Life of Faith
Present together
When I was a chaplain intern working with people with disabilities, there was one man I visited every Sunday right after worship.
The all-knowing cloud and the cloud of unknowing
Clouds evoke the sublime. What about the cloud that stores our data and mediates its flow?
The spirituality of waiting
If God is present in the planting and the harvest, then God is present in the time when nothing seems to be happening.
Cycling my way to peace
Turning the pedals over again and again, I began to feel the fullness of who I am and how I was made.
The wisdom of dreamwork
“I don’t interpret dreams,” says poet and spiritual director Rodger Kamenetz. “I bring them to life.”
Virtuous friendship
Prudence and constancy might not sound like much fun, but they create the load-bearing relationships communities need to flourish.
Can we build our own future?
Elon Musk’s techno-optimism needs something to temper it. Maybe the dimmer outlook of a companion named Hobbes.
Working with conscience
Our repair person refused to try to fix our fridge. He wanted to be able to sleep at night.
A permanent foreigner
Grace Loh Prasad’s memoir shows how the death of parents, for a child of immigrants, represents the vanishing of entire worlds.
My childhood congregation was a progressive Christian dream come true
So why don’t more of the people who grew up there practice Christianity as adults?
Dress and redress
In a blend of memoir and scholarly inquiry, Megan Sweeney challenges readers to take clothing seriously.
Phoning home
God, like an attuned parent, hears not just the words we say but also the hidden parts of our hearts.
OncoMouse and me
A genetically engineered animal helped me rethink the imago Dei. It might also save my life.
Praying the hours with W. H. Auden
The poet’s Horae Canonicae sequence is an underappreciated spiritual classic.
Moltmann the teacher
Studying theology with him offered me new possibilities for justice and abundant life.
Feeling God in a modernist cathedral-in-progress
While other churches have filled me with wonder, Barcelona’s Sagrada Familia brought tears to my eyes.
Treasures of our ancestors
Rabbi Debra Robbins creates a spiritual practice around the seven psalms of the Jewish morning liturgy.
Hair like wool
Both Daniel and Revelation compare God’s hair to wool. White enslavers used to say the same thing about hair like mine.
My dad’s old Bible offers more questions than answers
What can I learn from what he underlined—or didn’t?