When tragedy occurs we naturally want to reach out with words of comfort. We have to do better than “thoughts and prayers.”
We’ve been pelted with tragedies—some human created and others of nature---and many of us are reflecting and praying. Texas mass shootings, multiple other mass shootings, Hurricane Dorian, many ...
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The Blogs
Spiritual director are not preachers, missionaries or evangelists. Our primary job is to listen. With that in mind, there is no proselytizing in spiritual direction.
Our ethical standard goes even beyond the Golden Rule: Do to
others as you would have done to you. Spiritual directors are to treat our
clients ...
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Breathe your way into prayer with this practice found in my book 50 Ways to Pray.
When meeting with a spiritual director, they may ask you what it is you desire most in life. That’s because our deepest, truest desires are one way God reaches out to us to say “walk in this way.” Because of this, I recommend the desire prayer as a spiritual ...
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Spiritual direction training programs are unlike any other school you might attend. They are a hybrid of a retreat, a spiritual formation class and intensive training.
So often I’m asked, “Can you make a living off spiritual
direction?” The answer is not simple because, of course, it all depends on the
person, the market and the philosophy. Spiritual Directors International has
now had two webinars on the subject (I contributed to the first one) and when
you watch these, ...
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Increasingly, people “done with Christianity” are showing up
in spiritual direction. White evangelical Christian support for Donald Trump through
a troubled presidency is causing some young adults to “break up with their
church” and others to avoid church altogether. [1]
I saw the statistics and heard lots of commentary on this, but it ...
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Within the Christian context, most of us know the passage in
James that says “faith without works is dead.” And that is certainly true. But
what I observe in many churches (especially progressive liberal ones) is that “works
without faith are deadening.”
Both are true--they are two sides of the same coin. We ...
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For some time now, the motto of my denomination, the United Church of Christ, has been “God is still speaking.” This leaves us to wonder: how do we listen?
It’s such an important question.
What is God’s voice like? Is it still and small? The sound of sheer silence? Is it ...
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Part of my task as a spiritual director these days is coming to terms with parts of myself that get in the way of inner growth. The part I find most disturbing is my Inner Donald Trump.
As I work with my own spiritual director around archetypes (a pattern, model ...
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