religion
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How do you write your sermons?
Every now and again, someone asks me about my process for writing sermons. This question usually gets me pretty excited. I studied the creative process in graduate school and seminary, I like thinking about the theology of creativity, and like most… Continue reading
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Holding as prayer
Just before my first daughter was born, a friend gave me a small book called “Holding your baby.” It was a book of prayer and devotions to be read by a parent in the first days of their lives. It… Continue reading
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Writing fiction with the Holy Spirit
This afternoon I came home to find something very exciting waiting for me at my front door: a print copy of my second fiction book. The book is still in draft form and needs a heavy edit, and so I… Continue reading
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The tooth fairy and a longing for Heaven
The other day, in our evening prayer time, our youngest daughter prayed that the Tooth Fairy is real. She has her first “wiggle tooth”, and she has that beautiful combination of anxiety and joy at something new that children have about… Continue reading
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Red-tinted conifers and the darkness of God
When I was in high school, I hated going to church. It’s not that I wasn’t Christian, though I have to say that it wasn’t until college of when teaching abroad that I really gave honest, mature thought to the… Continue reading
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The Death and Rebirth of Writing
Conversion is never one hundred percent. We always bring something with us when we make a change (or changes are made) to our lives. To put it into even more Christian language, the death and resurrection that we experience in… Continue reading
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Studying just one thing for a while
Before I was ordained a priest, I studied and taught language and literature, specifically rhetorical writing and medieval poetry. As a teacher and a student, I had a lot to read: from students’ papers to long, narrative poems like Beowulf… Continue reading
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Touching Icons
When I first saw an icon, I immediately wanted to touch it. At the time, I was a graduate student at the University of Oregon, studying medieval poetry and, specifically, medieval myths about creativity. There is an art museum on… Continue reading
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Pockets full of candy (or not)
When I was a kid, our advent calendar was full of candy. That was enough for me. The calendar itself was a length of felt. Its color was off-white, something like the background color of this blog. There were rows… Continue reading
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Praying with(out) my wife
Recently, I asked someone if he wanted to be a Eucharistic Minister and help me distribute Communion at the Altar. The person politely declined, noting that he wanted to be with his wife in the pew. This made sense to… Continue reading
Incense and Crayons 