communion

In my 15 years as a pastor, I’ve seen a lot of watery eyes at the table.

Maybe the grace experienced in the sacrament precedes belief.

It’s difficult to study the phylogenetic tree and still feel lonely.

None of us wants it to end, because we know we'll never see each other again.

I feared it would last a week. Then came the moment of truth.

At mass with my friend, I received grace through hospitality—without receiving bread and wine.

A sandwich can be a subversive act.

As the children make their way out the door, trails of leftover communion bread go with them.

As I lifted the chalice, the baby began to play soccer under my ribs.

Matt grew up in the Episcopal Church. One Sunday he appeared at the altar—with his arms crossed over his chest.

Those of us who sought to change the congregation's communion practice met with indifference. So late one Saturday I took matters into my own hands.

My ecclesiastical criminality has been going on for 45 years. It all started at a Trappist abbey in Virginia.

Few secrets are as devastating as those that make us rethink our identity. Heidi Neumark discovered one when her daughter Googled their name.

Sacramentality is the breath of Christian life—life that springs from the sacraments and life that yearns to return to them.

As I came to the first student and his family, kneeling with outstretched hands, suddenly someone took out a phone and snapped a picture.

One of the prevailing myths in North America’s mourning-avoidant culture is that within a relatively brief time after a loved one dies, we will want and receive closure. Living in liminal space and profound pain, we yearn to end such grief, to lose the sense that we’re on the bridge to nowhere. After our 25-year-old daughter Krista died while volunteering in Bolivia, as parents we heard the term often.

People are looking to their computers, tablets, and phones for sacred moments. How are churches responding?

The frankincense gift needs to be taped back together. So does the stable wall.

A number of activist organizations are declaring March 15-17 "National Gun Violence Prevention Sabbath Weekend."

It's not clear if this is meant to replace The Brady Center's "God Not Guns Sabbath," which has been observed on the last weekend of September for a number of years. But the organizers seem eager to keep the event broadly ecumenical and interfaith.

This past Sunday was the Epiphany, the celebration of the incarnate Christ made manifest. It also happened to be the Sunday I decided to visit a congregation of the Metropolitan Community Church. 

The MCC is more theologically liberal than I am, so I braced myself for some hangups. But I also wanted to remain as open as possible to experiencing God in a different context. I’m glad I went.