Oct 15, 2025
Dear friends in Christ, As I have mentioned here before, each month I pray my way through the complete psalter as I say morning and evening prayer. This practice is a rich gift that I commend to each of you. (You can find the headings within the prayer book’s psalter so you know which psalms […]
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 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 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 16, 2025
Dear friends in Christ, This coming Sunday’s epistle reading brings us the beginning of St. Paul’s letter to the Colossians. Here’s an excerpt, one of the great highlights in the whole New Testament, if you ask me: He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; for in him all things […]
Jul 9, 2025
Dear friends in Christ, I often urge people to pray daily, even when they don’t feel like it. Yesterday, I followed my own advice. I don’t always succeed, but yesterday when it was time for evening prayer, I said my prayers even though I wasn’t feeling it. Having just read the news of the nation […]
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 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 […]