At the Easter vigil, we sit in darkness. It’s the first time I’ve brought my family to this service. The dark church is a new experience for my three children. My 7-year-old is fixated on the small flickering candle in my hand, whispering questions about the dripping wax and helping me to blow it out…
In my religious education, service began with keeping score. Confirmation was scheduled for Spring of eighth grade, but my classmates and I understood that reception of the sacrament was reserved for those who completed the requisite checklist. The list item that loomed largest was obtaining sign-off on 30 service hours. Eighth graders could be found…
“People always treatin’ me like a trash can.” This was a common chorus of a friend of mine, Crete, before his death a couple years ago. His life told the story of a kingdom of God that upended the dominant logic of the American dream – dressed in all its individualism and fragmentation, the stingy…
It’s Lent in the Catholic world. Prayer, fasting, almsgiving. I love Lent. It’s my favorite liturgical season. I think it’s because I’m action-oriented and Lent is about changing behaviors and seeing how that impacts both us and others for the better. Whether I’m fasting, giving, or praying, the whole season seems to say to me,…
Am I the only one who feels dizzy from daily news slaps? Minneapolis. Venezuela. Greenland. Last year we had a solid alternative vision. Pope Francis declared 2025 as the Jubilee Year of Hope and we were all pilgrims, journeying together in faith. I grasped that proclamation like a lifesaver. It anchored me as I watched…
I sit at my desk, gazing out the sliding glass doors as snow falls in large, deliberate flakes — like manna falling from heaven, I think. In a moment that feels like a meandering journey through an unforgiving desert, the image of nourishment is welcome, even if it’s only enough for today. Open and face-down…
I’ve been thinking about misogyny and the church even more than usual. A week ago, an ICE agent shot and murdered a woman named Renee Good, without reason or provocation. Days later, men who identify as Christian continue to defend the murderer, mock the victim, make jokes about her death, and say that she was…
Episode 99 of Messy Jesus Business podcast, with Sister Julia Walsh. In this episode of Messy Jesus Business podcast, Sister Julia Walsh, FSPA talks with Kaitlin Curtice. They explore Indigenous spirituality, the power of stories, the cyclical nature of being, expansiveness and liminality, the difference between certainty and faith, joy in art, Mother Earth, community,…
Episode 97 of Messy Jesus Business podcast, with Sister Julia Walsh. In this episode of Messy Jesus Business podcast, Sister Julia Walsh, FSPA talks with Vincent Noth, executive director of the Kinship Community Food Center in Milwaukee. They explore faith, segregation, inequality, systemic racialized poverty, mystical experience, food as entry point to community, mutuality, accompaniment,…
Episode 95 of Messy Jesus Business podcast, with Sister Julia Walsh. In this episode of Messy Jesus Business podcast, Sister Julia Walsh, FSPA talks with author and podcast host Matthew Sitman. They explore conversion to Catholicism, the breadth and universality of the Catholic Church, humility and openness, cancel culture, Pope Francis, mercy, ideology, relationships, being…
Episode 94 of Messy Jesus Business podcast, with Sister Julia Walsh. In this episode of Messy Jesus Business podcast, Sister Julia Walsh, FSPA talks with author and poet Cole Arthur Riley. They explore embodiment, resisting meritocracy, story, collective memory, letter writing, resistance, the tension between practice and belief, interiority, and much more. Podcast: Play in new…
My heart is torn in two by the situation in Palestine and Israel. Every day the situation sounds more dire and I feel more helpless. In seeking for some clarity I reached out to my former Quaker campus minister at Guilford College, Max Carter. He lived and served in the Palestinian West Bank in the…
