One of the good things about being a mother is that I get bragging rights. I don’t use them often. I like to save them for just the right occasion.

Today is one of those.

We’re having a rest and recuperation day. This weekend was fun. We had my whole fam damily here. As soon as they left, LightHusband’s mother and father arrived with nieces and nephews from his sister’s family. Then his sister and her husband came for dinner. So last night we had dinner for 12. Dinner for 14 on Saturday. Dinner for 12 last night. Yep … we’re ready for a low day. So it’s fishing and sewing and swimming and reading and …. what. ever.

LightBoy casually announced that he was taking his pole down to the Big Dock and drowning a worm. Here’s the result:

A twenty inch large mouth bass!  (LightHusband guesses it might have weighed over three pounds!!) Which he hooked, set, and caught … all by himself. Then he released it to live to tell the tale another day. But the grin tells the whole story. He’s one happy guy.

We’ve had a silly weekend together, my parents, my brothers and I and our families. The cousins have all had an exercise in “getting along.” There are little cousins and big cousins and they all have to get along with one another; make room for each other at the table. We big folks must accommodate each other’s disparate parenting styles; support each other and (when appropriate) gently take each other to task.

There was at least one literal rescue mission. My youngest brother took a sailboat out in a strong wind yesterday. It became too much for him in the broad lake. LightHusband and LightMom had to take the motorboat to bring him back. There have been other virtual rescue missions. Votes taken on whether or not “big” beans or “little” beans are better when baked at dinner last night. Family folklore retold to the little ones and the big ones. Familial relationships rehearsed and retold so that the children will remember who belongs to whom and when and why.

The “boys” have gone home now. Back to their regular lives. It’s just my parents and I at camp now. We had a good weekend together. Yesterday the weather was terrible, today, beautiful. There was fishing and tubing and snarking and laughing and somehow we packed 14 people around the dining room table. This afternoon as LightUncle2 packed his daughters up to to home, I overheard a conversation between the cousins as they laid claim to bedrooms “when we grow up.” They were making plans for the house in the future and how they would fit into it with their own children. Discussing which rules need to be continued and which they might decide to do away with. It was interesting to hear their thoughts on the matter. I’m sure that at 13/14 and 10 their ideas will change over time, but they understand this place in their legacy and that they must negotiate with each other into the future.

I hope that they will traverse those waters with greater skill and grace than I have been able to manage with my cousins. The break that came with them was brutal, sudden and without end.  I have given up hope that I will ever see them again or be in relationship with them again.   There are parts of me that don’t desire any relationship any longer because the sense of betrayal runs too deep.

No, that’s not exactly right.  It’s a sense that there were wrongs done by all parties.  Wrongs that must be set right somehow.  But those wrongs cannot be set right until they can be owned.  Therein lies the rub.  I may be wrong, but my instincts lead me to believe that my cousins are not interested in that road.  Down that road lies the difficult task of mutual confession, forgiveness, redemption and trust.  None of us is willing to proceed to that place.  We all have issues which make it easier to live in this uneasy place of grief, than to work out our differences and face each other’s pain, sorrow, hurt and shortcomings.  This familial battle which is my brother’s and yet is also mine left me wondering about how to work out those issues of hurt and forgiveness, grace and redemption.  Yet, I always told myself, it’s different … my cousins aren’t “believers.”  If they were part of the Body of Christ, it would work better.  Jesus-followers understand how all this works, so they can work these things out.

So, earlier this year, when the separation with my CLB came so brutally, suddenly and equally unendingly, I was taken by surprise.  Again.  There were wrongs done by all parties.  Wrongs that must be set right somehow.  Wrongs that cannot be set right until they can be owned.  Confessed.  Forgiven.  Redeemed.  And trust rebuilt.  But no one is willing to go down that road.

It was, effectively, a divorce.  Now this is metaphorical … and in the metaphorical sense, I was accused of having an affair.  I was accused of having other gods, of being a threat to those in leadership.  I had two choices.  Leave.  Or ‘fess up to something I wasn’t doing.  It was a Hobson’s choice.  Either way, the trust was broken.  If I left the relationship was destroyed.  If I ‘fessed up to do something I hadn’t done, the trust was broken.  So … we divorced.  I left everything behind.  There are some few people who I struggle to maintain shallow relationships with.  But we all know where everyone’s primary loyalties lie … and must lie.

