Professor Helen Vendler says that Emily Dickinson changed the first word of the fourth line the poem "Safe in their Alabaster Chambers" from "sleep" to "lie," and she says so because she believes--and, on the face of the earth today,…

“Pastor, can I ask you a question?” Joe asked me less than five minutes before the worship service is about to begin.   “Umm, sure…” I rather hesitantly replied, choir members mulling about the narthex around us preparing to circle…

1 Kings 19:9-14 Then the word of the Lord came to him, saying, ‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’ He answered, ‘I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts; for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars,…

As Christians—and most certainly as Trinitarian Christians who believe that God is a vibrant community of love and mutuality among three distinct Persons—we know that human beings created in the image of the Triune God were created for community.   But…

I was supposed to answer the question “Why do I write?” on a page you can find by clicking on “The 12” button atop this page.  Instead of finding my answer to that question there, you will see that I…

We can say for sure that the United States was not founded on a Christian basis. How do we know? From the testimony of prominent public theologians on both sides of the Civil War. Since that was an epochal conflict…

I began my day yesterday talking about pastoral care in the midst of grief and loss with twenty-nine seminary students. I ended my day reading articles about Joe Paterno, Jerry Sandusky, and the toppling of the iconic establishment known as…

As an "immigrant" to the Reformed tradition, I have often found that some of the "natives" in the tradition resonate with Chaim Potok's The Chosen--a staple of high school curricula (or at least the Chrisitan school curricula with which I'm…

I was staying in a hotel on one of those ubiquitous suburban strips—big box stores, gas stations, car lots, the usual suspects of restaurants.   Figuring it would be circuitous and challenging to drive the quarter mile to the restaurant on…