Learning to abide in care
What does it mean to be a community of care? How can we deepen in our care for one another in a world so caught up in efficiency and the self-protection of individualism?
Sisterly solidarity, crisis in Cameroon
Beheaded bodies lying in the streets. Stray dogs and pigs picking at human corpses on the roadside. Vibrant communities silenced and still, everyone indoors, too afraid to go to school or to the market. Roadblocks stopping travel, isolating entire villages. A pregnant woman delivers a baby who doesn’t survive because they can’t get to the…
Breaking down the walls because ‘tú eras mi otra yo’
I once stood near the United States-Mexico border. In the journey to this edge, I witnessed the evidence of militarization: guns, checkpoints, armored vehicles, cameras. The steel fence rose from the sandy earth like a misplaced mountain. I felt my body tense from the feeling of surveillance. I felt the unease and sorrow that seemed…
Reconfiguring my discipleship
The sisters and I are finished with eating our dinner, but remain seated at the table. I am sharing from a vulnerable place, telling a story about my struggles, growth and the challenge of being a healthy and balanced human. Then, our conversation is interrupted by a strange, loud squawking noise coming from the top…
Fear, faith and the flu
I am not a germaphobe by nature, but this year’s flu season has me in a tizzy of microbial paranoia. Daily news reports about the severity of this specific flu strain and the extent of the epidemic have fueled my anxiety, as did a recent email from my daughters’ school informing us of confirmed flu…
We walk together: reflections of the Women’s March
Leading up to the Women’s March on Washington last week, I noticed a lot of #WhyIMarch and also #WhyImNotMarching social media posts. Because the spirit, style and mission of the event—seemingly driven by language of “reproductive rights” (a new expression I’ve not yet come to terms with)—didn’t resonate with me, I found my own feelings…
Unfriended
“While he was at table in his house, many tax collectors and sinners came and sat with Jesus and his disciples. The Pharisees saw this and said to his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” ~ Matthew 9:10-11 This past fall, in the final ramp up to the election, I saw…
The Broken Body of Christ at the Border
Last month, I attended Mass at the border; I was part of a community of believers uniting around bread and wine miraculously made into flesh and blood. I was on the Mexican side, sitting on a concrete street curb next to another Catholic sister. Together we were a color pop in the assembly: we stuck…
We are one
Daily readings for October 8, 2016: Gal. 3:22-29; Ps. 105:2-3, 4-5, 6-7; Lk. 11:27-28 You are all one in Christ Jesus. – Gal. 3:28 We live in a society that has a tendency to divide us into enemy camps. Violence and squabbles due to differences like politics or culture have become strangely normalized. No matter…
More good news related to being messy
Ever since the birth of this blog nearly six years ago each discovery of Christian content elsewhere—stuff that also emulates the tone Messy Jesus Business aims to assert—has been a little thrill for me. And by “tone Messy Jesus Business aims to assert” I mean that in this forum we (myself and the Rabble Rousers) try…
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