Some people live their faith as if it were a mathematical abstraction. You’d think they’d never seen a star Or held a hand Or walked with a child. They live as if God Was a problem They thought they had solved— As if the answer were enough. There’s a world out there, A world we were put into, Not...

I am a Martha with a stick up her sense of piety. Every day that my stomach boils regarding My naked fingers and impressions on paper, I tell myself that He has covered me With His wings. But I know that I’ve already plucked them bare And eaten them for dinner, Smothered with the same honey that I’ve...

I am passionate about yummy foods. Naturally, out of this passion comes this love of cooking and baking; from that comes a love of teaching others how to cook. I often find myself in my apartment with a couple of younger ladies gathered around my kitchen table poring over recipes. I’m teaching...

Some middle-aged woman painted the room placed journals and pens, incense fumes, white candles, cassette tapes, every kind of crucifix, an old recliner that no longer fit her aesthetic. If only God were a door or a summer beach or a wise animal, a cottage we could enter, wiping our feet, smell of pomegranates,...

My journey on this relationship with God has been, well, a bit rocky. There’s been a battle inside me, one that rages and then goes dormant. But time after time it continues to rear its ugly head. I’ve never had to question why bad things happen to good people until they started happening...

Your much-loved, much-lauded, beautiful son finally marries the love of his life, but despite your pride and delight, you can’t brag on him or his new partner to any of your friends at church. Because the love of his life is actually a man. What do you do? You hide. Your daughter moves out into her...

  “I could buy you a drink/ I could tell you all about it/ I could tell you why I doubt it/ and why I still believe.”—Pedro the Lion I like to think that I’m in a good place spiritually right now. I go to a church where the newly elected pastor is a woman, and the director of music is gay....

“An amateur thinks it’s really funny if you dress a man up as an old lady, put him in a wheelchair, and give the wheelchair a push that sends it spinning down a slope towards a stone wall. For a pro, it’s got to be a real old lady.”—Groucho Marx Comedy and faith have a lot of...

Are you a warrior or a worrier? It might just be an accident of language, but warrior and worrier seem to be mutually exclusive if not polar opposites. A warrior, in any context, is disciplined, diligent, and single-minded. Worrying is, at best, unproductive, but at its worst – and most common –...

As I look outside my window At the gently shifting green leaves Against the coolness of the morning sky I realize that this Is the story of my whole life, This looking out, This reaching out, And sometimes, this moving out. It is as if I am always longing For what is just out of reach But I am being...