This is for the teenagers in your community.
The ones whose families have been hurt by churches so much that they won’t (or can’t) go back.
The ones whose very identities make them afraid they'll be reduced to an “issue” that needs to be solved.
...
Several years ago during an overnight event at the church I served, my high school youth ministry filed into our sanctuary and participated in a prayer ritual around the altar that involved lit candles. Unbeknownst to me, the wax from the candles...
It’s Ash Wednesday. I was supposed to be serving at church today, imposing ashes on people for an hour this afternoon.
Strangely, I was looking forward to it. While Ash Wednesday is morbid, there’s also a sacredness to it that I appreciate.
...
I first met Grandpa Elmer when I was 19. After a summer apart from each other, my then boyfriend, Doug, invited me to join him for Perry Pioneer Days - a local festival that included a parade that he and his Grandpa always walked in.
As clowns.
...
Is it easier to bring Jesus to the progressives or social justice to the evangelicals?
This is the question I’ve spent most of my professional life wondering, as I’ve alternated between evangelical and progressive settings, respecting both for...
Surely there’s a church somewhere that practices the kind of hospitality Jesus did, right?
I wanted desperately to believe this after my family found itself unwelcome at church during the last several weeks. Since then, I’ve continued to wrestle...
Last Sunday during worship, I sat in the comfort room with my two-year old, Kendall, in tears.
To be clear, I was the one in tears, not her.
We’d gone into the cry room to nurse. When we returned to the sanctuary, she started chattering. A LOT...
“You guys are making me not even want to go to church anymore!” shouted Hope, my six-year old daughter, from the backseat of our van as we headed home from our first day of church shopping.
We began church shopping at a local church that’s part...
The last time I went church shopping I was a freshman in college. My first Sunday on campus, I walked to the Methodist church that was a block from me. I’d grown up in the Methodist church and truly expected to find a church just like the one I...
Note: I wrote this piece a while ago, in connection with my new book, Called. In the days since when it live, however, I have accepted a new job with Fuller Youth Institute and so am now (ironically) in the process of transitioning out of my role...