Why do we fear Beauty? Because Beauty points us to God. Beauty is a window to the transcendent. It stops you, affects you, speaks to your heart. Beauty is dangerous. Beauty is not prettiness. Prettiness is decorative. Beauty is more. What’s the difference? It’s the difference between standing on a hillside watching a sunset with…
What is a Status Symbol?
What is a status symbol? It is an item which you value because you own it, not because you use it. Let’s unpack that… We determine an item’s value based on a number of concrete factors including the cost of materials, the cost of the labor (which includes both expertise and number of people-hours), and…
Year In Review: Rosh Hashanah 2023
As someone whose faith tradition lacks much in the way of a liturgical year, I am drawn to the Jewish holidays. They are, after all, the ones set forth in the Bible. Extreme Protestantism leaves one a bit bereft… we don’t do Lent or Advent or Saint’s Days. Easter and Christmas, that’s it. (I have…
Leaving Laodicea
Coming October 1, 2023 Laodicea is a worldview that values the rat-race over connection. It’s a physical location that makes it hard to participate in community even if we want to. Laodicea has its hooks in all of us. We know that what we’re doing isn’t working. We read the statistics about loneliness being more…
When Chaos Comes Calling
Chaos is calling. And she will be answered. We have been too long civilized, too long dependent on things. We have forgotten the tales we were told at Mother’s knee, tales about love and valor and miracles. Our dreams are of control, shaped out of plastic and spit out of a machine – one size…
Doing Vs. Being
The chrysalis time continues. I had thought I had emerged, that my wings were going to grow and dry in the sun. Now I realize that the nature of the transformation to which I was called is something entirely different. My transformation was not a transformation of actions. My transformation was a transformation of self….
Emerging from the Chrysalis
Emerging from the chrysalis, the butterfly is weak, her wings wet. In the struggle to exit the chrysalis, the wings are strengthened, but she must still sit and fan them, slowly drying them and expanding them to their full potential. She knows herself to be transformed, but yet is not ready to fly. It comes…
Midlife Crisis and Rework
A midlife crisis is such a trite thing to go through, but there are seasons in life that are meant to give us pause. It becomes time to redirect our efforts and rework our lives. I have been given the privilege, as I approach my 50th birthday, to take a season off of my ordinary…
Transparency is not Vulnerability
No one wants to be vulnerable to the general public, and I’d absorbed the idea that transparency = vulnerability. Recent events have forced me to confront this notion, and I’ve come to the conclusion that I was wrong – transparency is not vulnerability. To see something is not to have the ability to harm it….
Cycle of Seasons
Cycles of seasons compose our lives. Each season has its cycle, its beginning, its end. Each group of seasons is composed of seasons of rest, of productivity, of beauty, of silence. This cycle of seasons is there for all to observe, but we ignore what is before us to pursue what “should be”. In the…