Power brings a terrible pall to the church.  It corrupts even the most genuine and faith-filled leader or follower.  Machiavelli had it right … power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.  Where there are no checks and balances on our greedy selves, we will become that which we most despise.  When we surround ourselves only with people who agree with us, we cannot learn.  We cannot grow.  If we do not build in boundaries to restrain ourselves, we will hurt those about us.  That is where the church has consistently failed its congregants, by failing to understand the evil within the hearts of men and women who lead it.  By crying out the sin of the sheep and the perfection of the shepherds.  What kind of family is this?

We’re back at camp again.

Ten hours in the car.  That’s what the trip should take.  Ten hours.  Not … I don’t know … however many it took to get from Penn State to Albany in June.  That was a horrible trip.  In fact, I think it took longer to get from Penn State to Albany than it took us to get from Virginia to here today.  Go figure.

We left at 5:43 this morning.  We arrived at 3:50 this afternoon.  3 stops.  Bathroom, coffee and gas.

The coolest thing we saw was the uprights of the Delaware Memorial Bridge shrouded in clouds because it was so foggy.  That was really neat.

The coolest conversation we had was about the wall between Mexico and the US … this was sparked by an article in a National Geographic magazine I brought to read in the car.  There was a quote in the article that I think sums it all up really well … The wall is “A police solution to an economic problem.”  So we talked a lot about what that meant.  The LightChildren were digging it.

So … we’re here.  LightGirl and her cousin are playing an on-line game.  LightBoy, his cousin and her friend are playing card games.   LightHusband, LightUncle2 and I are avoiding making dinner … should be a fun evening.

We had the x of y discussions with LightGirl the other morning. I’m tired.

It is the beginning of adolescence and I’m tired.

This has been a long summer of vague discontent for all of us … and we’re all tired. Something is stirring. We’re struggling to rewrite familial roles in light of having this half-woman in our midst. Our various ailments have not helped this process.

We’ve been cleaning quite a bit too. As I’ve been recuperating I find I can’t stand the house any. longer. So … we’ve been cleaning. In part this was precipitated by a pass through the livingroom in which I chanced to spy crumpled underwear on the sofa. That was

the.

last.

straw.

One should never find crumpled underwear on the livingroom sofa. Well … the good news is – it wasn’t underwear. It was a crumpled teddy bear hockey sweater (in hockey they are called sweaters, not jerseys). Still … the shock factor combined with the recuperation factor got me going. So.

LightGirl has found all sorts buried treasure in her room. Her brand new hockey stick bag. Her old cellphone recharger (she thought this was left in a hotel room during a tournament in March). Every hour brings something new. Christmas in August. LightBoy is experiencing much the same joie d’vivre.

Then LightGirl and I looked under my bed. Now this is actually a fairly regular occurrence because it is where we store wrapping paper. But this time we really looked. And found her old Barbie carrying case.

That is somewhat similar to the case that LightGirl had (notice the past tense). We pulled it out from it’s “storage facility,” she looked inside and relived some of her Barbie memories. Then she very abruptly said, “I’m throwing this away. I don’t play with Barbies anymore and there’s no reason to keep this.” I had to agree with her. And I was very sad. But in that moment I appreciated my father.

When I was little and playing with Barbies I too wanted a Barbie carrying case. I wanted one just like all the other little girls. One made of (basically) vinyl covered cardboard with a snap lock and handle. They looked like this:

I’m not certain what inspired my father. I don’t know if it was finances. Or if it was that he likes working with his hands and wood. Or if he just couldn’t bear to spend money on cheap vinyl-covered cardboard. There are some things my father doesn’t talk about, so I’m not certain of his inspiration. But he made a Barbie carry-case for me when I was about 6 or 7. I don’t remember when I received it. Honestly, it’s been around so long now, I almost don’t remember a time when I didn’t have it. But here’s the terrible thing. When he first made it for me, I hated it. I didn’t want some handmade blue and white wooden box, with lovely brass fixtures. I wanted cheap vinyl-covered cardboard … sleek and shiny (and light weight) with pretty shiny colors, and Barbie’s picture on it. Just like all my friends had. My friends had beautiful, cool carry cases and they often got new ones here and there along the way. I just had my same old blue and white work horse.

