Sometimes changes in our lives need acknowledgment or ritual. We have lived long enough to accumulate wisdom, experiences, wounds, and redemption, and we need a way to say “Yes! These are the gifts that have brought me this far.” Then we get to decide if we want to take them into our future. Or we can let them stay in our past, as a chapter ending that marks the end of one time and the beginning of something new. I think about the moment I transitioned from pastoring churches. I… Read More
I’ve been among the privileged to be with Rep. John Lewis on a few occasions over the past few years. During many of the meetings, I listened to him tell a story of when he as a young teen. He would go to visit places like Selma or Birmingham or Montgomery. He would see signs on the building entrances that said, “Whites Enter Here,” and “Blacks Enter Here.” When he went home, he would ask his mother and father why those signs existed. They said, “That is just the way it… Read More
“The rich and the poor meet together; the Lord is the maker of them all.”– Proverb 22:2 Parents all over the world are stressing out. What are they going to do with their children this fall? How will they continue their education if they can’t go to school? What if they go to school and then contract the virus? In response, we are seeing a radical acceleration of creative solutions. One parent noted in an online emergent leadership group, “Almost overnight, social media groups and parenting networks are exploding with facebook groups, matchups, and spreadsheets… Read More
I was in a cohort of business leaders from around the world. One was from Zimbabwe, one from Amsterdam, and one from Paris. We were exploring the question: “What do we wish for this emerging world?” “I don’t want to go back to how I was living before,” my colleague in Paris said. “I wish I could just see what is coming,” said my colleague from Zimbabwe. “I want to read the future and see how this all plays out.” “I love the pace I am living right now. I’m scared of what… Read More
First, a note of gratitude to you: I took two weeks off from writing this meditation in order to rest, to heal, to listen and to pray. I spent time reading books about antiracism, emergence theory, mysticism…and one trashy romance novel. I walked in the woods and took naps. I paused to listen to my body, listen to the stories of black bodies being broken, and listen to the grief wracking and wrecking us as a culture. Thank you for your generous patience. I’m back. This week I had the wonderful opportunity to… Read More
Everything is breaking. White racism is breaking black lives. National leaders are breaking our laws and institutions. Our “closed” economy is disproportionately breaking the poor. Our fear of each other is breaking our communities. Our denial of reality is breaking our hope for a better world. Everything is breaking. As scary as it is…let it break. Let it break our bigotry. Let it break our hate. Let it break our fear, our privilege, our aggression, our silence. Let it break capitalism, our failed national leaders, our systems that oppress. Let it all break. When… Read More
Each of us has days when we are hopeful about the world that might emerge from this pandemic. Then we have days when we are heartbroken with grief over all that has changed and what we have lost. Today, I am heartbroken. I am heartbroken that we live in a world where a 25-year-old black man named Ahmaud Arbery goes out for a jog. Two white men, a father and son, believed he looked like a person responsible for a series of home invasions in the community. They call the… Read More
We need a new Story. The “Great Lockdown” is revealing that the old Story we have been using to give meaning to Western life can’t handle our new reality. The old story promotes individualism, “us” vs. “them” duality, inequality and a relentless consumerism that was driving us and the planet to death. Now, we get to create a new story about a new world that is possible because of this global pandemic. What kind of world shall we create? What do you want to be able to say about yourself?… Read More
We’ve passed a meaningful milestone. We have now lost more Americans to COVID-19 than to the Vietnam war. That number is hard to take in: 63,538 souls so far. It’s all so terrible. Where we go from this “dark night of the soul,” seems hard to discern. Moving forward toward a better world while heartbroken for those we leave behind is a torture I had not considered when this began. We must hold on and let go. I hope you are being gentle with yourself. I don’t want to rush… Read More
I’ve spent the last few days reading and researching extensively about the social impact of plagues over the course of history. I’ve needed to do this as part of a larger writing project. It’s not something I recommend for most of us. But let me tell you some highlights of what I have learned: These kinds of cataclysmic events fundamentally reshape human culture, often for the better. Those with wealth always fair better than those without it. NOTE: We should not repeat history this time around. We know better; now… Read More