Why an Episcopal Church, some people have asked me, and the simple answer is ‘because of Madeleine L’Engle’. But the actual answer involves Lauren Winner, Phyllis Tickle, Sara Miles, and Barbara Brown Taylor, a messy year, random Twitter conversations, and a blog post by a Pentecostal preacher. How can I describe what reading books and seeing a…
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church
And Now, A Story
Pastor-Kings and Servant Leaders
“I didn’t go to religion to make me happy. I always knew a bottle of Port would do that. If you want a religion to make you feel really comfortable, I certainly don’t recommend Christianity.”- C.S. Lewis Sometimes Christian leadership feels like God is continually handing us Sauls, saying, ‘you wanted a leader,…
When On-Fire Ends in Embers
Though it pales in comparison To the overarching shadows, A speck of light can reignite the sun And swallow darkness whole. – Sleeping At Last He said “ Many of those stories highlight the bad parts of growing up evangelical.” And he’s right. My best memories and most formative moments happened over 9 summers…
We Wanted the Fire to Be Popular
Shedding A Faith
I have been formed by a culture of newness. Even my existence is a testimony to the strength of the Shepherding Movement, and the only dead theologians I knew of until I was an adult were C.S. Lewis and Martin Luther. It was my two years at a Lutheran school that cemented the belief…
True Womanhood – Tension, Cracks, and a Concrete Faith
“Gender displays God…..Who we are and how we relate as women and men is an object lesson.” “Being created for someone indicates that God created the female to be a highly relational creature. Her identity isn’t based on work nearly as much as on how well she connects in her relationships….We need to keep…
True Womanhood – Affirming Female Ordination?
One of the things I dislike most about fundamentalism is that it automatically pits people against each other. I hate that the premise of this study is, if you don’t agree, you don’t have the truth, and your faith in Jesus is questioned. “…knowing those truths, and they are truths, about biblical womanhood, how…
True Womanhood – Death to Certainty
Looking For Trampoline Faith
The first metaphor to challenge my theological views was one of brick walls and trampoline springs. I find myself, all these years later, still longing for springs on a Sunday morning. Churches usually don’t acknowledge different perspectives and interpretations (unless it’s to say how wrong they are), let alone teach them. When you discover…