I still have my same old blue and white work horse. It doesn’t carry Barbie treasures anymore. Now it carries my mementos from a life well lived. It also carries something else. Something more ephemeral. It carries the love my father has for me. It speaks to me in ways that my father sometimes can’t. My dad has many words for many different things, but for things of deep emotion he keeps hidden away. So I must search those out and find them in a blue and white box hand-made for me some 40 years ago.

I was thinking about that blue and white work horse when I read this article about girls in India. This article made me very sad. The intersecting curves of progress and tradition are making the lives of girls very tenuous in India. The female infanticide rate is highest in the wealthiest districts. I wondered about the fathers there who are reducing their paternity to a financial bottom line and missing out on the opportunity to build a lifetime with a daughter. I understand that the cultural mores are very different in India, but father and daughterhood are universal familial ties. What is the impact of reducing familial ties to a financial bottom line? How will those thousands of individual decisions ultimately effect/affect Indian culture? No one knows at the moment. But when I think of the inestimable value of a human life and how we assure our children of this each day in the thousand small and large bits of time and conversation, I think that the children of India are learning to evaluate life based on only one facet of human interaction. I wonder how this will play itself out. How will these cultures who have progressed so quickly on one face handle the change? How will the rest of us handle it as well?

Since it seems to be vogue these days …

I’ve well-documented my INFP-ness.  But this description from the site above really gave me pause:

“An INFP’s feelings form the foundations of the individual. They are sacred and binding, in the sense that their emergence requires no further justification. An INFP’s feelings are often guarded, kept safe from attack and ridicule. Only a few, close confidants are permitted entrance into this domain.”

I would only add that when it becomes clear that an INFP’s confidence has been misplaced, the damage has long term effects.   When, as in my case, those confidants use an INFP’s feelings to their own ends … well … I’m still struggling with how to process that.  How to process the fact that something that forms my very foundations was used against me for another’s gain … in a church.  Nice (and she spits).
On to cheerier notes … there was also this, which I completely agreed with:

“Their job must be fun, although not raucous, and it must be meaningful to them. They need a strong purpose in their work. They want to be recognized and valued, without undue attention given to them. They may become embarrassed when made the center of attention. As a result, they may undersell their strengths in order to avoid being singled out and made to feel conspicuous. They would rather have their worth be noticed gradually over time.”

LightGirl took the test and she’s an ENFP.  Well … she’s only 13 and that is likely to change.  But maybe not.  She is her father’s daughter and he is also an ENFP.

The Multi-Intelligences results were interesting but no surprise.

Gee … drugs turn your brain to mush.  I’m still waiting for my brain to come back.  So this will have to do in the meantime.

… a week makes.

This morning I woke up at the regular time.  Having only been woken by a spectacular thunderstorm in the middle of the night.  There was no pain in my mid-section.  I did not feel like clawing my body in half.  And I had slept all night.  This was in marked difference to last Thursday night.

I am on the mend.  It’s very slow going and that makes me a little crabby.  I don’t recuperate well.  I may have mentioned a time or two in the past that patience is not one of my gifts.  Nor do I want it.  I understand that it’s a fruit of the spirit.  But as far as I’m concerned it’s the grapefruit of the spirit.  You need to add a lot of sugar to make it palatable.

My doctor told me to add foods as I felt able and to keep them low fat.  Oh bother.  It seems this sludge in my gall bladder will respond to low fat.  So I’m calling this my sludge free eating.  It sounds less mean and stingy.  The very last thing I’m to add back is dairy.  This is presenting a problem because dairy foods are my comfort foods.  I love milk, cheese and yogurt.  LightHusband teases me that I’d make a great Middle Ages woman … just give me bread and cheese and I’m happy.  Soy is out because I’m allergic to it.  So that leaves fish (yuck), chicken and beans for sources of protein.  I guess I’m going to learn to like fish.  I’ve rediscovered Jello.  I love red Jello and forgotten it.  And LightHusband found an organic applesauce that comes very, very close to a replacement for ice cream.  Now, if you knew how much I love, love, love ice cream you’d know how astonishing that statement is.  I’m still going to “need” ice cream once in a while, but this applesauce is darn good.  I see a gastroenterologist in early October to begin the process of figuring out why this happened.
In other news, LightGirl had a followup with her orthopedist yesterday, and he gave her the green light to start skating again.  NO PLAYING HOCKEY.  She can skate, but she can’t play.  She can practice, but she can’t play.  He was very specific about her boundaries.  But he was also very, very pleased with the progress she’s made.  She’s doing a lot of walking now without her brace or crutches.  She still can’t completely flex her leg straight, but she’s very close and she’s much stronger now than she was three weeks ago.  However, I do think she may have lost some of that tone in the last 24 hours because she’s just been floating around the house and not using her leg at all 😀 she’s been so happy.

