Streets to Dwell In
Pledging Our Troth
Behaving, Believing, Belonging
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It is astonishing how certain human bonds are able to transcend time and place. Early one year, my brother Chuck made contact—on the Internet, no less—with a long lost relative in Iceland. As genealogists reckon relationships, Kiddi is our second cousin once removed; in the simpler reckoning of the American South, he might be called a “kissing cousin.”
From Your Minister
Ambiguity
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What are you? Are you a man? A woman? Person of color? Are you straight or gay, able or disabled, citizen, immigrant, settler? Are you legal or illegal? Do you belong here?
Where is it documented? Your birth certificate, in your skin, on your wheelchair, the shape of your hips, or your DNA—does it have a US stamp of approval? Tell me, what are you?
Belonging
Whose Are You?
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Whose are you?
Who carries you in their heart, thinks of you, whether you think of them or not? Read more →
Becoming a Military Wife
I am a military wife.
This is an identity I never anticipated claiming. The daughter of a father who was drafted during Vietnam, I have not always held the military in the highest esteem. Even when I worked at the VA with veterans of all ages, I did not envision myself as married to a servicemember in a million years! I have always respected military servicemembers, and appreciated their service. But to be honest, I really had no interest in being part of that system! And yet, years later, I claim this identity with admiration and appreciation for my spouse and her commitment to service as a Captain in the United States Air Force Reserve.
Life works in mysterious ways, and is constantly stretching me. When I fell in love with Susan, it became clear that the military would become part of my life. While this is not always easy, I know that her status as a “future-minister’s wife” is no walk in the park either! But each of us feels called to our vocations, and it is amazing to have a partner who understands what it feels like to be called. And, as a friend of mine described perfectly, it is a voluntary military and a voluntary marriage. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t want to be.
The Company We Keep: Hospitality and Mutuality
Moral communities in which roles of host and guests are not tightly defined but allow for mutuality are communities that recognize a multiplicity of gifts.
—Christine Pohl, Making Room: Recovering Hospitality as a Christian Tradition, (1999) p.122
Often in religious community we speak of nurturing diversity as welcoming. When we use the language of welcome, we are embracing the language of hospitality. When you think of hospitality, are you most comfortable as guest or as a host? How comfortable are you with being both stranger/guest and host at the same time? How easy is for you and your community to move fluidly between those roles?
Radical hospitality makes room for and is grounded in:
- the generous care of every person’s gifts,
- the belief that every person has gifts worthy of and necessary to the flourishing faithful community, and
- the commitment to answer the calling of each other’s gifts into the life of service, worship, leadership, membership, and spiritual growth.
To Be Seen
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Every particle of the world is a mirror,
In each atom lies the blazing light of a thousand suns.
In the pupil of the eye, an endless heaven.
—Islamic mystic, Mahmud Shabistari Read more →
