I recently sat down with MaryAnn McKibben Dana to talk about the power of improv as a tool to cope with and care for loved ones with Alzheimer’s Disease.
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:: A Sermon on Mark 9:30-37 ::
In the face of all the tragedy in today’s world…we, like the disciples, may not understand. We may have our priorities backwards. We may be too afraid or ashamed to ask the questions of our hearts. We, too, can be paralyzed, retreating into apathy.
Gathering with others who see the hurt of the world and the hurt in our own lives gives us a chance to process and to mourn and to find new life. The rituals and traditions we enact serve as containers for our grief, providing safe space...
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:: A Sermon on Mark 6:30-34, 53-56, with Thoughts from The Wild Goose Festival ::
We often go looking for healing on our own, in a secluded place, but sometimes the only place we can find the healing we need is in the crowd of community.
There are many different kinds of healing - physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, and relational. In today’s story, I think it is both emotional and physical healing that Jesus tries to offer the apostles after their journeys. But of course, Jesus is interrupted...
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:: A Thought from NEXT Church National Gathering::
I love experiential worship (can't you tell?). So, when I saw a workshop about it scheduled for the NEXT Church National Gathering in Minneapolis, I was excited.
After talking about the basics of thinking out of the box, we looked at the story of the resurrected Jesus feeding the disciples on the beach from John 21. I chuckled inside as the leader asked our table groups to imagine a prayer station for this passage - we had just created a table-scape for communion based on this text. It felt like I had the answer to the test! But I contained my glee and listened to the other group members, realizing that each story has multiple...
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"How about painting during my Easter sermon?" asks the senior pastor at my internship church.
We had just witnessed Shawna Bowman creating a communion table and other artwork at the 2014 NEXT Church National Gathering in Minneapolis.
Sure, I thought sarcastically. Easter, no pressure.
It's one thing to create a piece at your own pace and your own time but it's a whole other thing to create something meaningful in under an hour, while others are watching, based on the theme and words of another person. No big deal.
But, in the spirit of improv, which we've been exploring at Pilgrims, I said "yes!"
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As a student at Wesley and an intern at Pilgrims, one of my favorite activities is planning worship. We plan as a group, students and professors, church members and staff. It's not just a task, but a way to get to know others and how God is working...
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:: An Epiphany Sermon and Artwork ::
"Jacob was left alone; and a man wrestled with him until daybreak."
A little over a year ago, I found myself sitting outside a church on the cold, damp bench of a picnic table, dropping the F-bomb on God. Repeatedly.
I was halfway into a two week intercultural immersion with our unhoused, hungry, mentally ill, and abused neighbors on the Route 1 corridor of Fairfax County. We were meeting some of the most vulnerable people in society, hidden and invisible amidst...
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If you're visiting this site, then I'm betting you're a visual thinker. So why not have a visual way to plan the use of worship space?
Recently, at a worship space workshop with Carol Marples from Soul Marks, a group of us made this model of Church of the Pilgrims' sanctuary. We added some elements we're experimenting with...
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We are always trying to fit in, label ourselves, define our role. Our identity can be based on defining ourselves against something else - "I don't know what I am, but I know I'm not that." It almost becomes a process of elimination as we go through life. But once in a while, we find it. The right word, the right paradigm, the glove that fits. And we know...
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