seminary I was “invited” by one of my theology professors to partake in a tutorial. The purpose of this tutorial was to teach me how to write as an academic. I was not the only student given this opportunity -   several other, older, women students were also invited to tutorials. I agreed and was assigned to work with a kind, brilliant, slightly younger male student. He taught me the essential components of academic writing comprised primarily of never using the word “I” and always writing in a formal, technical manner that made no reference to personal experience. After a few sessions I grasped the gist of this genre of writing and proceeded with my seminary career, earning mostly A’s and a few B’s. Nonetheless, writing in that formal academic style has never been my forte. I am a person grounded in the experiential. I process life through my feelings, my body, my instincts, and my learned knowledge. I need to engage all my sensibilities to assess life and faith...