Oct 1, 2025
Dear friends in Christ, Last Sunday I visited a church to hear a preacher. It turns out I’m married to the preacher, so I wanted to hear her! I thought the sermon was excellent, but that’s not the point of this week’s reflection. Sherilyn (my spouse) was preaching at St. Thomas Episcopal Church in Terrace […]
Sep 17, 2025
Dear friends in Christ, This coming Sunday, we will hear a lesson from the First Letter to Timothy, in which St. Paul writes that God “desires everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.” St. Paul here is echoing his Lord Jesus, who commanded us to preach the Gospel to […]
Sep 3, 2025
Dear friends in Christ, The collect from last Sunday, which we use every day this week in the Daily Office, is a good one: Lord of all power and might, the author and giver of all good things: Graft in our hearts the love of your Name; increase in us true religion; nourish us with […]
Aug 20, 2025
Dear friends in Christ, As you receive this, I am beginning a brief vacation. Seeing the world is a great joy of mine, and I find time away from work to be refreshing and even essential. We who follow Jesus would do well to notice how he rested in his earthly ministry. He kept the weekly sabbath, […]
Aug 13, 2025
Dear friends in Christ, I’m writing this week’s email from Camp Allen, the camp & conference center of the Diocese of Texas. This week I’m attending a gathering of church leaders from all over, focused how we can share resources as a church so that we can carry out God’s mission. It’s tempting to view […]
Aug 6, 2025
Dear friends in Christ, I was recently re-reading Forward Movement’s first publication from 1935. On the last page, there’s a powerful prayer “For Zeal.” Almighty God, whose Son Jesus Christ came to cast fire upon the earth, grant that by the prayers of Thy faithful people a fire of burning zeal may be kindled and pass from […]
Jul 23, 2025
Dear friends in Christ, This coming Sunday, the lectionary gives us the gift of Jesus teaching his disciples the Lord’s Prayer. Sometimes when I pray this prayer, it occurs to me that I’m saying a prayer that Jesus himself taught, and it knocks me over. I invite you to go look up Luke 11:1-13 in […]
Jul 2, 2025
Dear friends in Christ, A few weeks ago, my predecessor as Forward Movement’s head, the Rev. Dick Schmidt, reached out to me. He was going to be in town, and he wanted to come by the office with a friend of Forward Movement to meet me and other staff. Mike (pictured here) first got in […]
Jun 25, 2025
Dear friends in Christ, The news can be exhausting. It’s easy to begin to believe that the world is spinning out of control, that evil will have the last word. But we who follow Jesus know that grace and mercy always have the last word. The mighty empire tried to extinguish God’s love on Calvary, […]
Jun 18, 2025
Dear friends in Christ, Today, as I write this, it is Tuesday evening. The reading for evening prayer includes part of the twelfth chapter of St. Luke’s Gospel, in which Jesus holds a denarius and tells his followers to give to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and give to God what is God’s. Divine worship is […]