Bewilderment
We enter this week before Christmas telling the story, beginning with these simple words: This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about.* I am struck by how ordinary (i.e., messy) is the start of the life of a Messiah. Messy in that it is not what we expect, not all that tidy and neat, and […]
The Joy of Anticipation – Dec. 16, 2022
“Advent is a period of preparation for Christmas but, unlike Lent, it is not a period of penance. It is a period that focuses us on joy. We prepare ourselves to understand the full adult meaning of the feast. We come to realize more each year how great are our blessings, how beautiful is a life lived in […]
Signs That God Is with Us – Dec. 14, 2022
“It is one thing to make a pilgrimage to the desert to find God. It is entirely another to be open to finding God where we are… Life is not an exercise in spiritual gymnastics. It is one long, unending attempt to put on the mind of God wherever we are, whatever happens to us […]
What Did I Expect?
When I agreed to follow Jesus, I had no idea what I was getting into. I was forty years old, and had spent most of my life alternately yearning for and avoiding a deeper relationship with God. When I was in my early teens, I went to a Jewish summer camp in the San Bernardino […]
