For a lot of years now I have been journeying with a lot of women who have been in marriages or relationships with narcissists. I’m not talking about plain old self-absorbedness, of which we all have a touch of in different ways. I’m talking about something far more insidious and confusing, too–people with true blue […]
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One of the hardest things for me is when I see talented, amazing, gifted, educated, passionate, articulate, creative women who over the years have found that they have no place left in the church. They waited. They tried. They gave it their all. They showed up again and again and again and again. And in […]
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Yes, I call out unhealthy church systems all the time. Yes, I rant and rave about equality. Yes, I believe sometimes people need to leave church-as-they-knew-it to save their souls. Yes, I am deeply disturbed by how power and control has hurt so many. But I also still do love the “church.” I believe in […]
Read Moremy dear friend & ministry partner recently attended a local leaders gathering and messaged me with a text that essentially said this: “not one woman speaker, presenter, pray-er, anything-at-all-er. see, i am starting to notice it!” i wrote him back, “yep, it’s real, and it sucks and thanks for noticing.” also this week i heard […]
Read Morei originally wrote this post in 2010, and it’s part of down we go. but in the past couple of weeks i’ve had some interesting conversations that reminded me of it and i thought i’d pare it down and re-post it. it’s funny, still, after these years, my thought is pretty much the same except […]
Read Moregoodness gracious, people get riled up over conversations about “church.” i wish we could get as much traction on justice & poverty issues! it’s fascinating, really, how passionate many are about this topic, especially when someone threatens the church in any way. i didn’t read all of donald miller’s post last week about why he […]
Read Morei have a theory about healing: most of us need it, a lot of us want it, and many of our church experiences have taught us some things that make it harder to get. this makes me sad, mainly because church is supposed to be a place of healing, the safest place on earth to […]
Read More“when we honestly ask ourselves which person in our lives mean the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a warm and tender hand. the friend who can be silent with us […]
Read Moreone of my favorite gospel stories is the woman who busts into simon the pharisee’s house in luke 7 and falls at Jesus’ feet, wiping his feet with her tears. in that moment, he was hanging out with the put-together, religious elite talking about theology. they were supposedly the sane ones, and she was the […]
Read More“the best criticism of the bad is the practice of the better” – richard rohr * * * * * i had an interesting conversation with a friend this past week who didn’t really know my story of the past 7+ years of the ups of working on a big church staff to the downs […]
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