Singing Along the Journey
Thoughts about faith and wholeness set to the soundtrack of life

Preparing the way…part the second

After days of pitching out mementos and piles of paper, sending books to new homes, taking no longer needed clothing to a place where it was more in need and building furniture with confusing but ultimately accurate cartoon drawings to guide my assembly process...after all those days doing cleanup and reorganization the day finally came:  the first day of orientation. [caption id="attachment_2138" align="alignleft" width="300"] Okay, I look more than a little nervous.[/caption] And so I spent yesterday getting to know this new community into which I have been led.  I met people who had arrived on campus after 16 and 19 hour long flights -- their first airplane flight ever,…
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Preparing the way…part the first

I am deep into my preparations.  I have been deep into my preparations for a while now...I made a lot of unusual (at least for me) choices about how to pass these months so that I would be free to devote myself to this time of preparation. I am, as always, working on my sense of intentionality.   I am aware of change ahead, even if I do not understand its shape or direction. And you ask, what are you doing to prepare?  What is taking all this focus, all this time...what caused you to stay home during this last month of summer?  Hours spent in prayer, reading?  Yoga, meditation, personal…
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Let the adventure begin…

This is the very first post in a brand new writing adventure...a new writing adventure about a new living and learning adventure that begins for me on August 8, 2012. You see, I am finally going to seminary. It is an adventure that has been a long time coming.  A very long time.  Perhaps we would have to say that it is an adventure that began the first time I made my mother explain to me why I, an eight-year-old Presbyterian, could not take holy orders and become a nun.  The question and the call showed itself several times in my life, but I never had the strength or the…
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Creating a new rumor…

All summer, ever since the end of Calvary's 150th anniversary weekend at the beginning of June, there has been something new....something new just out of reach, not visible, not clearly felt, not yet arrived...but there and clear enough to hold my attention now for a couple of months.  And the only framework my conscious mind seems to have with which to understand that feeling is through a story I heard told by John Bell at a recent conference.  I know that I won't get the details right, but that is how it goes when you repeat a story...you repeat it through the lens that has meaning for you. It seems…
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A beautiful day…

Something that I was reading this morning at the gym brought me back with a snap to the moment when the idea for this blog was born...I was riding on a plane to somewhere, who remembers where, and I was reading an amazing book by John O'Donohue, Beauty:  The Invisible Embrace  (John O'Donohue is most known for his work with Celtic poetry and wisdom, published as Anam Cara).  I am not a person normally drawn to the "celtic"...not in music or poetry or, well, anything, but I had heard Krista Tippet interview John O'Donohue one Sunday morning.  I was moved by him as a philosopher and I was moved by the…
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Making an allelluia…

There are times in the life of a community that are for celebration and times that are for sorrow.  And, there are times like this one, that are for both. And it was that smile that I remember from the first time I met Dee.  In those first few moments of conversation, when I sat eating a sandwich in a place I had never been, about to embark on a journey I could not imagine, I learned in a few short minutes of small talk that this woman sitting next to me was a pioneer, an educator,  a worker for social justice, a lover of nature, and a lover of all…
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Your input most urgently requested…

In a life fueled by freelance music and church work such as mine, this is a difficult time of year.  You are not really not busy, but as the seasons of work wind down to the days of summer, what really looms before you is the work of planning your next season -- beginning new projects, submitting ideas to concert series to procure performance dates, working on classes to start in the fall, and so forth.  This year, for me, added to all this planning and thinking and arranging is the spector of returning to school full-time:  not knowing how much time I will have available to freelance work, not knowing…
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Thinking about…

...Pentecost.  Yes, this is an official church-nerd-out-of-control post. Well, maybe not.  Maybe it is just me being sentimental.  You see, this Pentecost Sunday (May 27, 2012) will be the second anniversary of my licensing by the Calvary Baptist Church (you can read about it here).  That day was the beginning of many wonderful changes for me.  And as I embrace the remembrance of that first Pentecost again this year, I am about to step off on yet another adventurous  path along the way.  I have been accepted to the program in Christian Formation at the Virginia Theological Seminary in Alexandria, VA. I have no idea where I am going, but…
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Why, and on whose authority?

If my mother were still with us and you could ask her, she would tell you that "Why?" and "Who says?" are two questions that I have asked since the moment I first understood how to ask a question.  I was one of those children, you know, the kind who drive all adults around them to total distraction with repeated questions about how the world works and why it works that way and who says it works that way.  Clearly, asking the big questions and living in a world of questions has been part of my spirit since, well, since forever. So it is probably not surprising to anyone that one of…
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And the question stays forever the same…

I am fascinated by this simple fact:  no matter what I am reading, no matter what I am studying, no matter what paper I am writing, the question, ultimately, stays the same.  And that question?  What kind of disciple are you called to be and how, on your own journey? Can you be of help in the formation of those who choose to walk along beside you, and if yes, how? Everything, always, comes down to the question of discipleship and formation, at least, for me. Today's task is to complete one of two blog posts for my independent study course about technology and faith.  The paragraphs which follow share…
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