Brother Fire

This is one speech that didn't make prime time at the DNC, but worth seeing. Peace!

Yesterday, Sen. John McCain selected Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska as his running mate for this year's presidential election. There are so many worthy candidates he could have chosen to be the Republican nominee for Vice-President. And clearly there are special interest voters that he needed to consider when he made his choice: conservatives, evangelical Christians, young voters, moderates, women, environmentalists, undecideds, etc. So I imagine that he must have thought long and hard about who could produce the most votes, as well as who could fill his shoes as President of the United States if needed. So lets take a look to see which votes that John McCain is hoping to garner with this selection. According to a number of sources (take a look here , here and here ), Palin is the Governor of Alaska for only 19 months, and prior to that was a City Council Member (1992-1996) and Mayor (1996-2002) of Wasilla, Alaska (population less that 5,000). She is a staunch social conservative,...

When a friend shared this video with me -- my first thought was, "What a wonderful gift!" Please take a look -- it will make your day. God bless!

I have tried to live a missional life as long as I can remember. I think that I've tried to live a missional life longer than I've known what it means to live a missional life. Some might say that I live an alternative lifestyle. Others might say that I've made some poor decisions when choosing the direction of my life: "Don't go into the helping professions -- you'll never make any money." And one of my favorite comments: "If you got paid for half the volunteer work you've done, you'd be rich!" I see these observations as a sure sign that I'm living missionally. When I say that I live a missional life, it means that I live as though I've been sent to proclaim the Word not only through traditional means (i.e. leading a faith community), but rather living the Gospel in my life's work by modeling Christian living in my day-to-day activities, living the Great Commission -- Missio Dei, everyday! To me, missional is not a technique...

I'm a bit troubled at the conclusion of the Lambeth Conference. Some have declared the conference a success because there was no further splintering or rebellion. How could there be? 250 of the most conservative Bishops were not in attendance, nor was the Bishop who was the focus of the controversy, Bp. V. Gene Robinson. In addition, there were no motions and no church legislation to be voted on. So did anyone leave the Anglican Communion? No. However the victory is hollow considering that nothing was gained during the conference. It seems that the conference was dominated by the American contingency (21% of the Bishops in attendance were from the Episcopal Church of the US). And with alleged "white papers" being distributed by Americans throughout the conference, it seems that their agenda became the focus. What I find most disturbing is that Archbishop Rowan Williams called that there be a moratorium on further consecrations of gay Bishops and that gay-sex is st...

I love being Catholic. I especially love being a progressive, Independent Catholic. I'm at a synod meeting of our li'l denomination (the United American Catholic Church) and I am so proud of the work that we do. I am reading a couple of different books that talk about what many hate about church -- specifically about the mixed message of churches who talk about mission but don't DO mission. We are a church of doers! My hope is that I can plant, build and grow a church of doers. By the way, the picture above is (from left to right): Bishop Anthony Hash, Father Christopher Ross, myself and Father Tom Shortell.