December 16, 2018

  I’ve started taking Tuesdays as my Sabbath, and while there’s lots of reasons why I’ve made this shift, one of the biggest is so that I can spend more time hiking.  It’s my time to check-in with God.  I realized recently that my prayer life has been centering a lot on important things; each […]

Read More

November 25, 2018

  I spent my summers during college working at Suttle Lake United Methodists Camp in Sisters, Oregon.  It’s in the cascade mountains, right off the Pacific Crest Trail.  Suttle lake is a beautiful Moraine Lake.  It was formed when a glacier, flowing off hthe nearby Mount Washington, gouged out a shockingly deep valley, three miles […]

Read More

November 18, 2018

  Sometimes it is surprisingly simple to be the Church.  It’ doesn’t cost a lot some days; a few hours, some hot cocoa mix, folks bring a few freshly picked apples, a bag of oranges, and we reuse our coloring tablecloths, a few favorite games, and a kickball.  I’ve got a whole room full of […]

Read More

November 11, 2018

Maryland Presbyterian Church, it is a joy to be with you this morning. I have known a few of you from the very first day I moved to Baltimore a year and a half ago. My first official day on the job ended with a McCabe camp partners meeting. Whether it’s in a park off […]

Read More

November 4, 2018

Each Week at the Camas Outdoor Center, I thought about the legacy of our ancestors.  Each week, we remembered the legacy of those long past, and dreamed about the community that might be formed and reformed in the week ahead.  In the spring and summer of 2009, I was on staff at the Camas Outdoor […]

Read More

October 21, 2018

 This past week, I’ve been reading Dare to Lead: Brave Work. Tough Conversations. Whole Hearts by Brené Brown.  She’s an incredibly inspiring author and researcher on shame, belonging, and vulnerability, whose TED talks have launched a movement for people from US Presidents to Fortune 500 CEO’s to Rocket Scientists and Pastors to be more vulnerable […]

Read More

October 14, 2018

During World War II the aerial bombardments of the German blitzkrieg and the decimation caused by the Allies carpet bombing orphaned massive numbers of children, whose homes were also destroyed.  Refugee camps and orphanages were set up across Europe, and their staffs worked hard to make sure children had plenty of fresh air and space to play, nutritious meals and loving adults.  But at night, …

Read More

October 7, 2018

    Next week, Eric and I will celebrate our second wedding anniversary.  Our tradition on our anniversaries is to go out to dinner, and check-in with each other.  It’s a Frank discussion we think of as our own state of the union.  We reflect on the past year of marriage, to see what we […]

Read More

September 30, 2018

R-E-S-P-E-C-T . Was there ever in our lifetime a voice that so lifted our hearts into the heavens? Aretha Franklin, seen in giant photos of America’s newspapers recently…

Read More

September 23, 2018

Last Wednesday, while I was setting up for our Examen Happy Hour out by the labyrinth, I noticed the first falling leaves.  Their slow dance to the grown made it feel real that it has been a year since I moved to Baltimore.  That evening, while I was walking the winding path of the Labyrinth, […]

Read More