I first became intrigued by David Brooks when he provided the conservative commentary on the PBS NewsHour. I didn’t always agree with him but I always admired his thoughtfulness and the kindness that he exhibited to his dialogue partners. Later I became acquainted with his written words  appearing in The …

God’s heart was grieved. God looked around at the wickedness of humankind and saw that human hearts were filled with evil. And God was sorry that God had made them. (Genesis 6: 5-11) In the  first chapters of  Genesis, we read about the beauty of God’s creation: rivers, mountains, birds, …

At the beginning, women had no voice in the church. The board was exclusively men for many years. However, one woman’s voice was resounded every week. Esther Darnell was the paid soloist who was hired the first year of the church’s formation. She was a well-established performer in Kansas City and …

When I was a child, nothing brought me more joy than summer camp. I would beg my mother to let me stay more weeks. The rope swing over the river, the counselor skits at dinner, the girls’ banter in the cabin, the massive games at night in the woods, and …

I didn’t know what to expect. Without the typical hubbub of activities: parties, concerts, shopping, I didn’t know if it would feel much like Christmas. Just after Thanksgiving I went to the Dollar Tree to pick up some special order supplies for the church Christmas decorations. Although I had an email confirmation that …

The best metaphor for our world of today is astronauts speeding through the cosmos, but with their life-supporting capsule pierced by a meteorite fragment. But the Church resembles Mary and Joseph traveling from Egypt to Nazareth on a donkey, holding in their arms the weakness and poverty of the Child …

Twenty five years ago I experienced the most unusual holiday of my life. My son was due on December 26 but arrived on December 17. I suppose it was the first time in my life that I was not in church on Christmas Eve. And this year, all of us …

This week we have been bombarded with numbers.  Numbers of absentee ballots, of electoral college votes, of new covid cases, percentage of positive test rates.  We are swimming in a sea of numbers and statistics and trying to make meaning of it all.  Sometimes the numbers are overwhelming and sometimes …

I met Father Ed Hayes 25 years ago when he was directing a retreat center in rural Kansas. Ed had this grandfatherly way of bringing people together from many different spiritual perspectives. He was equally at home at the head of the long oak dinner table and at the chapel’s communion table …

By Spring 1919, the flu pandemic had claimed 2,300 souls from Kansas City’s population of 250,000, leaving us one of the hardest hit cities in America. In November of that same year, a missionary sent to our city by the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) began meeting in homes with …

“Not in my lifetime has there been a spectacle which has so depressed me. One wonders how long the free society can endure degradation of the office of president in campaigns such as this. The intensity of feeling is going to leave us with a first class national headache on …

I listened to an interview with author and professor, George Saunders. In the interview he shared about the time he went incognito in a homeless shelter in Fresno, California. There he met a wise older man from Guatemala who kept saying “Everything is always keep changing.” Professor Saunders says that …

“Monkey in the Middle” pierced the subtle rhythm of the ocean lapping at the shore. Squeals and dives and splashes erupted as my young adult son taught his nieces and nephews his favorite childhood game.