Sooo … all in all we’ve been given the green light to return to Vermont for the last week of the summer.  This is good because my brothers and their families will be gathered at camp the last weekend of August.  So we’ll be having a mini-family reunion then.  I’m looking forward to seeing all the nieces and the nephews together.  Laughing with my brothers in the way that we only do when we’re together.  Teasing my mom and dad.  Watching my brothers be uncles and getting to be the auntie to their kiddos.  Life is good.

We have a dog. His name is Sam; Samuel Allen when he’s in trouble. He was named after the father of Ethan Allen … not the furniture company. The Vermont Revolutionary War hero. Thank you. Sam is a golden retriever. He is the third golden we’ve had. Our first was named Ethan (Allen), our second was named Zimri Allen (Ethan’s brother). Now we have Sam. Ethan Allen’s wife was named Fanny. LightHusband wants to get a female bassett hound and name her Fanny. I think that might make her neurotic.

When we got Zimri, we stumbled across a dog training book that became invaluable to us. It was written by a group of monks in upstate New York … the monks of New Skete: How To Be Your Dog’s Best Friend. Their theories of dog training are driven by dog psychiatry, an understanding of how dogs think and behave, what drives them and why they do the things they do. Once we understood that a primary driving force behind dog behavior is “the pack” and his place in the pack, we were able to train our dogs much more easily. Based on this, we learned that a disciplinary tool that can be used very effectively with dogs is exclusion. If you separate a dog from the pack and exclude him, he knows very quickly that he is being punished. So, for instance, unless a dog is very accustomed to life in a crate if you suddenly begin to put him in one overnight when he is used to sleeping in your bedroom, he will think he is being excluded from the pack cave (bedroom) and is being punished for something.

Sometime later we had children. Children are messy and difficult. But I observed to LightHusband one day that the methods that one uses on small children are not all that different than those one uses on a dog. That may sound distasteful. However, you must speak clearly, use simple one or two word phrases, don’t string together commands, etc. Now … obviously, children outgrow this sort of training at about age 3 or earlier. But one of the primary disciplinary tools that we continue to use, even now, is separation from the pack. After all … that’s what a grounding is. As in, “You’re grounded.” The child (now a teen) can’t have any connection with his/her pack (other teens) for the specified period of time. Or perhaps the parents merely seek to control the means of access by taking away a cell phone or phone privileges or something of that nature. In some manner, the teen is now excluded from the pack as a means of punishment.

We use exclusion from activities all the time in the adult world as a means of control. I received an e-mail from the hockey club. If dues are not up to date, players would be removed from practice … excluded from the team until the dues are caught up. It’s distasteful but considered the norm. People are cut from the team if they don’t measure up; can’t behave, etc. Think about it … how do things work in an office? There are teams and people are included on them based upon performance, ability to be a “team player,” etc. Or they are excluded … punished.

Those are the overt methods of using exclusion to gain acceptable behavior from people. What about the ways in which we use subversive methods of exclusion to “get someone to behave?” What do we do then? We use body language. We use facial expression. We use tone of voice. But we humans are just like dogs. We use pack behavior to let others know when they have made a misstep and need to get themselves back in line.

On the flip side, we use inclusion to reward people for good behavior. We invite them to parties and dinners and coffee. We phone them. We e-mail them. We “include” them in our social circles. We do this as long as they meet whatever standards we might have (and we all have them) for behavior. If people ever become threatening in any way, we begin to exclude them. Sometimes this is right and necessary. But what about when we just sort of don’t like what they’re doing, or they’re dirtier than we are? Or maybe they make us uncomfortable? What if they just speak more plainly than we are used to? Perhaps in their relationship the woman speaks more often than the man (or vice versa … whatever, it is something that is different than the group), then what?

Here’s the conundrum we are faced with. These problems are not officially problems. The behaviour is not out of bounds egregiously enough for the offender to be spoken to. Everyone simply hopes that s/he will notice that his or her behavior is not quite normal and they will straighten up and fly right. Sometimes that happens. Sometimes it doesn’t and people simply begin to drift away, thinking to themselves, “Yeah, So-and-so, I’m not so sure about him (or her).” The invites dry up and So-and-so begins to feel lonely. Sometimes someone will come along and kindly mention one or two things that s/he could do to help. Maybe things change, maybe they don’t. Often I think they do and suddenly So-and-so has discovered how to make friends and influence people.

