One of the jokes going around has it that being a Canadian these days is like living over a meth lab. When I first heard this line, it was in reference to the intentionally stoked fear and loathing that currently characterize U. S. political discourse. What the joke didn’t address was the fact that even …
Recently, my sister introduced me to the term “false flat.” The phrase, coined by bicyclists, refers to a stretch that appears to offer easy riding but actually inclines uphill. The rider is seduced into expecting an effortless peddle but instead has to keep pumping. When you’ve anticipated coasting, it makes the ride that much harder. …
We had never met although we had friends in common, interests in common, were about the same age and lived in villages just down the road from each other. Now I was never going to know her. So I thought. +++ +++ +++ I got the text from a mutual friend, who knew I might …
Note to the Reader: This theological paper was written three years ago. For many of you, communion isn’t an important issue, and the length of the paper will be daunting (21 pages). But if you, like me, struggle with the meaning and practice of the sacrament of communion, this may be of interest. Part One: …
A teacher of mine once defined attention as the most genuine form of love. He taught me this using a rock, which I was to observe for 15 minutes without composing metaphors, rehearsing geological history, or discerning the face of Jesus in the markings on its side. I was simply to see it, stripped of …
Note: This appeared in the September 2012 edition of The United Church Observer, but I forgot to post it here! I fell in love with Slocan Lake in southern B.C. the same way I fell in love as a teenager: head over heels, infatuated, besotted, enamoured. I couldn’t stop sneaking peeks: green mountain …
AN IMPORTANT NOTE: Each year, the Slocan Lake Stewardship Society—which I currently serve as president of the board—hosts a “Lake Lies and Tall Tales” event where community members tell stories and compete for prizes. This year, the “most fishy” tale was awarded a gallon of fish fertilizer, and the best story won a photo of …
January, 2009 The nun Sister John of the Cross, the central character in the novel Lying Awake, has spent long, dry decades in a Carmelite cloister outside Los Angeles, praying and waiting for a tangible sign of God. As the book opens, she has finally begun living the contemplative’s dream: daily ecstatic union with the …
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