Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg has been called “the Twitter rabbi” (@TheRaDR), and I confess, that’s where and how I got to “know” her. I started following her for hot takes on religion, politics, and ethics; within a few weeks I was enthralled by her threads of scriptural exegesis and began “saving” them for future reference (aka,… Read More
Revised Common Lectionary: Respect As Spiritual Practice
Exodus 20:1-4, 7-9, 12-20 Philippians 3:4b-14 Matthew 21:33-46 Is respect becoming an old-fashioned idea we remember only when we miss it? Today’s readings left me thinking a lot about respect. Wonder along with me about wanting respect, offering it, changing the criteria for it, and losing it. What did you think respect was and… Read More
Our Spiritual Disciplines: God and Dog
It happens every day. After work, I walk in the door, and she starts to prance and paw gazing with hopeful light in her brown eyes, asking for it to HAPPEN. NOW. PLEASE? If it doesn’t HAPPEN. NOW. PLEASE? and I have to tell her, “Later, it is coming later” her flickering eyes smolder, her… Read More
Our Spiritual Disciplines: Routines of the House
Growing up, my mom and dad always insisted on Saturday morning that my sister and I would help them clean the house before we got to do anything we called fun. Though it wasn’t meant to be punishment, it sure felt like it. I would regularly complain: “Why can’t I watch cartoons like my other… Read More
Our Spiritual Disciplines: Summer Sabbath Shift
I was introduced to the idea of spiritual practices more than thirty years ago. Daily journaling before my children were awake was my way in. Soon I began praying my surroundings and the events of the day as I walked around the neighborhood or the ball fields as my practiced. Choir became a spiritual practice… Read More
Our Spiritual Disciplines: Walking
Solvitur ambulando. It is solved by walking. ~ Variously attributed to Diogenes and to Augustine. I was a small child when I absorbed the connection between walking and spirituality. A short gravel drive connected our house to that of my grandparents’ – my first regular walk, no doubt seemingly a long one for short legs. Destination?… Read More
Our Spiritual Disciplines: Never on Pointe
When my son was three he started taking ballet. He had been doing parent and child music classes before that and he corrected me that it was not the singing, but the dancing that he loved. So when The Ballet School offered a special to get boys interested in ballet, we signed him right up. He… Read More
Our Spiritual Disciplines: Sewing
Most of you know that sewing is a hobby of mine. What you may not know is that it is also a spiritual discipline for me. I felt like sharing what makes sewing an excellent spiritual discipline and what spiritual and practical lessons my practice has taught me over the years. 1. Trust the… Read More
Friday Five: Needing an Epiphany
Recently, I was watching the movie Wish I Was Here. As the main character – a dad in his thirties – was facing a bit of a life crisis, he took his children to one of his happy places. This location was one that led him to an epiphany. His son asks him “what is an… Read More
WitsEndsDay: Spiritual Fantasies
Sometimes I fantasize about a “real” spiritual life–the kind I read about in books: hours hiking in the woods every week, extended quiet times with the sunrise and God, week-long silent retreats, pilgrimages to Iona, contemplative examens at the end of each day. My fantasies though, are generally interrupted by a child needing a Kleenex,… Read More
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