Who is So-and-so? Why S/he is the new christian 1st Baptist just brought to Christ last week.

This is part of the August Synchroblog … the rest of the team’s thoughts may be found as follows:

Cobus van Wyngaard is contemplating Inclusivity within claims of heresy
Mike Bursell asks the question Inclusive or exclusive: you mean there’s a choice?”
Steve Hayes is blogging his thoughts “Christianity inclusive or exclusive?
It’s a family affair comes Jenelle D’Alessandro
John Smulo will be adding his thoughts
Erin Word share some thoughts on The Politics of love
Julie Clawson couldn’t resist adding her thoughts
As is Sam Norton.
Mike Bursell,muses on yet another synchro topic
Questions abound with David Fisher
And Sally shares her thoughts here

Til next month then

Do you know where you were twenty years ago today?

How about twenty years ago this minute?

Yeah … I do.

I was running around my hometown finding flowers and preparing for my wedding … and discovering that the wedding wine had been stolen in the night. So I had to find a working telephone amongst the summer camps on the lake where we were having the reception. This was in the days before cellphones and all.

I was getting married. To LightHusband. My first husband. My parents’ favorite son-in-law … I’m their favorite daughter (just so you know).

I’m also their only daughter. 😉

I met LightHusband (officially) when I was twenty-two years old. We began dating about 6 months later. We’ve been together ever since. That’s now been more than half of my life.

We were married in an antique church in my hometown by the minister who had been LightHusband’s minister all of his growing up years. The church still has box pews, no electricity or heat and an old-fashioned pump organ. The Methodist Church ladies “catered” our reception at Memorial Hall on Mirror Lake. An ad hoc band made up of friends played for dancing. Since LightHusband forgot the CD with our first dance on it, we danced to “Help Me Make It Through The Night,” while all of our friends and family laughed and laughed … so did we. We could hardly dance we were laughing so hard.

The party and dance was the best ever … our friends still talk about it. We told people to bring their swimsuits so they could jump in the lake after the formalities … and they did. They also brought canoes and kayaks and other assorted water fun devices. So there were drippy happy people on the dance floor, and dressed up formal people and all having fun … especially LightHusband’s 85 yo grandmother who turned off her hearing aid and dove in. It was the first and perhaps only time I’ve seen my parents dance together … my dad isn’t much of a dancer (he’s a thinker).

The path these last 20 years has been convoluted, circuitous and full of surprises both good and bad. In many respects our wedding was a foreshadowing of our marriage. Our life has been full of drippy happy people and people dressed formally. We have told people that we do not do things in the regularly expected manner; some take us at our word and some just enjoy the show. There have been unpleasant and pleasant surprises and we’ve rolled with them. Well … LightHusband has rolled with them … (in the words of Larry Vaughn) “…I have spent a magnificent amount of energy trying to change things I cannot change.”

Today we are going to revisit some things we “used to do.” Spend time together. The LightChildren will go spend the night at friend’s houses and we are heading out on an adventure. I think we’ll talk about the next 20 years and the last and be glad with one another.

UPDATE:

Before we left this enormous delivery of 20 roses came to our door!! I was completely surprised. LightHusband has (almost) never had flowers delivered. I knocked him over with a hug. A little while after the shock wore off he asked if I was surprised. I looked at him sideways. He chuckled and said, “Good. My strategy is working.” To which I replied, “Oh yes … strategic oblivion. Good idea!!” And we both fell out with laughter.

… and what am I learning lately.

This is a new synchroblog co-ordinated by Glenn Hager at Re-dreaming the Dream. I learned about it from Erin. The theme resonates with a lot of the thinking I’ve been doing lately, so I thought I’d participate.

So here’s my list … in no particular order other than the order in which I thought of them.

– I learned that women are second class citizens in God’s economy.

– I learned that the Bible can be used like statistics … to prove anything that the user wants it to prove. It’s not a beacon of love; it’s a weapon to bludgeon people with.

– I learned that faith and religion are interchangeable.

