Not from our home in Durham is the Liberty Warehouse, which once housed tobacco auctions. The building is not beautiful; it is, however, historic because it is one of the last of its kind still standing, a visual legacy of what our city once was. It is also on its last legs. Its most recent…
I know I said this a review of Mike Stavlund’s book, A Force of Will: The Reshaping of Faith in a Year of Grief, but I’m going to start by talking about why Patty Griffin is a great songwriter. Trust me: they’re connected. I finished the book last week and was so moved and challenged…
if I count my way around the room we are twelve scattered across tables and couches, close enough to talk but all engaged by screens and books silent disciples of different causes I am facing one who looks troubled though I cannot see what she sees only what she shows in her eyes the brick…
Somewhere I have pictures. During the summer of 2011, a group of young people and adults from our church went to Birmingham, Alabama to help clean up after the devastating tornado that had dredged a path of destruction a mile wide from Tuscaloosa through the Magic City. We drove up to the north side of…
it’s a quiet pentecost morning and I’m out of town on a side street of life where I ducked out of the drizzle only to find myself in hart and soul coffee everyone here speaks my language though silence is not my strong suit it strikes me that it takes some quiet for the Spirit…
“Do you want to get well?” The whole story swings on that sentence. The story I’m speaking of is Jesus’ encounter with the man at the pool at Bethesda. Soon another Feast came around and Jesus was back in Jerusalem. Near the Sheep Gate in Jerusalem there was a pool, in Hebrew called Bethesda, with…
I realize I have been silent here for a couple of weeks. For a number of reasons, I have found it hard to get here. I could not let National Poetry Month pass without one more poem, however. I have been moved by this image and the story of the discovery of the landing gear…
You say you see no hope, you say you see no reason We should dream that the world would ever change You’re saying love is foolish to believe ‘Cause there’ll always be some crazy with an Army or a Knife To wake you from your day dream, put the fear back in your life… Look,…
these are days littered with losses the absences seem more present perhaps because we marked eighteen months since my father-in-law died now the news comes of others — one who made me laugh and one who reminded me God laughs, too hard to navigate life without hitting these pot-holes of the heart even the ones…
Yesterday morning I went to breakfast with a room full of people who make me proud to live in Durham. The group was the Religious Coalition for a Nonviolent Durham, which is a profound collection of folks who are working diligently to end violence in our town, or as they say, “Our mission is to…