Religare

  Religare I enter a vacant room through which energy flows in a web around an empty earthly hemisphere a cathedral without walls or roof   a room humming with anticipation and I ask to the emptiness,   What is about to happen here?   And the flagstones rumble with laughter and the light moving…

Desert

Listen to me read the poem here I stood at home and wept. I wept at the sight of hostas and Queen Anne’s lace    and petunias and lambs’ ears    that grew    while I was in the desert. I wept in gratitude for rain I did not see or hear    or feel on…

Meditation for the Religion Section of my Local Newspaper

Meditation for the Religion Section of my Local Newspaper …and here’s a link to the hymn I reference, if you’re interested…

Glimpse of Glory

When my parents were missionaries in Japan, they had colleagues that ran the gamut from liberal Presbyterians to conservative Southern Baptists, and while there were lots of differences, one that seemed most obvious  to my teenaged perspective was the differences when it came to alcohol. My parents enjoyed wine and beer, and always tucked little…

Christmas Crisis?

Throughout Advent, I will be sharing songs and images that connect to each Sunday’s lectionary text. This week, the song is “The Trumpet Child,” by Over the Rhine. The image is “The Last Trumpet (recto); Two studies of a right eye, a profile of an open-mouthed young man, the head of an eagle, and the…

Reflections

Reflections This Dallas-based photographer has a lovely series of photos that explore both the way we see ourselves, and the history behind the lives of people we think we know. I think it is beautiful.

Spirituality & Practice:A Litany for All Saints Day, by Mary Lou Kownacki, OSB

This prayer for All Saints Day names historical figures that have certainly been saints in my life, and it also challenges me to go out and learn more, dig more deeply, into the life and works of some of the “saints” I know less about. Here’s a sample: Through Harriet Tubman, prophet and pilgrim, you…

In the Picture

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/allison-tate/mom-pictures-with-kids_b_1926073.html?utm_hp_ref=fb&src=sp&comm_ref=false   This mother expresses a common aversion to being photographed, and how she is learning to overcome it for the sake of her kids. Beauty, beauty, beauty. And thanks to my sister-in-law for posting this to Facebook!

The Metropolitan Museum of Art – Quilt Top, Crazy pattern

Need more beauty? Visit metmuseum.com and explore the hundreds of pieces they have available to view on-line. It won’t compare to wandering around the museum, itself, but on a rainy day, it will do. The Metropolitan Museum of Art – Quilt Top, Crazy pattern. If you click on the above link, and then choose the…

Soul Beauty

In a world where too much ugliness happens every day–much of it on the internet for millions of eyes to see–let’s take a moment and celebrate how one young woman has transformed a moment of ugliness into one of beauty. It all started when this photo, taken without the subject’s knowledge, was posted on a…

Andre Muniz Gonzaga Dalata

This Brazilian artist’s flickr page is a treasure trove of graffiti-style public art.

Outer Space

Here’s a little extraterrestrial beauty for your day