– I learned that Jesus is a Republican and I’d better be too or my salvation would be null and void. I also learned that Jesus is a free-market capitalist who looked down on welfare cheats because they leached off the system.

– I learned that America is now God’s promised land and we are God’s new people.

– I learned that church is just like any other social group … only it’s rules are more strict and they’ll exclude you in a flash if you break them.

What I’m learning lately … is there is no second-class … or first-class … in God’s economy. We are all on equal footing, equal creations in the eyes of the Creator. There is no separate but equal to Her. There is just, is. We just are. We are just created. Different, yes. But that does not mean that some get to do some things and others not … that does not mean that all can sin equally but that all cannot serve equally. We are indeed equal … equally loved, equally serving, equally gifted. Anything else is a lie.

I cannot discern how to use the Bible as anything other than a love letter to me. I rarely use it in conversation anymore. There are bits and pieces that are meaningful to me and I might quote those, as people quote poetry or other pieces of literature that are meaningful. But using proof texts and finding pieces that “prove” my point in a legal argument seems to miss the mark of God’s intent with his Word to us.

I’m losing my religion and keeping my faith … in large part because it seems that people in charge of the church lied. They are way more interested in keeping their own patch of turf than in understanding God or Jesus or the Holy Spirit and passing the understanding on.

Well … Jesus and politics or economics just stands on it’s own. He pretty much spoke out against the powers of his age and I’m certain he’d speak out against Republicans AND Democrats now.

God only has one promised land and promised people. Israel. Now. Here’s the kicker. He sent the Israelites out of the Promised Land around 2,000 years ago and He hasn’t brought them back. So a lot of the current troubles that are happening in the Middle East. Yeah. Those are man made. I could write a book … no, several books … on why the current Middle East troubles have nothing whatsoever to do with God bringing the Jews back to Israel and everything to do with men doing it. No, I’m not a conspiracy theorist or anything. It’s just that God was not in that. People were. So there will not be any peace or redemption or reconciliation. There will be war. And as for the US … we are not God’s promised land or promised people despite any songs we might sing or secret ambitions we might have. We’re just lucky. There but for the grace of God go us; we really ought to be a little more grateful, and a little less arrogant.

I learned in the Bible that church is supposed to be Christ’s Bride, His Body here on earth. I learned in church that it’s just another social group with strict social rules that need to be followed in order to be included. It’s part of the faith vs. religion thing. But all churches are social groups. All of them. In order to be part of one, you must follow the rules. The first rule is that they are not really Jesus followers. That’s only part of the show. If you really want to be a Jesus follower, you’d do best to leave the church and do that on your own time. The church is too busy with their own parties … err ministries … to bother with the things that Jesus talks about. Above all … don’t ever ask anyone to talk to God about what they’re doing. Don’t ever suggest that anyone in leadership pray to God about their participation in an issue. Don’t ever suggest that following Jesus might mean stopping and listening sometimes. Don’t think outside the box. Don’t ask questions. Don’t quibble with leaders. Don’t be free. I’m learning that on my own it’s just possible that I might be able to hear God again. Maybe. I hope so. I’ve been missing him.

UPDATE (Aug 5):

Here’s a list of all the folks who participated in this synchroblog … they’ve got a lot of great things to say, but make sure you read Glen’s Summary here … it’s really, really good:

Glenn @ Re-dreaming the Dream: Synchroblog (Introduction)

Erin @ Decompressing Faith: Think Of It As “Agapeology.”

Alan @ The Assembling of the Church: Here I Am To Worship.

Heather @ A Deconstructed Christian: 15 Things I Learned From and Another 15 I Am Learning Lately

Jim @ Lord, I Believe; Help My Unbelief : Some Ecclesiastical Paradoxes

Lew @ The Pursuit: It’s A Grace vs. Works Thing

Lyn @ Beyond the 4 Walls: Learning To be “Proper”

Paul @ One For The Road : A Gracious Voice

Benjamin @ Justice and Compassion: Pithy and Provocative

Julie @ Onehandclapping: Faith, Certainty, and Tom Cruise

Aaron @ Regenerate: Hope

Monte @ Monte Asbury’s Blog: Jesus Doesn’t Matter Much

Rachael @ Justice and Compassion Rachael Stanton

Glenn @ Re-dreaming the Dream: Unsaid Communication

Glenn @ Re-dreaming the Dream: Reflections About Refugees (Summary Reflection)

This is what we had for dinner the other night: