Vox Veniae Podcast: Recent Episodes
Vox Veniae
The work of the people. Our weekly rhythm of being together as a larger community to WORSHIP and CONFESS, to engage SCRIPTURE and PRAYER, to celebrate EUCHARIST, and to be sent back into the city with a BENEDICTION each and every week.
On Trinity Sunday, we conclude our series, Teach Em How To Say Goodbye: Jesus’ Parting Words to a Community in Transition, which looked at the final discourse of Jesus with his disciples before the whirlwind of his death, resurrection, and ascension. Today, we consider how God is shaping our leadership for our own lives, our faith community, and the larger world. [John 16:12-15]
Reflection
- In what ways can I courageously lead in my larger community?
- What can I do to tend to my full self while I am doing that?
On Pentecost, we are in the penultimate message in the series, Teach Em How To Say Goodbye: Jesus’ Parting Words to a Community in Transition, which looks at the final discourse of Jesus with his disciples before the whirlwind of his death, resurrection, and ascension. Today, we consider how God might be inviting us to bear witness to beauty and brokenness, as we humbly listen to one another’s stories. [John 14:15-27]
Reflection
- As we sit together in our own metaphorical upper room, can we pray together that the Holy Spirit would astound us with unexpected beauty?
- How might God be inviting you to speak into or bear witness to another’s beauty and brokenness?
- How might God be breathing beauty or possibility into the broken places in or around you?
On the seventh Sunday of Easter, we continue in the series, Teach Em How To Say Goodbye: Jesus’ Parting Words to a Community in Transition, which looks at the final discourse of Jesus with his disciples before the whirlwind of his death, resurrection, and ascension. Today, we ponder how to be complete in unity by highlighting the unique ways we have been created and called to illuminate God’s Love. [John 17:20-26]
Reflection
- What difference does it make to hear Jesus praying for Vox Veniae, churches across our continent, and the global church?
- Is there a specific way you or Vox could show oneness with other Christians from whom you are divided?
- How might you begin to pray for people who will be part of Vox and the global church in future?
We pick up in our series, Teach Em How To Say Goodbye: Jesus’ Parting Words to a Community in Transition, which looks at the final discourse of Jesus with his disciples before the whirlwind of his death, resurrection, and ascension. On this sixth Sunday of Easter, we confront transition as an inevitable part of life and consider what it is to wake up to Jesus making a home in our everyday lives. [John 14:23-24, 28-29]
Reflection
- How might our collective faith buoy us in seasons where our personal faith is lagging?
- Is there an invitation for you to keep company with Jesus?
- How might our experience of loss and joy be in transformative conversation?
On the fifth Sunday of Easter, we begin a new series, Teach Em How To Say Goodbye: Jesus’ Parting Words to a Community in Transition, which looks at the final discourse of Jesus with his disciples before the whirlwind of his death, resurrection, and ascension. On this graduation Sunday, we hear reflections from Olaya Hinojosa and Sam Malare about how they are navigating this transition. [John 13:31-35]
Reflection
- How do you navigate challenging feelings during times of transition?
- What legacy of love has been shared with you?
- How might God’s Love guide you and ground you in times of transition?
What is Divine goodness inviting us into? On the fourth Sunday of Easter, giving his last homily as a pastor at Vox, Weylin Lee recalls moments of Divine goodness through the restoration of contemplation, comfort through solidarity, and mercy through nonviolence. [Psalm 23]
Reflection
- Where can I make space to reflect in stillness and truly rest?
- How might I practice presence with those experiencing a dark valley?
- How am I invited to adopt a lens of abundance in practicing mercy?
What is that thing you just can’t help but do? On the third Sunday of Easter, Vanessa Maleare sifts through our lives in search of our precious and peculiar calling as she juxtaposes our journey with Peter’s call to be God’s Presence in the world. [John 21:15-19]
Reflection
- What is written on your rock?
- What are you being called to in this season?
- What are you being called out of this season?
How might we be tempted to over-identify with our politics in unsettling times? On the second Sunday of Easter, Nic Acosta fasts from being “that guy” in regards to seeing everything solely through a political identity and challenges us to question how a purity psychology of politics might subtly supplant our love for Christ and neighbor. [John 12:1-8]
Reflection
- Has purity thinking affected how I relate to other with different political views?
- What are some ways I can practice detaching my sense of self from my political views?
- How can I lean into Christ as the true source of my identity?
How does Easter invite us to live into the unexpected experiences of rebirth? On Easter Sunday, Weylin Lee beckons us to the Risen Christ through unexpected loss, listening to unexpected voices, and reimagining unexpected hope. [Luke 24:1-12]
Reflection
- How might the places of loss in our lives be generating rebirth?
- What unexpected voices are inviting us to disrupt our lens of normalcy?
- How might we expand our imagination of hope?
How might we put our nonviolent resistance into words? On Palm Sunday, Gena St. David draws inspiration from both the nonviolent example of Jesus and the nonviolent practice during the civil rights era on how we might resist dehumanizing evil and injustice. [Luke 22:47-54]
Reflection
- How might we draw courage from Jesus’ response to violence?
- How might you practice nonviolence toward yourself this week?
- Which violent patterns might you wish to interrupt?
How might some of our unquestioned core beliefs keep us from growing in the Life of Christ? On the fifth Sunday of Lent, Christopher Mack wonders how we might jump off the treadmill of unfulfilled dreams and imagine what arrival at purpose and belonging in the Life of Christ looks like. [Philippians 3:7-14]
Reflection
- Are there some dreams for your life that seem ill-fitting in light of the life of Christ?
- Does understanding the love of God we experience and extend to others as cruciform, invite you to reexamine your own belovedness or someone else’s?
- How does the cruciform love of God expand your longing and understanding of bearing good fruit?
Resources
- Book: Letters and Papers from Prison by Dietrich Bonhoeffer
- Book: The Selfless Way of Christ: Downward Mobility and the Spiritual Life by Henri Nouwen
- PDF: Core Beliefs Info Sheet from Therapist Aid
- https://www.therapistaid.com/worksheets/core-beliefs-info-sheet
- Podcast: Don Koch, John Mark McMillan, Thomas Torrey, hosts, “Redefining Success” You Have Permission (podcast), March 24, 2025, accessed April 2, 2025.
https://megaphone.link/TOREC2388149299
How does being made new connect with peacemaking? On the fifth Sunday of Lent, Christopher Mack considers what is required for healthy new growth in our lives and community. [Philippians 3]
Reflection
- Are there some dreams for your life that seem ill-fitting in light of the life of Christ?
- Does understanding the love of God we experience and extend to others as cruciform invite you to reexamine your own belovedness or someone else’s?
- How does the cruciform love of God expand your longing and understanding of bearing good fruit?
What does it look like for us to care for one another’s pain? On the third Sunday of Lent, Gena St. David and Weylin Lee bear witness to pain & injustice, collaborative peacemaking, and hope. [Isaiah 55]
Reflection
- Where do you notice scapegoating inside us and between us today?
- Who is “an opponent” you might wish to get to know better as a person?
- How are you becoming a source of “unexpected kindness” toward someone?
Are you longing to fit into empire or for belonging in the Kingdom of God? On the second Sunday of Lent, Kimberly Culbertson contrasts the allure of empire to the way we show up to protect one another in the Kingdom of God. [Luke 13:31-35]
Reflection
- Where might God be inviting you to challenge the status quo of empire and lean more into a kingdom mindset?
- In this season of Lent, how are you creating space to examine the longings of your heart?
- What is one way you might let God gather you under her wings this week?
What do we need to let go of in order to bear good fruit in our lives? On the first Sunday of Lent Christopher Mack looks to Jesus’ triumph over evil, injustice, and suffering as opening a way for us to ground pain in Divine Love . [Luke 4:1-13]
Reflection
- As we begin Lent, is there a place where you feel acutely depleted or empty?
- Where do fears, resentments, and insecurities threaten to block your ability to see God at work?
- How can you listen to the Nonviolent Forgiving Way in silence?
Resources
- Book: Wondrous Encounters for Lent by Richard Rohr
- Book: Breathing Underwater: Spirituality and the Twelve Steps by Richard Rohr
- Music: Sanctuary: Exploring the Healing Path by Alana Levandoski
- Podcast: The Cosmic We, season 4, episode 1 (Albuquerque, NM: Center for Action and Contemplation, 2023)
- https://cac.org/podcasts/crisis/
- Video: Contemplative Sit 12-Minute Meditation by Dr. Barbara A. Holmes (Albuquerque, NM: Center for Acton and Contemplation, 2023) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGU8QusRjD0
What do you feel separate from in your life? On this Transfiguration Sunday, Lilly Ettinger reminds us that creative transformation often comes in times when we experience great challenge and turmoil. [2 Corinthians 3:12-4:2]
Reflection
- In what ways do we struggle with “veils” that obscure our understanding of God and ourselves?
- How might you open yourself to Jesus’ transformative work in an area of your life where you veil a “veil” remains?
- What steps can you take to confront the veils that obscure God’s light in your relationships, work, or community?
When you encounter systems of oppression do you tend to shrink or fight? Kimberly Culbertson acknowledges the conflicts we encounter all around us and within us, inviting us to creatively resist the destructive violence, and imagine a world in harmony with God’s Reign. [Luke 6:27-30, 35b-36]
Reflection
- How might you lean into the creativity of a third way when you are caught in the either/or thinking of shrinking or fighting as you encounter systematic oppression?
- When you encounter dissonance, how open are you to repentance as a move toward greater freedom and strength in relationships and community?
- How compassionate are you toward yourself when you make missteps in your pursuit of justice and right relationship?
How does remembering our past shape who we are becoming together in the coming years? Christopher Mack facilitates a panel of Carol Lee, Hannah Friesen, and John Bagwell, longtime members of Vox, as they tell the story of what has made Vox such a special community. This is in conversation with our scripture which talks about the importance of roots both for resilience in times of adversity and for bearing good fruit in the years to come. [Jeremiah 17:5-10]
Reflection
- How has your time at Vox shaped your spiritual journey?
- Where are you hoping to bear fruit in your own life this season?
- Is there an invitation for you to become more rooted in spiritual community?
How can we pay attention to the conversation of Majesty and Mystery in our own humble lives?
On the fifth Sunday after Epiphany, Christopher Mack connects our experience of Divine Majesty to our need to receive and give mercy in a way authentic to our calling. [Isaiah 6:1-8]
Reflection
- What is your soul longing for today?
- How can we validate the deeper questions of one another’s lives?
- Where do you need to see yourself or others more clearly and compassionately?
What might it mean to be exceptional? On the fourth Sunday after Epiphany, Vanessa Maleare invites us to see the Divine guiding us to harness our power through acts of mercy, resistance, and hope rooted in God’s Beloved Community. [Luke 2:22-38]
Reflection
- How do I see God’s movement around me?
- Do I hear an invitation?
- Does the invitation align with who God is?
As we reflect on how Christ is revealed during the season of epiphany, how are we invited to embody the good news Jesus lived and taught? On the third Sunday after Epiphany, Weylin Lee guides us to meet this moment of uncertainty with a robust embodiment of the good news of Jesus the Christ. [Luke 4:14-21]
Reflection
- How do we respond to unexpected invitations to embody good news?
- What opportunities resonate for us to embody good news to the most vulnerable?
- What is our collective work to embody good news as we move into a new season of Vox (4.0)?
On the second Sunday after Epiphany, Lilly Ettinger wonders what happens when we look at spiritual gifts less as markers of our individual superiority and more like gifts to further our common good. [1 Corinthians 12:4-11]
Reflection
- Where do you find communities of mutuality in your life? Where are you looking for them or hoping to find them?
- Where have I seen the beauty of community flourishing, and how can I participate more fully in that?
- What role does vulnerability play in the strength of a community, and how am I invited to lean into it?
What might baptism have meant for Jesus and what might it mean for us today? On the Baptism of the Lord Sunday, Christopher Mack plunges into waters of chaos and upheaval to hear baptism as an invitation to be transformed into the person, who by God’s grace, we are called into becoming…for God, ourselves, and one another. [Isaiah 43:1-2; Luke 3:21-22]
Reflection
- What wisdom have you gained from participating in a community moving through fear and upheaval together?
- How can we reorient ourselves around that which is life-giving, for our flourishing, inviting us into mutuality and interdependent beloved community?
- If you feel you’ve lost sight of who you’re becoming in Christ, how can you listen for the voice calling you beloved this week?
On the second Sunday after Christmas, Aurelia Dávila Pratt reminds us of our true identity as children of God, image bearers, and beloved. Repeating The Jesus Prayer and other intentional phrases and mantras, we are invited to ground ourselves in our deeper meaning and purpose. [Luke 18:9-14]
Reflection
- What helps you remember who you truly are, especially when life feels overwhelming?
- When do you feel most grounded or connected to the Divine within you and around you?
- When have you felt the need to start over, and what gave you the courage to begin again?
How can we create a shared world where God’s love is experienced? On the fourth week of Advent, Vanessa Beltran highlights how moments of shared vulnerability–like Mary’s journey to Elizabeth–are essential to becoming who God created us to be, so we can truly understand God’s blessings. [Luke 1:39-45]
Reflection
- How can you open your heart and life to others in ways that allow both you and them to experience the blessing of God’s love, even in moments of vulnerability or unknowingness?
- In what ways do you sometimes forget that you are blessed by God, and how can community—your relationships with others—help you remember and live into this truth?
- How can you actively create spaces of relational freedom and blessing in your daily interactions, allowing both yourself and others to experience God's love and affirmation?
Is there a part of your life that feels exiled or stuck in a rut? On this third week of Advent, Christopher Mack hears in the message of John the Baptizer, an invitation for our lives to be joyfully undone in the wilderness of waiting. [Luke 3:7-17]
Reflection
- When have you experienced a disruption that led to transformation?
- How can this season of waiting re-envision our way in the world?
- Where is there an invitation for God’s newness in this current disruption?
What comes up for you when you think about uncertainty? Weylin Lee begins our season of advent with three markers for wading into waiting and uncertainty: discerning with imagination; recalling God’s gifts; and embodying a path of love. [Psalm 25]
Reflection
- How might we practice discernment with imagination?
- What are some of God’s gifts that you can recall in this current season?
- What is the path of love you are invited to walk and embody?
How powerful can we be when our one voice is not just one voice? Vanessa Maleare tends to our collective healing with four admonitions inspired from Ecclesiastes: grab your people; conserve energy; grab hold of your joy; and make decisions. [Ecclesiastes 4:9-12]
Reflection
- What are my non-negotiables?
- Who do I have to have around me?
- What is true for me right now?
What does it look like for you to listen to your whole life? Christopher Mack looks for a way see God in those who see differently than us and how to experience communal solidarity in uncertain and challenging times. [Psalm 146:2-3, 5-10]
Reflection
- How might we be centered in God’s Peace this week?
- Where do you find it challenging to bear witness with your whole life?
- How might you reconnect with the larger worlds of creation and community this week?
Resources
- Book: Spiritual Disciplines Handbook: Practices that Transform Us by Adele Ahlberg Calhoun
- Website: Hokusai: Waves of Inspiration https://nelson-atkins.org/art/exhibitions/hokusai-waves-of-inspiration-from-the-museum-of-fine-arts-boston/ :
How do we practice radical welcome? Gena St. David explores how inside each of us exists a wanderer, skeptic, and believer as we conclude our fall series “Who is Vox?” She uses the practice of walking a prayer labyrinth to help us recognize vulnerability, value the winding path, and practice small experiments. [John 3:3-8]
Reflection
- What does the wanderer inside you want from Vox?
- Who at Vox do you trust with your inner skeptic?
- How does the believer inside you wish to participate in Vox?
What is Vox’s invitation and practice of pursuing justice as a spiritual community that seeks to embody Christ? Weylin Lee considers our hospitality to the vulnerable, embodied presence for solidarity, and nonviolent resistance for flourishing in our fall series “Who is Vox?” [Matthew 5:3-6, 10]
Reflection
- Where are the places we can practice hospitality as an act of justice?
- What are some practical ways you can meet physical needs of the vulnerable?
- How might our nonviolent resistance be needed for restorative justice?
Do you have fear around showing up in church spaces? Kimberly Culbertson invites us to embody Jesus together by becoming a community of repair and wholeness in our fall series “Who is Vox?” [John 14:18-19, 25-27]
Reflection
- Thank you for being part of my healing. Love, Kimberly.
- How might God be healing you in this season, both through and for deeper community?
- Who is God asking you to see or champion or smile on in this season?
What is an indicator of a healthy spiritual community? Christopher Mack focuses our fall series “Who is Vox?” on the centrality of community as a rhythm that forms us in the Jesus Way of living, dying, and rising. [John 13:1, 35-38]
Reflection
- What wisdom could we learn if we explored the broader history of the church with humility and curiosity?
- Are there areas of Christian tradition that are unhelpful to our growth, and what would it look like to let go of them and explore other areas?
- What are some ways we might embrace our collective imperfection as a community?
Nic Acosta continues our fall series “Who Is Vox?” by connecting us to being the Body of Christ by delving into what it might mean to embrace both our Christian pluralism and our collective imperfection. [Colossians 1:15-23]
Reflection
- What wisdom could we learn if we explored the broader history of the church with humility and curiosity?
- Are there areas of Christian tradition that are unhelpful to our growth, and what would it look like to let go of them and explore other areas?
- What are some ways we might embrace our collective imperfection as a community?
What’s your reason for getting out of bed? Vanessa Maleare begins our fall series “Who Is Vox?” by introducing our communally crafted purpose statement: Vox Veniae (Voice of Grace) is a spiritual community that seeks to embody Christ by fostering collective healing, pursuing justice, and welcoming wanderers, skeptics, and believers.
Reflection
- How have I defined my personal purpose in the past?
- How do I define my personal purpose now?
- What is Vox doing right now that excites me?
What are ways you know you are loved? On the eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost, Brittany Graves connects our spiritual journey, which starts out the size of a mustard seed to seasons of growth and embracing shifts, while nourishing ourselves in Divine Love. [Mark 4:26-34]
Reflection
- When hearing the text for today, what stands out to you in the parable of the growing seed?
- What spiritual practices are grounding for you?
- What are ways that you know you are loved or you witness the kingdom of God surrounding you?
Where might we compassionately reconsider the messages we are embodying and passing on? On the seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost, Christopher Mack wonders how we might learn to use our words to build a more compassionate world for ourselves and others. [James 3]
Reflection
- Are there words of wisdom you can immerse yourself in over the coming weeks?
- Who is someone whose wise presence you might seek out and from whose practice you might learn?
- How might you choose life giving words for family, friends, and social media this season?
What excites you about what Vox is (or could be) creating? On the sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost, Kimberly Culbertson propels us into creative tension as we consider our communal gait. [Matthew 13:31-34]
Reflection
- How often have you seen yourself as a vital part of the church body versus as a recipient of church services?
- How does the concept of tensegrity shift the way you think about the Vox value of participation?
- Do you see Vox as part of a new imagination or new movement of the church? And if so, what does this energize you toward?
If our practice of faith is to be aligned with the way of Christ, what are we invited to embody? practice? On the fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost, Weylin Lee grounds us in a nonreactive posture of engaging with presence and intention toward others. [James 1:22-27]
Reflection
- How might our posture of listening facilitate a healthier practice of faith?
- What does a more freeing and sustainable practice of faith look like for us?
- How is our practice of faith being guided by the most vulnerable around us?
Resources
Book: This Here Flesh: Spirituality, Liberation, and the Stories that Make Us by Cole Arthur Riley
What comes to mind when you think of Christ’s power? On the fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost, Christopher Mack examines the armor of the oppressive Roman Empire, and how it was reimagined as strength for creative nonviolent resistance in challenging and tumultuous times. [Ephesians 6:10-20]
Reflection
- How might you practice pivoting toward God’s Peace in this season?
- What does it mean to experience God’s Peace without detaching from challenges around you?
- How might we creatively embody God’s Peace for our loved ones? For those marginalized?
When you think of wisdom, what do you usually think of? On the thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost, Lilly Ettinger sees in Wisdom not boredom, over-spiritualizing, or dry asceticism, but joy, celebration, and a way of seeing clearly. Wisdom is an invitation to really live. [Proverbs 9:1-6]
Reflection
- How does the imagery of Wisdom building a house and preparing a feast invite me to live this week?
- How do the metaphors of Wisdom resonate with my understanding of spiritual nourishment and growth?
- What does the invitation to “Leave your impoverished confusion and live!” (The Message) mean for me?
Resources
- Quote: “We will intuitively know how to handle situations which used to baffle us.” -9th Step Promises, Big Book AA
- Quote on Hospitality: “We make sure we always create space to welcome others” -Lilly Ettinger
How much do I look to God as I try to discern what is true and good? On the twelfth Sunday after Pentecost, Kimberly Culbertson acknowledges that to speak the truth requires us to wrestle with our practice of discernment, rather than outsource it to others. [Ephesians 4:24, 29]
Reflection
- What stops me from engaging the practice of discernment?
- What stops me from speaking the truth?
- How can I lean into community as I practice discernment?
Resources
- Prayer: “God, grant me the serenity to accept that there are things I do not know, The courage to speak the truth I do know, And the Wisdom to know that even what I think I know today may seem wrong tomorrow.” –Serenity Prayer revised by Kimberly Culbertson
What are the ways we might impose our own priorities onto Jesus and fail to see him for who he really is? On the tenth Sunday after Pentecost, Nic Acosta reminds us to acknowledge our own biases, how we project them onto Jesus, and how God’s generosity is active among those we consider to be wrong . [John 6:1-15]
Reflection
- What do I find when I engage with Jesus as presented in the Gospels?
- How might our cultural and political biases be keeping us from seeing Jesus clearly?
- How can we be gracious and generous even toward those who misrepresent Christ?
How many of us feel an incongruence throughout liturgy, questioning if we really believe the prayers and psalms passing through our lips? On the ninth Sunday after Pentecost, Vanessa Maleare breathes life into our incongruencies around faith and life by inviting us to make space. [Matthew 14:13-21]
Reflection
- What space are you craving?
- What beliefs are you wrestling and contending with?
- What nourishment are you lacking and who might you ask for what you need?
Resources
- Book: A Faith of Many Rooms: Inhabiting a More Spacious Christianity by Debie Thomas
- Book: Still: Notes on a Mid-Faith Crisis by Lauren Winner
- Book: Feminist Prayers for My Daughter: Powerful Petitions for Every Stage of Her Life by Shannon K. Evans
When you feel joy… how do you know? On the eighth Sunday after Pentecost, Gena St. David, delves into the relationship between joy and grief and points us to how embodying joy can be an act of sacred resistance. [2 Samuel 6:14-19]
Reflection
- When you’re experiencing joy what do you sound like?
- When your body feels joy, what do you notice?
- When you want to share joy, what does it occur to you to do?
Resources
- Book: This Here Flesh: Spirituality, Liberation, and the Stories that Make Us by Cole Arthur Riley
- Article: Why Michal Rightly Despised David, Womanists Wading In The Word by Wilda Gafney
- https://www.wilgafney.com/2018/07/12/why-michal-rightly-despised-david/
In a world bent on dividing and condemning, how might we listen to and seek reconciliation with the complex song our whole life is singing? On the sixth Sunday after Pentecost, Christopher Mack seeks illumination on the intimacy shared between David and Jonathan, and what it teaches us about loving ourselves and loving our enemies. [2 Samuel 1:23-27]
Reflection
- What part(s) of your life and story do you struggle to welcome or find wholeness?
- Where have our interpretations of scripture reinforced problematic, or unjust understandings of ourselves or others?
- How can we embody God’s good news to ourselves and others?
Resources
- Book: Jonathan Loved David: Homosexuality in Biblical Times by Tom Horner
- Book: The Love of David and Jonathan: Ideology, Text, Reception by James E. Meredith
- Book: Consolations: The Solace, Nourishment and Underlying Meaning of Everyday Words by David Whyte
How might your life work differently when you can feel in your body the joy, safety, and pleasure of which the psalmist writes? On this Pride Sunday, Amy Wolfgang encourages us to feel the embodied confidence of God beside, before, and within our being. [Psalm 16:8-11]
Reflection
- How can our community go before and beside those in fear of their call to embodiment?
- Who in your life deserves their flowers?
- What would today be like if you knew that God rejoices in your body?
Resources
- Video: Writing The Funeral of Cecilia Gentili at St. Patrick’s Cathedral NYC https://www.youtube.com/clip/UgkxUxJAq0_SHZ-vpIv62DizFhX6Ozu-TVch
How might our faith community speak about God in a way that is inspired and inspiring? On the fourth Sunday after Pentecost, Kimberly Culbertson reminds us to exhale as we prepare to leave behind our old narratives to embrace the new God is forming among us and through our mutual work. [1 Samuel 16:6-12]
Reflection
- Who do you say that Jesus is?
- How might the Spirit be asking you to see as God sees? What lenses might you need to set down?
- What might God be asking Vox to see, embrace, and become in this season?
Resources
- Book: Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within by Natalie Goldberg
- Book: This Here Flesh: Spirituality, Liberation, and the Stories that Make Us by Cole Arthur Riley
How can we overcome the adversity of our divided times without losing a radical love for those on the other side? On the third Sunday after Pentecost, Christopher Mack notices parallels between anxieties about political leadership in the time of Samuel and our own. He offers practical tools for how to co-create understanding and connect across differences. [1 Samuel 8:4-9, 19-22 ].
Reflection
- Where might you acknowledge your own understanding as partial and incomplete?
- Have you experienced co-creating understanding with someone?
- What might it look like for you to take one step closer to someone important to you, who you disagree with this week?
Resources
- Book: I Never Thought of It That Way: How to Have Fearlessly Curious Conversations in Dangerously Divided Times by Mónica Guzmán
- Video: Belonging: The Science of Creating Connection and Bridging Divides by Geoffrey L. Cohen
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=shqgkOTeS6U
- Video: How to Understand and Be Understood by Dr. Ruchi Sinha https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KU7Dg8VP3dA
When you hear someone say, “God is not just our father, but also our mother,” what comes up for you? On the third Sunday after Pentecost, Vanessa Maleare walks us through passages throughout scripture, to birth maternal images in our imagination and experience of God [John 3:3-8].
Reflection
- Is there a part of yourself you need to reintegrate for wholeness?
- How can you imagine God as your mother comforting you today?
Resources
Book: This Here Flesh: Spirituality, Liberation, and the Stories that Make Us by Cole Arthur Riley
What might we need to let go of in order for our community to be reborn? On Pentecost Sunday, Eugene Kim invites us to experience God in each of us, churches as relationships rather than institutions, and to understand our main job as love [Acts 2:1-4]
Reflection
- What do you see and hear of God within you?
- What do you see and hear of God in the people around you?
- What do you see and hear of God in community — the space between us?
Resources
- Article: Letting Go of What We Have Known by Barbara Holmes
- https://cac.org/daily-meditations/letting-go-of-what-we-have-known-2023-05-04/
- Book: The Great Emergence: How Christianity is Changing and Why by Phyllis Tickle
- This Here Flesh: Spirituality, Liberation, and the Stories that Make Us by Cole Arthur Riley
In our journey to move towards flourishing, what are the less traveled paths we’re invited to walk on and through? On this seventh Sunday of Easter, Weylin Lee companions us down a spiritual path that delights in freedom, consents to the Creator, and is revealed over time. [Psalm 1]
Reflection
- Where might you practice delight in the pursuit of liberation and freedom?
- What is a practice of consent that you are sensing in your journey?
- How are you invited to travel a path that the divine is still revealing?
Resources
Book: An Asian American Theology of Liberation by Wong Tian An
What might it mean for you to make a home in God’s Love? On this sixth Sunday of Easter, Christopher Mack wonders what it means for us to make an intimate, safe, and revolutionary home by mirroring Christ’s Love. [John 15:9-16]
Reflection
- In what ways do Jesus’ words meet and stretch you during our divisive, violent, and overwhelming times?
- Are there creative yet practical ways Jesus’ example inspires you to selflessly love your neighbor and enemy?
- What hope or empowerment might come from knowing Jesus shared everything he heard from God?
Resources
Book: Renovation of the Heart in Daily Practice: Experiments in Spiritual Transformation by Dallas Willard and Jan Johnson
Washed Clean
When you think of baptism, what comes to mind? On this fifth Sunday of Easter, Kimberly Culbertson explores the inner commitment, public declaration, and the mystery of baptism in Christian spirituality . [Acts 8:26-38]
Reflection
- Are there areas in your life where you need to practice agency, repentance, or return?
- How does the embodied experience of baptism fit into your story? How might you incorporate kinesthetic rituals into your spiritual practice?
- Where might you need to lean into community for witness, support, or celebration? Where might you step up to provide this kind of community?
Resources
Book: This Here Flesh: Spirituality, Liberation, and the Stories Make Us by Cole Arthur Riley
Who is someone who makes you feel safe? On this Good Shepherd Sunday, Kelly Cutbirth leads us through practices that ground us in the goodness of God’s companioning presence. [Psalm 23]
Reflection
- What familiar advice do you often ignore?
- What practices help you find a sense of safety and rest?
- How does the Shepherd’s promise of mercy and goodness, even in the midst of life’s challenges and hardships, feel to you?
Resources
- Book: Good Enough: 40ish Devotionals for a Life of Imperfection by Kate Bowler and Jessica Richie
- Book: What Is God Like? by Rachel Held Evans and Matthew Paul Turner
Embodying the Tension of Resurrection
As we consider the significance of an embodied resurrection, what tensions are we invited to carry and embody on our journey of faith? On the third Sunday of Easter, Weylin Lee looks at the challenge and richness of an embodied spirituality. [Luke 24:36-48]
Reflection
- How are we invited to live from our vulnerabilities and scars?
- How might we embody peace to make room for our full range of emotional responses?
- What is our embodied life bearing witness to and what story are we telling?
Resources
- Book: This Here Flesh:Spirituality, Liberation, and the Stories that Make Ust by Cole Arthur Riley
Oil and Dew
What are barriers we perpetuate to keep ourselves and others from experiencing belonging? On the second Sunday of Easter, Christopher Mack delves into the very good experience of unity and the messiness that ensues as we work toward it. [Psalm 133:1-3]
Reflection
- How might you feel delight in your body this week?
- Where is an oppositional identity persistent in how you understand and react to the world?
- If in revenge we imitate the one who wronged us, then how might reconciliation be an invitation for you to reflect God?
Resources
- Book: Why Did Jesus, Moses, the Buddha, and Mohammed Cross the Road? by Brian McLaren
- Book: The Psalms by Robert Alter
- Poem: Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front by Wendell Berry
- https://allpoetry.com/poem/12622463-Manifesto--The-Mad-Farmer-Liberation-Front-by-Wendell-Berry
Being at Home
What does it mean to be at home? On this Easter Sunday, Gena St. David centers our resurrection hope in our embodied experiences. Allowing the good news to be something that shows up in our bodies, emotions, and relationships. [Mark 16:1-6]
Reflection
- What would be different if I felt “at home” in my body?
- How might I practice “name it to tame it” with my emotions?
- Who do I wish to tell or express my love to this week?
Resources
- Book: Black Liturgies: Prayers, Poems, and Meditations for Staying Human by Cole Arthur Riley
- Video: “That’s Emotions, Mama!”: 4-Year-Old Has Heartfelt Conversation About His Feelings by Jonisa Padernos via Storyful
- https://video.storyful.com/record/27877
- Book: Old Path White Clouds by Thich Nhat Hanh
- Book: Tiny Beautiful Things by Cheryl Strayed
Anticipating Someone You Love
What’s in the box? On this Palm Sunday, Vanessa Maleare heightens anticipation about experiencing and participating in life with God. Through the acts of Palm Sunday we see Jesus as the sort of king who came to serve everybody else and who doesn’t like to see even his enemies get hurt. [John 12:12-16]
Reflection
- When you picture Jesus back in the day what does he look like?
- When you picture Jesus in heaven with God what does he look like?
- Is Jesus someone you wouldn’t be able to wait to see?
Upside Down Glory
Where have you seen systems of oppression benefiting from the glorification of suffering? On this fifth Sunday of Lent, Christopher Mack glimpses an Upside Down Glory of God that does not require the renouncing of our Divine Image; sets us in solidarity on a path of downward mobility, and reveals the violence of othering and casting out. [John 12:23-32]
Reflection
- Are there deforming religious ideas of denying your humanity you are invited to name & renounce?
- What might it look like to embody a self-giving love that honors your personhood as well as others?
- How might we become more aware of where our own impulse to cast ‘others’ out drives us?
Resources
- Book: The Wisdom Way of Knowing by Cynthia Bourgeault
- Exhibit: The Archaeology of Silence by Kehinde Wiley at the Museum of Fine Arts Houston
- Film: X-Men: The Last Stand Directed by Brett Ratner Written by Simon Kinberg & Zak Penn
- Book: Pleasure Activism by adrienne maree brown
Where might you be misperceiving God’s intent in your life? On this fourth Sunday of Lent, Kimberly Culbertson considers how we navigate challenging seasons by looking at the story of the Hebrews wandering in the wilderness. [Numbers 21:5-9]
Reflection
- How has God carried you through times of trouble?
- Where might you be “looking at snakes” and misperceiving God’s intent towards you?
- How might God be steadying you through a season of change even now?
What is your relationship to power and authority? On this third Sunday of Lent, Weylin Lee invites us to disrupt oppressive systems, embody our anger through protest, and reimagine decentralized power in light of the story of Jesus' confrontation in the temple. [John 2:13-22]
Reflection
- How are we revealing and disrupting oppressive systems?
- How are we connecting with and expressing our passions as a form of protest?
- How are we reimagining ways of decentralizing power and removing gatekeeping?
Resources
- Book: Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents by Isabel Wilkerson
- Film: Origin Written and directed by Ava DuVernay
Book: Anger: Wisdom for Cooling the Flames by Thich Nhat Hanh
How might we name the need for and create a different set of practices, as well as theological and communal pathways according to our uniquenesses? On this second Sunday of Lent, Christopher Mack interrogates a one-size fits all spirituality and invites us to “begin again, again” this season. [Romans 4:13-15, 18-22]
Reflection
- What might respecting how the Divine Creator has made you look like on this lenten journey?
- How might you incorporate learning from someone else’s perspective into your lenten experience?
- Where might you need healing from a one-sized fits all approach to the spiritual journey?
Resources
- Book: Spiritual Disciplines Handbook: Practices That Transform Us by Adele Ahlberg Calhoun
- Article: Faith: Instead of giving up something for Lent, what if we gave something to the community? by Josh Kulak https://www.statesman.com/story/news/local/2024/02/20/faith-give-something-to-the-community-for-lent/72661308007/
- Webpage: Ash Wednesday & Lent Resources https://voxveniae.com/2024/02/ash-wednesday-liturgy-resources/
What have you embraced with your time and attention that is weighing you down? On this first Sunday of Lent, Vanessa Maleare compares the poetic psalms to the stories we tell and how each of us uniquely hears them in light of the story of our Christian faith. [Psalm 25:1-10]
Reflection
- Is there something to which you give your time and effort, that hurts you?
- What is something that would bring you more life, that could occupy that space instead?
On this Ash Wednesday, Christopher Mack, Caroline Cody, Vanessa Maleare, and Weylin Lee invite you into a practice that is an amalgamation of a sacred reading and an examen. After a short reflection, they read a few verses of our passage at a time as we intentionally listen to the conversation between the text and our lives as we begin this 40 day journey of Lent together.
[2 Corinthians 6:1-10]
Reflection
- We are God’s co-workers, not the Most High’s minions nor the Almighty’s underlings. We participate in God’s salvific liberation with a posture of “power with” rather than “power over.” How might you, as a Divine co-laborer, reflect this participatory power this lent?
- What might this Divine co-laborer relationship be asking of us? What might it cost us in this season?
- We are invited here to participate in work in all states of being alongside our divine partner. This work can be joyful and strenuous. What might that consistent labor look like for you in this season? What emotions does this bring up in you?
- Where are the glimpses of hope that we are noticing that are emerging alongside the seasons of loss and grief? How are we invited to hold both of those simultaneously in tension with each other?
What is possible when we speak boldly, listen intently, and connect expectantly? On the sixth Sunday after Epiphany, Brandon Kinder facilitates a panel discussion with YanHao Wong and Emily Galusha to reflect on their artwork in our Vesper art show “What Is Your Voice?” They discuss connections to spirituality and how artistic creativity is an exploration of finding our voice in the world. [Mark 9:2-8]
Reflection
- Is there a piece of art that inspires you to find your voice?
- How have awe and wonder inspired your own creativity?
- How does creativity fuel our inner healing and outer work of peacemaking and justice bringing?
Despite the evidence around us, how can we awaken to God’s posture of love and liberation for the earth? On the fifth Sunday after Epiphany, Virginia Cumberbatch names the disruption, disappointment and injustice we face, while guiding us to the liberation movements of acknowledging, awakening, and anticipating God’s loving presence all around us and our world. [Isaiah 40:21-31]
Reflection
- How might we renew our strength, our faith, in the midst?
- How can the uncertainty or mystery of our human condition embolden us in our collective purpose for equity and liberation?
- How can we entrust the big, the unknown, the scary to God’s hands?
Resources
Book: Shoutin’ In the Fire: An American Epistle by Dante Stewart
How has pride in our knowledge limited our ability to love? On the fourth Sunday after Epiphany, Weylin Lee invites us into a practice of discernment rooted in mutuality that respects difference, embodied contemplation, and a freedom that protects the vulnerable. [1 Corinthians 8:1-6]
Reflection
- Where does knowledge limit and hinder our posture and practice of love and mutuality?
- What is our invitation to consider meaningful relationships with those beyond our own comfort and alignment?
- What does a nonviolent practice of empathy look like as we hold space for difference?
Resources
Book: This Here Flesh: Spirituality, Liberation, and the Stories that Make Us by Cole Arthur Riley
How might we creatively embody good news toward our enemies? On this third Sunday after Epiphany, Christopher Mack glimpses Divine Love enveloping our pain, extending toward our enemies, and shifting our perspective through the story of Jonah. [Jonah 3:1-5, 10]
Reflection
- Is there somewhere pain has you locked in a cycle that isn’t working?
- Where might God’s Love invite you to shift your perspective?
- What might it mean to show up wholly for yourself and others?
Homily: The Good Work
What stories and beliefs did you inherit about sexuality? On this second Sunday after Epiphany, Kimberly Culbertson invites us to question and explore our inherited beliefs and practice, in light of Paul’s paradigm of the good and beneficial. [1 Corinthians 6:12-13]
Reflection
- As you consider the work of being human, can you begin to prayerfully ask God, “Is this beneficial? Or is this destructive in some way?”
- How can you lean into community as you discern right actions for your life?
- We are members of one another. How is your life helping your communities to thrive
Can you recall a life realization that in retrospect appeared glaringly obvious? On this first Sunday after Epiphany, Lilly Ettinger invites us to wonder at God’s radical inclusion and how it invites the formation of a Beloved Community experiencing rescue and restoration. [Isaiah 60:1-6]
Reflection
- Where might you “lift your eyes” and see the world around you?
- Is there a place where you once felt like you didn’t belong but now do?
- What changed? What needs to change?
Who do you know that gives really good hugs? On this Fifth Sunday, Vanessa Maleare leads the Wonder Moment for our New Year’s Eve liturgy and brunch. She invites children of all ages to remember and reside in our beloved belonging. [Galatians 4:4-7]
What are the glimpses of hope, peace, joy, and love that we are invited to notice and hold with us? On the Friday before Christmas, Weylin Lee looks back on our year through both a global and local lens, before inviting us to practice sacred reading or lectio divina to glimpse grace in our own lives. [Luke 2:13-20]
Resource
- Practice: Vox Lectio Divina Guide
- https://voxveniae.com/lectio-divina/
Homily: The Joy of Remembering
When have you been surprised by joy? On the third Sunday of Advent, Christopher Mack ponders how Mary and Elizabeth found deep joy in challenging circumstances through gratitude, kindness, peacemaking, and solidarity. [Luke 1:46-56]
Reflection
- How might I cultivate joy by practicing gratitude this week?
- Is there a person or situation where I might choose kindness and generosity?
- Where can I seek out community and practice solidarity for the road ahead?
Resources
Commentary: Luke 1-9 (Wisdom Commentary Series) by Shelly Matthews and Barbara Reid
How are we preparing to embody the peace of Christ and live as peacemakers? On the second Sunday of Advent, Weylin Lee connects peacemaking to the practices of rehumanizing others, Being present to decentered places, and adopting a posture of consent. [Mark 1:1-8]
Reflection
- How is love helping me hold on?
- Which parts of life feel like caterpillar soup?
- How am I inviting my community to come near?
Resources
- Article: Welcoming Prayer by Contemplative Outreach https://www.contemplativeoutreach.org/welcoming-prayer-method/
- Poem: Shalom, Her Magnetic Heart Than by Kaitlin Curtice https://www.kaitlincurtice.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Curtice_poems.pdf
What helps you hold on? On the first Sunday of Advent, Gena St. David wades into the wilderness to grasp onto hope in these challenging times. [1 Corinthians 1:3-7]
Reflection
- How is love helping me hold on?
- Which parts of life feel like caterpillar soup?
- How am I inviting my community to come near?
Resources
- Instagram: @blackliturgies by Cole Arthur Riley
- Article: The Three Elements of Self Compassion by Kristin Neff https://self-compassion.org/the-three-elements-of-self-compassion-2/
Podcast: Swearing Is More Important Than You Think by Freakonomics https://freakonomics.com/podcast/swearing-is-more-important-than-you-think/
How might we re-imagine God’s justice in a restorative framework rather than a primarily punitive one? On Christ the King Sunday, Christopher Mack reexamines scriptures on God’s justice and judgment through a lens of nonviolent theology and restorative justice. [Matthew 25:31-40]
Reflection
- Where are you struggling to see God at work in our divisive, violent, over-consumptive, and destructive world?
- When you long for God to be at work in the world, what values or actions do you hope for?
- How might our hunger for justice reshape our baggage of images of God’s judgment?
Resources
- Book: Raising Abel: The Recovery of the Eschatological Imagination by James Alison
Finding Wisdom
What does wisdom mean to you? Gena St. David glimpses the wisdom of nature as shared through life, trees, and rain. We are invited to consider how we might find spiritual wisdom in the cycle of connection, disconnection, and reconnection embodied in nature and the life of Jesus. [Proverbs 3:13-20]
Reflection
- What wisdom have you learned by observing patterns in nature?
- Where am I currently working against the wisdom of nature?
- What does nature teach me about the wisdom of Love?
Resources
- Book: On the Brink of Everything: Grace, Gravity, and Getting Old by Parker Palmer
- Meditation: “Personal Weather Report” from Sitting Still Like a Frog by Eline Snell
Let’s Not Do This
When you think about your story of faith, is there a season where you felt especially burdened by the teachings and ideas around you? Kimberly Culbertson follows up her October 1st message, “Rethinking Priesthood” with a reminder of three areas, Problematic Sexual Ethic, Religious Responsibility, and Disregard for Self, where we should reconsider how religious leaders have set limitations to reinforce their own power instead of offering mercy to the marginalized. [Matthew 23:1-5]
Reflection
- What burden might God be trying to lift from your shoulders this morning?
- What burdensome expectation for others might God be calling you to release?
- How might you lean into the “rest for your soul” that Jesus promises?
God Loves Every Part
What does a hug from God feel like? On this Fifth Sunday, Vanessa Maleare, leads our entire community, including our younger ones from Greenhouse and Zamyn, in a wonder moment. She reminds us that God loves us holistically, including our being, thoughts, and feelings [Genesis 1:1-5, 26-27, 31]
Reflection
- Which song or breath practice might you deepen?
- Where do you desire to feel more free?
- How might song or breath help you decide to wait or move?
Resources
- Film: Inside Out by Disney’s Pixar
- Poem: Broken Record by Michael Moynahan SJ
Marcus Clarke, Resident Artist at Vesper, enters into a conversation with Weylin Lee exploring how art articulates and forms us along our spiritual journey, and encourages us to see our various callings as part of exercising our God given creativity. [Genesis 1:1-5, 26-27, 31]
Reflection
- How are we invited to practice creativity and co-create with Creator?
- How might our practice of making invite healing and restoration?
- How might we explore our own expression of creating and making?
Resources
- Website: Studio Delmar. The artistic practice of Marcus Clarke
https://www.delmar.work/
What is Collective Discernment?
How do we create a community of equals that resists becoming a cult of personality… that resists celebrity culture? Gena St. David wraps up our fall series on non-hierarchy by inviting us to recall the wisdom we’ve gained from each of our teaching team’s perspectives and practicing collective discernment by listening deeply to the Spirit, our bodies, and to on another as we navigate community conversations and practices. [Philippians 2:1-2]
Reflection
- What questions are alive inside me today?
- How might I practice listening deeply to the Spirit, my individual body, and others?
- Which voices do I tend to elevate above others?
How do we exercise power effectively and holistically? Christopher Mack examines different organizational models and what characteristics might characterize a faith community moving beyond non-hierarchy. [Philippians 4:1-7]
Reflection
- In a crisis, where do you tend to look for safety, control, or influence?
- How might you seek a “loyal companion” to help facilitate an impasse in your life?
- Is there a practice for right-sizedness you feel drawn to this week?
Resources
- Book: Reinventing Organizations: A Guide to Creating Organizations by Frederic Lafloux
What hesitancies do you have when you consider yourself in relation to priesthood? Kimberly Culbertson explores how we are invited to be hope carriers, resource facilitators, and sacrificial relators as we live out a shared calling. [1 Peter 2:4-5, 9]
Reflection
- How have you been called out of darkness into marvelous light?
- How has God wired you to be part of creating spiritual space for others?
- How does interdependence change the way you view priesthood?
Resources
- Book: Searching for Sunday: Loving, Leaving, and Finding the Church by Rachel Held Evans
How can we grow from engaging tensions in our world? Vanessa Maleare shares her story of being shaped by tension in living out her calling, while reflecting on the story of Peter living in the tension of past failure and present affirmation. [John 21:18-22]
Reflection
- Where in your life are you fleeing from tension?
- Which of these unresolvable tensions calls to you the most??
- Which of the unresolvable tensions feels most pressing to engage in personally? Corporately?
Resources
- Book: Braving the Wilderness: The Quest for True Belonging and the Courage to Stand Alone by Brené Brown
How is a practice of shared leadership resistance against oppressive and harmful structures? Weylin Lee vulnerably reflects on the journey of Vox from hierarchy toward non-hierarchy and how this practice is a form of resistance. [Philippians 2:1-8]
Reflection
- Who are the voices we need to include at the table?
- In what ways might you practice love with the most vulnerable?
- What areas of power and privilege are we invited to let go of?
Resources
- Podcast: The Rise and Fall of Mars Hill by Christianity Today
- Book: When Narcissism Comes to Church: Healing Your Community from Emotional and Spiritual Abuse by Chuck DeGroat
- Book: A Church Called Tov: Forming a Goodness Culture by Scot McKnight & Laura Barringer
What has been your experience of (non)hierarchy in faith communities? At the beginning of our Fall vision series, Gena St. David interrogates our relationship to power and experience of hierarchy in light of a nonviolent messiah who embodied humility. [Philippians 2:5-8]
Reflection
- What are the strengths and shadows of hierarchy?
- How might I practice embracing myself, and others?
- Do I tend to overutilize or underutilize my power?
Resources
- Podcast: The Rise and Fall of Mars Hill by Christianity Today
- Book: When Narcissism Comes to Church: Healing Your Community from Emotional and Spiritual Abuse by Chuck DeGroat
- Book: A Church Called Tov: Forming a Goodness Culture by Scot McKnight & Laura Barringer
How do you work through your expired dreams? On the eve of our Fall vision series, Christopher Mack ponders how setbacks, dead ends, failure, and loss shape our spirituality. How might we see ourselves and one another with new eyes of hope, imagination, and solidarity for the journey ahead? [Exodus 3:1-15]
Reflection
- How have you been shaped by expired dreams?
- How might you cultivate humble awareness to see the unexpected in the ordinary?
- Where are you trying on your own, where you might need to invite others in?
Resources
- Book: Does God Have a Big Toe? Written by Marc Gellman and illustrated by Oscar de Miejo
- Song: Defying Gravity by Stephen Schwartz from Wicked: A New Musical
- Article: The Ghosts of Archer City by Michael J Mooney
How do we show mercy to our bodies as God does? Gena St. David juxtaposes a living sacrifice with the death dealing ways we often do violence to our bodies. She explores how showing mercy, as God does, to our bodies through gentleness, rest, and healing is an act of worship. [Romans 12:1-2]
Reflection
- Where is God inviting me to try softer this week?
- What prevents me from resting when I need to?
- Whose help could I ask for in my healing process?
Resources
- Book: Try Softer: A Fresh Approach to Move Us out of Anxiety, Stress, and Survival Mode--and into a Life of Connection and Joy by Aundi Kolber
- Book: Rest is Resistance: A Manifesto by Tricia Hersey
- Book: My Grandmother’s Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending Our Hearts and Bodies by Resmaa Menakem
What would it look like for us to create more space at the table? Weylin Lee looks at an encounter between Jesus and the marginalized to consider how we move beyond our biases, prioritize mercy over convenience, and disrupt negative peace. [Matthew 15:21-28]
Reflection
- How are you invited to decolonize your view of Christ and your faith?
- How might you offer a unique voice and story in our collective work of advocacy?
- What does a nonviolent response look like for you in response to someone else's violence?
Resources
- Book: Blind Spot: Hidden Biases of Good People by Mahzarin R. Banaji & Anthony G. Greenwald
- Book: Healing Resistance: A Radically Different Response to Harm by Kazu Haga
What hope might you create space for in order to stay close to God’s promises? Virginia Cumberbatch opens up about audaciously holding on to hope through seasons of challenges, disappointments, and injustice. [Psalm 105:1-5]
Reflection
- What would it look like to create space to reflect on the promises God has kept?
- How can the uncertainty or mystery of our human condition embolden us in our faith and purpose?
- What promises have you dismissed or declared obsolete that God might be calling you to resurrect and reclaim?
Resources
- Book: Joy Hunter by Alexis Jones
- Book: Shoutin’ In the Fire: An American Epistle by Danté Stewart
How might we respond when we feel powerless, unsupported, and at a loss for words? Christopher Mack points to the Apostle Paul’s understanding of Spirit crying out with us for compassion and renewal. [Romans 8:26-32]
Reflection
- How do you handle moments when you find yourself speechless?
- How can we continue to bear witness as God’s subversive global family?
Resources
- Book: Romans Disarmed by Sylvia Keesmaat & Brian Walsh
- Art: Wintered Field by Jason Yarmosky
- Book: Roman for Normal People by J.R. Daniel Kirk
How does reflecting on God’s abundance impact your willingness to consent to God’s movement in your life? Weylin Lee considers a parable of Jesus on growth. How might we reimagine our relationship to God’s abundance and how we expand our lives beyond ourselves? [Matthew 13:1-9]
Reflection
- How might consenting to God’s abundance facilitate your growth?
- Where have you experienced growth even in rocky and thorny seasons?
- What are some ways we can be active beyond ourselves?
Resource
- Poem: The Facts of Life by Pádraig Ó Tuama
What expectations, titles, and ideas have you been handed about Jesus? Nick Zadrozny approaches the gospel text with curiosity, playfulness, and insight. We find ourselves challenged as Jesus befriends people on the moral margins of society who make us feel uncomfortable. [Matthew 11:16-19]
Reflection
- What have you been told about who Jesus is?
- What have you studied about who Jesus is?
- What expectations do you have about who Jesus is?
Have you ever had to push through discomfort to stand in your beliefs? On the last weekend of Pride, Amy Wolfgang recounts their own journey of integrating their faith with their queer identity. They challenge us to imagine and live into a hopeful and creative stance toward our collective future. [Matthew 10:27-39]
Reflection
- Is there a hurtful or violent theology you are being invited to set aside for your healing journey?
- Where do you sense tension from being at the point of opposition or oppression for countering a violent system?
- How might we imagine justice-bringing as ‘one of the most pleasurable experiences’?
Resources
- Book: Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing World by Adrienne Maree Brown
- Vox Homily Practice and Resources
How do we pivot from a past experience of deliverance to forming a community practicing sustained love and liberation? On the weekend of Juneteenth, Christopher Mack recalls the evolution of slavery to Jim Crow segregation to mass incarceration in the United States. How do our scriptures’ images of liberating eagles, nonviolent sheep, creative serpents, and peacemaking doves inform how we form community? [Matthew 10:16; Exodus 4-6]
Reflection
- How might you listen more clearly to your life?
- What would it look like to allow Christ to lament alongside you?
- Where might you show up in solidarity with your community this week?
Resources
- Raise Up by Hank Willis Thomas
- Museum: The Legacy Museum and The National Memorial for Peace and Justice by the Equal Justice Initiative
- Instagram Post: “How do we talk with our kids about life with Jesus if we don’t say obey?" By Meredith Miller
- Art: The Cotton Bowl by Hank Willis Thomas
- Art: ALL LI ES MATTER by Hank Willis Thomas
- Book: Mindful of Race: Transforming Race from the Inside Out by Ruth King
What helps you feel welcome? Gena St. David gathers us around the table to notice who feels welcome and who is missing. How might a nonviolent practice might help us follow Jesus in being good news to the marginalized while celebrating alongside one another? [Matthew 9:10-13]
Reflection
- Who among us feels least welcome?
- Whose suffering might we relieve?
- How is our story related to our calling?
Resources
- Book: Simply Jesus: A New Vision of Who He Was, What He Did, and Why He Matters by N.T. Wright
- Film: Chinatown Rising a Harry Chuck and Josh Chuck film
- Book: Love Is My Savior: The Arabic Poems of Rumi translated and edited by Nesreen Akhtarkhavari and Anthony A. Lee
How might we stimulate one another to bring to today, the best of what we can from the past? On this Pentecost Sunday, Christopher Mack ponders how Mother Holy Spirit might animate our nostalgia to empower us in challenging times. [Acts 2:1-8, 12-13]
Reflection
- How might you find a sense of home in some new and unexpected development?
- What might you do this week for the common good?
- Where might the disempowered find empowerment in our community?
Resources
- Book: Seasons of Our Joy: A Modern Guide to Jewish Holidays by Rabbi Arthur Waskow
- Song: Home by Diana Ross [from The Wiz, original film soundtrack)
- Book: An Introduction to the Old Testament: The Canon and Christian Imagination by Walter Brueggemann
- Book: Acts of the Apostles: Wisdom Commentary by Linda M. Maloney and Ivoni Richter Reimer
How does singing sustain us? Gena St. David resonates with the power of songs to help us embody hope in challenging times of adversity and nonviolently resist injustice. [Psalms 68:4-9]
Reflection
- Which song or breath practice might you deepen?
- Where do you desire to feel more free?
- How might song or breath help you decide to wait or move?
Resources
- Book: Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain by Oliver Sacks
- Song: Mississippi Goddam by Nina Simone
- Song: Hard Times (Come Again No More) by Stephen Foster
When have you engaged with someone radically different from yourself? Christopher Mack hears in Paul’s cross-cultural message regarding the unknown god in Athens, a subversive God who topples the status quo and a Peacemaking Christ who is our moral arc and present assurance. [Acts 17:22-31]
Reflection
- How might you notice our idols of scapegoating, isolationism, and violence?
- What might it look like to name the injustices of scapegoating the trans community, our interventions into the politics and economies of Latin America, and lament our dependency on violence, guns, and death?
- How might you express hope in light of the unknown in the coming weeks?
Practices
- Book: Acts: A Theological Commentary on the Bible by Willie James Jennings
- Book: Acts of the Apostles: Wisdom Commentary by Linda M. Maloney and Ivoni Richter Reimer
What are some areas that need a deeper look when it comes to how we see Christ, ourselves, and others? Weylin Lee stares afresh at the story of Stephen’s communal execution, and elicits bravery from us to go beyond deconstructing to decolonizing our faith. [Acts 7:55-60]
Reflection
- How are you invited to decolonize your view of Christ and your faith?
- How might you offer a unique voice and story in our collective work of advocacy?
- What does a nonviolent response look like for you in response to someone else’s violence?
Resources
- Podcast: Faith for Normal People, Episode 10, Decolonizing Our Faith by Danyelle Thomas
- Film: Chinatown Rising a Harry Chuck and Josh Chuck film
- Book: The End of Memory: Remembering Rightly in a Violent World by Miroslav Volf
On Good Shepherd Sunday, Kimberly Culbertson points to the story of the man born blind in the Gospel of John as a living example of how Jesus companions us, and how we are to embody community for one another. [John 10:1-6]
Reflection
- Is the person of Jesus shaping your ability to see and be seen?
- Is the person of Jesus shaping your ability to move toward and guide others to abundance?
What do we do when we’re struggling with addiction in our own life or a loved one’s ? Lilly Ettinger and Joe Arenella bravely share about their own recovery journeys and how they have experienced hope and life, even in the most challenging of circumstances. [Psalm 116:1-6]
Reflection
- What is your cry to the Divine?
- Where might you seek reconciliation in your life?
- How might you take a step toward healing?
Resources
- Book: Breathing Under Water: Spirituality and the Twelve Steps by Richard Rohr
- Book: Divine Therapy and Addiction: Centering Prayer and the Twelve Steps by Thomas Keating
What does forgiveness mean to you? Gena St. David places lived experience of personal and systemic injustice of the church in conversation with the anxious disciples' first encounter with the risen Christ. [John 20:19-23]
Reflection
- When have you feared punishment for telling the truth?
- How might anger become a holy emotion?
- What injustices do we need to grieve more fully prior to forgiving?
Resources
- Book: The Wild Edge of Sorrow by Francis Weller
What step of hope might we take together? Christopher Mack retraces the steps of Mary Magdalene through trauma and isolation to renewal and belonging. [John 20:1-18]
Reflection
- What part of your human experience do you need to know God, in Jesus, experiences alongside you?
- How is what you are willing to see impacting how you live?
- What does bearing witness to belonging look like for you this week?
Resources
- Book: Learning to Walk in the Dark by Barbara Brown Taylor
- Book: The Rebirthing of God: Christianity’s Struggle for New Beginnings by John Philip Newell
- Book: Everything Belongs: The Gift of Contemplative Prayer by Richard Rohr
- Book: Belonging: 5 Keys to Unlock Your Potential as a Disciple by Karoline M. Lewis
How are we invited to resist the desire for power and living out of our ego? This Palm Sunday, Weylin Lee questions what draws us to certain models of greatness rather than eschewing upward mobility as we follow Jesus on a humble path of solidarity with the vulnerable. [Matthew 21:1-11]
Reflection
- How are we invited to resist the desire for power and living out of our ego?
- Who and where are those we need to be in solidary with?
- What does our identity reveal about our authentic calling?
Resources
- Book: The Selfless Way of Christ: Downward Mobility and the Spiritual Life by Henri Nouwen
- Podcast: Lead Us Not by Sojourners
Book: This Here Flesh: Spirituality, Liberation, and the Stories that Make Us by Cole Arthur Riley
How might trust grow as we invite God into our dry places? This fifth Sunday of Lent, Kimberly Culbertson companions us into vulnerable places of grief, challenge, and trauma, as she considers what healing looks like in our story here and now. [Ezekiel 37]
Reflection
- Where in your life are you longing for resurrection? Can you lay that before God?
- Is there somewhere in your life where you are facing resistance to resurrection? Can you lean into Trust?
- Where have you already experienced resurrection? Can you make space for joy and gratitude?
What parts of ourselves feel exiled? On this fourth Sunday of Lent, Christopher Mack places the man born blind in conversation with the woman at the well to see how they both bear witness to the power of belonging. [John 4 & 9]
Reflection
- How might you consider sacred repair and healing for exiled parts of your life? For people exiled?
- How might you move toward more belonging for yourself and others?
- What does a commitment to Beloved Community look and sound like for you in the coming weeks?
Resources
- Book: River Flow: New & Selected Poems by David Whyte
- Book: Belonging: 5 Keys to Unlock Your Potential as a Disciple by Karoline M. Lewis
- Book: Atlas of the Heart: Mapping Meaningful Connection and the Language of Human ExperienceTime Away with God by Brené Brown
When you slow down the pace of your life what’s catching up with you? On the third Sunday of Lent, Christopher Mack slows down to listen to the woman at the well and how her encounter with Jesus invites us to rest and wonder. [John 4]
Reflection
- Where might you listen for your embodied life’s need for rest?
- How might the light of day be illuminating uncomfortable realities of bias in our community?
- Is there anything you need from Jesus? In mutuality what might Jesus need from us?
Resources
- Book: Crossing the Unknown Sea: Work as a Pilgrimage of Identity by David Whyte
- Book: Belonging: 5 Keys to Unlock Your Potential as a Disciple by Karoline M. Lewis
- Book: Invitation to Retreat: The Gift and Necessity of Time Away with God by Ruth Haley Barton
What helps us “leave home” in trust? On this second Sunday of Lent, Gena St. David sifts through our unsettling experiences of leaving the familiar in parallel with Abraham’s journey into the unknown. [Genesis 12:1-4]
Reflection
- How are you “leaving home” (identity, loyalty, authority) in this season?
- What’s helping you “leave home” in trust?
- Who are you “leaving home” with?
What does it say about our spiritual imaginations that Lenten fasts often center on our relationship to food, drink, or media, but less often on our relationship to power? As we begin Lent, Christopher Mack examines the testing of Jesus in the wilderness through the lens of how we steward and are enticed by power. [Matthew 4:1-11]
Reflection
- Where do you feel the pull to compromise your values and purpose?
- How might the power, perks, and prestige of Empire distract us from collective action?
- Where have you seen scripture, prayer, and community used to hurt and to heal? How might this change how you engage with them in the coming weeks?
Resources
- Book: Matthew and the Margins: A Sociopolitical and Religious Reading by Warren Carter
- Book: The Jesus Way: A Conversation On the Ways that Jesus Is the Way by Eugene Peterson
- Litany: Levingston, Zhailon. “Hope: A Litany Claiming Another World Is Possible and On Its Way.”In Rally: Communal Prayers for Lovers of Jesus and Justice, edited by Britney Winn Lee
- Vox Values
How might uncertainty propel us deeper into the mystery and revelation of God’s grace in the midst of injustice, suffering, and oppression? Virginia Cumberbatch sits with the sense of being out of control in our chaotic and heartbreaking world to find faith in learning to trust and work toward God’s Dream when we do not currently see it. [Psalm 99:1-5]
Reflection
- How might we invite a spirit of exploration and curiosity in the midst of uncertainty?
- How can the uncertainty or mystery of our human condition embolden us in our faith and in our purpose?
- What’s one thing this week you can invite spirit led revelation?
Resources
- Book: The Cross and the Lynching Tree by James Cone
- Book: Shoutin’ In the Fire: An American Epistle by Danté Stewart
- Dance: The Dance Theatre of Harlem
- Instagram Social Media Account: @BlackLiturgies Project by Cole Arthur Riley
- Song: “Man of Your Word” by Maverick City
How does relational conflict feel inside us? Gena St. David delves into Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount to share a hopeful practice for navigating conflict with others, make amends, and embody peace. [Matthew 5:21-24]
Reflection
- Who are you currently separated from (externally or internally)?
- How might you talk with them about your role in the separation?
- What might change (be reconciled) inside you after talking with them?
How are we invited to live out the identity that Christ offers us? Weylin Lee invites us to embody Jesus’ images of salt and light as we collaborate in God’s work, reveal injustice, and see scripture as wisdom rather than a rulebook. [Matthew 5:13-18]
Reflection
- How can we participate and collaborate in God´s work around us?
- Where are the injustices we are invited to reveal and uncover?
- How might we engage scripture as a journey to wisdom?
Resources
- Book: Invisible: Theology and the Experience of Asian American Women by Grace Ji-Sun Kim
- Book: How the Bible Actually Works: In Which I Explain How an Ancient, Ambiguous, and Diverse Book Leads Us to Wisdom Rather Than Answers–and Why That’s Great News by Peter Enns
- TV Show: Hulu’s The 1619 Project by Nikole Hannah-Jones
Where do you return for renewal when your heart feels heavy with sorrow? Christopher Mack holds recent national tragedies up to the beatitudes and wonders how they invite us into an alternative to the violence of our world, while simultaneously creating space for us to process the hardships we encounter while partnering for God’s Justice. [Matthew 5:3-12]
Reflection
- Where do I most struggle to see God present and enveloping my own life?
- Is there a situation or group in your world where it’s hard to imaging God? How might you open yourself to Radical Love?
- What invitation in the beatitudes might there be for action and contemplation this week?
Resources
- Book: Shoutin’ In the Fire: An American Epistle by Danté Stewart
- Book: The Ninefold Path of Jesus: Hidden Wisdom of the Beatitudes by Mark Scandrette
- Book: Rally: Communal Prayers for Lovers of Jesus and Justice Edited by Britney Winn Lee
- Art: The Mothership Designed by George Clinton, Peter Larkin, Jules Fisher
- Art: The Mothership (Capsule) Created by Jefferson Pinder
How is Jesus revealed through our community? Christopher Mack reflects on the messiness of community and how the cross leads us into solidarity with the marginalized as our personal and communal wounds are mended. [1 Corinthians 1:10-13, 17-18]
Reflection
- Where do you experience the wounds of severed community?
- How might the cruciform power of Jesus bring care to your pain?
- What creative redemptive foolishness might you be invited to participate in?
Resources
- Book: Forgiveness and Reparation, the Healing Journey by Mpho Tutu van Furth
As we begin a new year, how might we discover rhythms and moments of immersing ourselves in the way of Christ? Weylin Lee opens up about how experience and encounter get us unstuck and in step with God’s Radical Love [John 1:35-42]
Reflection
- How might we sit in the tension of the paradox of Christ?
- How can we intentionally make space to listen?
- What ways can we foster community towards transformation?
Resources
- Book: Both/And Thinking: Embracing Creative Tensions to Solve Your Toughest Problems by Wendy K. Smith and Marianne W. Lewis
Speaker Gena St. David uses the phrase "all bodies matter" in today's homily in the context of support and solidarity for the vision and mission of Black Lives Matter https://blacklivesmatter.com/about/. She begins the new year reflecting on Epiphany and how mystery can lead us into goodness, belonging, and beautiful embodiment. [Ephesians 3:5-12]
Reflection
- When have you felt part of a larger body?
Resources
- Visual Art: Myein by Ann Hamilton
- Vox’s Values: Mystery
What are we invited to do or change as we consider the unexpected disruption that the first Christmas brought with the birth of a baby? On the eve of Christmas Eve, Weylin Lee leads us in the practice of lectio divina through a reflection over the past year and through the Christmas story [Luke 2:8-15]
Resources
- Book: Wholehearted Faith by Rachel Held Evans
How do we move from our reasonable resolutions to dreaming in league with the Divine? On the fourth week of advent, Christopher Mack opens up about how experience and encounter get us unstuck and in step with God’s Radical Love [Matthew 1:18-25]
Reflection
- How is Jesus being “with us” an anchor through imperfections and surprises this season?
- Is there someone you might respond differently to in light of God’s Love?
- What’s awakened and unsettled in you as you move with God through the certainty of the status quo to the creative unfolding of God’s Just Love?
Resources
- Book: Holy Envy: Finding God in the Faith of Others by Barbara Brown Taylor
- Book: Silence: And Other Surprising Invitations of Advent by Enuma Okoro
- Poetry: For a New Beginning By John O’Donohue https://luminaryquotes.com/quote/for-a-new-beginning
How do you usually respond to something that’s unexpected? On the third week of advent, Weylin Lee invites us to glimpse restoration and healing for ourselves and those around us, even in the most uncomfortable places and seemingly invisible people. [Matthew 11:2-11]
Reflection
- What are the glimpses of restoration around us in the midst of disappointment?
- What are the uncomfortable truths that we’re invited to hear and engage?
- Who are the invisible that we need to acknowledge and advocate for?
Resources
- Invisible: Theology and the Experience of Asian American Women by Grace Ji-Sun Kim
How does God relate to us through trust? As we enter the second week of advent, Gena St. David invites us into a wilder waiting in the wilderness, as we reconsider misperceptions of our life and their ramifications. [Matthew 3:1-6]
Reflection
- Who has embodied God’s love for you?
- How has your perception of love changed after being with them?
- What misperceptions about God, love, or ourselves need confessing?
Resources
- The Wisdom of Wilderness: Experiencing the Healing Power of Nature by Gerald May
How might we foster hope among so much grief and cyclical injustice in the world? Christopher Mack begins this season of Advent slowing down to glimpse with the prophet Isaiah, a word that might remake our world. [Isaiah 2:1-5]
Reflection
- What ruts of routine or quicksands of status quo are constraining your life or world?
- How might you move in ways congruent with your openness to hope?
- Is there a place of deadly chaos you are lamenting? How might that be an act of hope?
Resources
- Sometimes by David Whyte https://www.themarginalian.org/2020/08/19/david-whyte-sometimes/
- Tracks of a Fellow Struggler: Living and Growing through Grief by John Claypool
- Rise Up Shepherd: Advent Reflection on the Spirituals by Luke Powery
How might I endure in the presence of fear without being overcome by it? Christopher Mack looks at an apocalyptic biblical text, and how it invites us to reflect on our own fears, challenges, tragedies, and violence in light of the Jesus Way. [Luke 21:5-8, 10-13, 17-19]
Reflection
- How might the name of Jesus guide and ground you in chaotic and troubling times?
- Where might you be led astray by easy answers, charismatic personalities, shiny spectacles, or a group to scapegoat?
- What is essential about your life that you must not betray in challenging times?
Resources
- Pope Francis Discusses LGBTQ Catholics with James Martin SJ In Private Vatican Audience by Gerard O’Connell
As we recount God’s goodness, what are the ways we’re invited to embody that goodness for others? Weylin Lee explores how we might embody the goodness of Christ in seasons of disruption and challenge. [Psalm 145: 1-5, 17-21]
Reflection
- In what ways are we invited to participate in restorative justice?
- How might we practice proximity with the most vulnerable?
- What is our work in advocating for the liberation of those who are marginalized?
Resources
- Be the Bridge: Pursuing God’s Heart for Racial Reconciliation by LaTasha Morrison
- The Power of Proximity: Moving Beyond Awareness to Action by Michelle Ferrigno Warren
- This Here Flesh: Spirituality, Liberation, and the Stories that Make Us by Cole Arthur Riley
What is our connection to the environment, our faith, one another, and our bodies? Christopher Mack closes our series on participation by leaning into our call “to care for and serve the earth we belong to.” [Romans 8:19-23; 12:18]
Reflection
- Where do you see creation groaning for renewal?
- How does the lament of creation show up in you?
- How might right-sizedness toward creation invite hopeful participation?
Resources
- Dr. Robert Bullard: Father of Environmental Justice
- Becoming Rooted: One Hundred Days of Reconnecting with Sacred Earth by Randy Woodley
- Sympathy by Paul Laurence Dunbar
- Vox Veniae’s Values
How do we navigate the messiness of our humanity together? Kimberly Culbertson reflects on messages of codependency versus interdependency in our faith community and beyond. [2 Timothy 4]
Reflection
- When have you been tempted to carry other people’s loads? When have you been tempted to let others carry your load?
- Can you make space this week to practice interdependence? To do so, will you lean toward offering care or asking for care?
Resources
- Vox Veniae’s Values
What is the movement that we are invited to as we cultivate our souls? Weylin Lee explores how tending our souls centers us around love, invites us into harmony with others, and forms us in humility. [Romans 12:9-16]
Reflection
- When it comes to our participation, how are we invited to tend our soul and create space for others?
- How is spiritual formation, both individually and collectively, an act of our participation?
Resources
- Vow of Nonviolence by Eileen Egan and Rev. John Dear, S.J.
- Love is the Way: Holding on to Hope in Troubling Times by Bishop Michael Curry
- Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don’t Know by Adam Grant
- Vox Veniae’s Values
What does it mean to be the body of Christ? What places inside my body are crying out? Gena St. David reflects on how we embody participation, as we continue our series. [Romans 12:1-5]
Reflection
- How is your body unique?
- How is God creating transformation through our bodies?
- How is Vox participating in Christ's body?
Resources
- Vox Veniae’s Values
What is our communal interpretation and incarnation of the life of Jesus? Christopher Mack continues our series on Participation by reflecting on how we might navigate enduring hopelessness with our beloved belonging and collective creativity. [1 Corinthians 12:1-3, 27-31 and Jeremiah 32:17]
Reflection
- Is there someplace you have been silent where you can begin praying for wisdom on how to speak out?
- How might you find your true self by grounding yourself in community ?
- Where is cruciform love leading you to consider offering your gifts for the common good?
Resources
- Moonage Daydream Director Brett Morgen on Meeting David Bowie and Capturing the Artist’s Spirit by Luke Hicks
- Daily Prayer with the Corrymeela Community by Pádraig Ó Tuama
- Vox Veniae’s Values
- Partnerships
- Inside Books Project
- Keep Austin Fed
- Ashish Centre
How does liturgy (“the work of the people”) invite us towards Christ’s embodied vision of the church community? Weylin Lee continues our series on Participation by considering collaboration that is expansive, inclusive, sustainable, and mutual. [1 Corinthians 12:12-26]
Reflection
- What presence and voice can each of us bring to litury?
- What might sustainable participation look like for us in this season?
- How might we facilitate mutuality through “the work of the people?”
Resources
- One Church Many Tribes: Following Jesus The Way God Made You by Richard Twiss
- Vox Veniae’s Values
What does it mean to be invited to participate? Gena St. David begins our six week series on Vox’s value of Participation by reflecting on where we have been to imagine a collective future where each of us is essential. [1 Corinthians 12:4-7]
Reflection
- What makes you essential to our community?
- What does a covenant of participation mean to you?
- What “common good” is the Spirit inviting Vox to participate in?
Resources
- Sankofa by Chibundu Onuzo
- Vox Veniae’s Values https://voxveniae.com/values/#.Yx1rfOzMK85
All of our life is participation in the Divine, which means all of our life is in participation with creation & community. Christopher Mack reflects with the psalmist for communal comfort & challenge this Labor Day weekend. [Psalm 139:1-6; 10-18]
Reflection
- How does it feel to be fully seen by God and companioned by One who knows you so completely?
- Where are you tempted to play it safe by not moving beyond mimicking others’ brilliance?
- What invitation to collective action is there for you in glimpsing God’s grandiosity?
Resources
- New Seeds of Contemplation by Thomas Merton
- Life Abundant by Sallie McFague
- Shoutin’ In The Fire: An American Epistle by Danté Stewart
How does relating with God impact your fear? Gena St. David explores how the focus of our fears often fail to materialize, and how we might navigate the challenges that do emerge. [Hebrews 13]
Reflection
- How does your relationship with God impact your fear?
- How are you feeling afraid, and how can you empathize?
- What would you do differently if you felt less afraid?
Resource
- Plowshare Prayer by Spencer LaJoyet
On Austin Pride weekend, Christopher Mack looks through the Gospel of Luke’s portrayal of a woman bent down to ponder what it looks like to stand up in solidarity for the marginalized. [Luke 13:10-17]
Reflection
- How might you allow your formation in the Divine Womb to shape your identity?
- Where might our habitual patterns and comfort zones be pressing down on the marginalized?
- How might we confront the powers of resentment and rejection with steadfast joy?
Resources
Pride 2022 Research & Resources
Books
- “Beatitudes for a Queerer Church” from The Backwater Sermons: Poems by Jay Hulme
- In the Margins: A Transgender Man’s Journey with Scripture by Shannon T.L. Kearns
- Life of the Beloved: Spiritual Living in a Secular World by Henri J.M. Nouwen
- Time on Two Crosses: The Collected Writings of Bayard Rustin
- “Who Said It Was Simple” from The Collected Poems of Audre Lorde
Prayer
- A Prayer: We Are Holy. We Are Sacred. We Are Divine. By Rev. Theresa Soto
Documentary
- My Name Is Pauli Murray
Lauri Raymond reflects on how embracing contemplative prayer opens us to the Love, Wisdom and Wholeness of God that transforms us individually and collectively. [Ephesians 3:14-19]
Reflection
- What is getting in the way of vulnerability and trust?
- How can I spend more quiet time with God?
- How can I bring contemplation into my life and relationships?
Title: Does Fear Keep Us From Heaven?
How might fear keep us from experiencing heaven here and now? David Wallace examines how our commonly held fears impact our spirituality. [Luke 12:32-40]
God’s Love gets on eye level with us and God’s Liberation lifts up the marginalized. Christopher Mack shares how Hosea pictures God as a loving caregiver who we can mirror in our own life through steadfast solidarity and working for the common good. [Hosea 11:1-11]
Reflection
- How might you reflect on who you are called to be in the world and who we as a faith community are called to be?
- Is there an invitation for you to act as you consider God bending down in Love and lifting you up in solidarity?
Praying can be an act of naming that invites us into creative responses of redistributive justice. Gina Bastone-Trevino wrestles with the Lord's Prayer and a familiar parable in ways that stretch us during times of crisis. [Luke 11:1-10]
Reflection
- What surprising strangeness can you find in re-reading the Lord’s prayer?
- What desire do you need to name to God, and what creativity do you find in this practice of naming?
- Where is God calling you to pray for redistribution and justice?
Resources
-
Daily Prayer with the Corrymeela Community by Pádraig Ó Tuama:
- “Prayer is words and shape and art around desperation, and delight and disappointment and desire. Prayer can be the art that helps you name your desire. And even if the desire is only named, well, naming is a good thing, surely. Naming is what God did, the Jews tell us, and the world unfolded. Or perhaps naming is what the Jews did, and God unfolded. Either way, I’m thankful. Naming things is part of the creative impulse. Naming the deep desires of our heart is a good thing, even if those desires are never satisfied.”
-
New Zealand Anglican Lord’s Prayer | He Karakia Mihinare o Aotearoa
- https://newzeal.salvationarmy.org.nz/church-community/women/resource/god-our-father-and-mother-free-printable-%C2%A0new-zealand-anglican-lords-prayer
If we understand Jesus as making the invisible, visible, then how might that reshape our faith and lived experience? Gena St. David invites us into a conversation about how the incarnation impacts our own bodies and upsets patterns of retribution. [Colossians 1:15-20]
Reflection
- What impact does reflecting on the incarnation have on your body?
- What qualities of God are reflected in Jesus?
- What’s the story about God we’re telling through our relationship with one another?
Title: Plummeting in God's Love
This week’s Old Testament reading talks about setting a plumb line as a measurement against an unjust nation. Nicolas Acosta explores living a life rooted in prayer as a plumb line to anchor us in a chaotic world. [Amos 7:1-7]
Reflection
- How can I find little moments to sink into God's love live this week?
- How might God’s love anchor us in place amid the chaos of the world?
Resources
- The Prayer of Examen:
- https://voxveniae.com/the-prayer-of-examen/#.YsyMkOzML6Z
In a world enamored with violent power over others, ensuring security for only some, Christopher Mack shares an alternative empire defying wisdom from those on the margins. [2 Kings 5:1-14]
Reflection
- Where might you glimpse God in the surprises, setbacks, and ordinary moments of your life?
- How might you listen to the wisdom of the marginalized this week?
- How can you mirror Jesus’ relationship to power and the powerless?
Resources
- Poem: Start Close In by David Whyte
- https://newstoryhub.com/2018/01/start-close-in-david-whyte/
- Visual Art: Stars and Bars by Hank Willis Thomas
- https://www.artsy.net/artwork/hank-willis-thomas-stars-and-bars
- Prayer: The Romero Prayer by Bishop Ken Untener
- http://www.romerotrust.org.uk/romero-prayer
In a time of upheaval and in a culture of violence, Gena St.David guides us to consider how our spiritual community might become known for its immunity to violence through acts of creative confrontation, surprising defiance, and disruptive humor. [Luke 9:51-58].
Reflection
- What have we been taught about Jesus’ nonviolence?
- How does a passive understanding of “turn the other cheek” serve the oppressor?
- Where might we utilize creativity, surprise, and humor to interrupt patterns of violence?
On Juneteenth, Virginia Cumberbatch invites us into practices of acknowledgement, confession, and lament on our collective journey of liberation [Romans 5:1-5].
Reflection
- What might the church need to acknowledge before sojourning on its journey of reconciliation and justice?
- How might we individually and corporately consider lamenting racial injustice and collective harm?
- How can you lean into God’s definition of righteousness and justice (Romans 5:1) to inform your communal practice ?
This Trinity Sunday, Christopher Mack offers questions for reconsidering how the Triune Life of God invites us to strengthen our spirituality and our goodness toward others. [John 16:12-15].
Reflection
- As you prepare to approach the Table, where do you need grace to bear the seemingly unbearable?
- Where might God’s Triune Life guide you to trust your inner authority and discernment?
- How do you see Spirit advocating on behalf of those who suffer oppression and injustice today?
Resources
- Book: Why Did Jesus, Moses, The Buddha, and Mohammed Cross the Road?: Christian Identity in a Multi-faith World by Brian McLaren
- Art: The Life of Christ by Keith Haring
-
- https://artsandculture.google.com/asset/altarpiece-the-life-of-christ-keith-haring/4gGyrQoV9HnbCw?hl=en
On Pentecost Sunday, Kimberly Culbertson invites us to lean in and listen for Spirit’s divine ‘Yes, yes, yes!’ over our lives. [Acts 2:1-11].
Practices
- Invite the Holy Spirit into moments of disorientation, and in doing so, receive peace that only God can offer
- Ask the Holy Spirit to help us see clearly
- Ask the Spirit how you are discounting yourself, and step out in faith
Reflection
- In moments of disorientation, can you turn toward the Spirit and receive peace?
- Where might God be looking to help us see and hear one another more clearly?
- How might God be releasing you from frantically ranking your significance, and instead invite you to trust that you are enough?
Resources
- Poem: Keep Yourself at the Beginning of the Beginning by Hannah Emerson
- https://onbeing.org/programs/hannah-emerson-keep-yourself-at-the-beginning-of-the-beginning/
- Book: The Brain and The Spirit: Unlocking the Transformative Potential of the Story of the Christ by Gena St. David
- https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-brain-and-the-spirit-gena-st-david/1140496719
As we build towards pentecost with the life of the Risen One in our midst, James Alison invites us to see our lives as a place of God’s indwelling and revealing. [John 14:23-29].
Reflection
- What do you make of the difference between appearing “to” someone and appearing “within” them?
- What do you make of Jesus’ going and his coming being the same thing?
- How do you understand the peace of his parting?
Christopher Mack imagines Jesus’ prayer for our active participation in God’s Love and call to work alongside those struggling, afraid, and forgotten. [John 17:20-26].
Reflection
- What is it like to imagine Jesus’ praying for you?
- Where do you or your world feel fragmented? How might you open yourself to God’s Love and Oneness?
- How might you move yourself to the song of Triune Love?
Each of us is not seeing something about God, and this fifth Sunday of Eastertide, Gena St. David invites us to shift our perspective to glimpse something unexpected. [Acts 11:2-12].
Reflection
- If we’re not seeing something clearly, then how will God let us know?
- What new prayer practice do you want to try this week?
- Toward whom is the Spirit moving you?
Practice
- Open Hearted Prayer: If I’m seeing things wrong, let me know.
- Question for the week: Who are we still seeing wrong?
On this Good Shepherd Sunday, Christopher Mack reflects on who might be good shepherds in our lives and how we might be the same for others [Acts 9:36-42].
Reflection
- Does Jesus’ self-giving life as a good shepherd offer you hope, healing, rest, or reconciliation you need right now?
- Does someone in your life remind you of Tabitha? Is there an invitation in their example for you to embody Beloved Community?
Practice
- Showing up for mutual flourishing. How do you show up for your own grief? How can you show up for the grief of others? How might you invite others to show up for you?
- Consenting to God's presence. How is the Mystery of God’s Love inviting a ‘yes’ from you? How might you become aware of God’s Love flowing to you in ordinary moments?
- Leaving a legacy of love and liberation. How is the Mystery of God’s Love inviting a ‘yes’ from you? How might you become aware of God’s Love flowing to you in ordinary moments?
In this season of Easter and resurrection, Weylin Lee reflects on how we are forming new patterns and a new way of life that Jesus invites us toward [John 21:1-19].
Reflection:
- How might making space for sacraments help disrupt our default patterns?
- What does our version of feeding and tending to the vulnerable look like?
- What is our tension with following the nonviolent path of Christ?
Practice:
- Making space for the sacraments. How does the Eucharist disrupt our need for self-achievement and self-protection? How might liturgy disrupt our isolation and individualistic faith?
- Love in the ordinary ways. How do we faithfully contribute to the restoration and healing of the hurting and marginalized? What does our version of feeding and tending to the vulnerable look like?
Resources:
- Film: Revolution of Our Times (viewer discretion advised)
David Wallace reflects on how doubt and belief coexist and both are necessary in our journey of faith [John 20:19-29].
Reflection
- When has your certainty led to unforgiveness?
- How does trusting in God change your understanding of having faith, despite living in a world with such suffering?
Resources
- Book: The Sin of Certainty (Peter Enns)
On this Easter Sunday, Christopher Mack reflects on the paradox of resurrection love and the invitation that Jesus’ nonviolence offers us towards peacemaking [Luke 24:1-11].
Reflection:
- Where is Christ inviting you to shift perspectives to find life in death?
- How might forgiveness, righteous anger, and nonviolent resistance call you toward hopeful action?
On this Palm Sunday, Jonathan Davis reflects on how Jesus' journey into Jerusalem subverted empire and injustice of his day [Luke 19:28-40].
Reflection:
- How might God be calling me to subvert injustice in my own sphere of influence?
- How can I announce/proclaim the alternate Kin-dom of God this coming week?
- What parts of established religious systems do I reject in following the Way of Jesus?
Resources:
- Book: The Last Week (Marcus Borg & John Crossan)
During this season of Lent, Weylin Lee reflects on how we are invited to welcome discomfort as we reflect on Jesus’ journey towards death [John 12:1-11].
Reflection:
- How are you invited into the vulnerability of practicing or receiving extravagant love?
- What is your invitation to practice sabbatical year rhythms that center around the poor?
Practice:
- Be vulnerable in extravagant love. Who are we invited to extend extravagant love toward? Who are we invited to receive extravagant love from?
- Sabbatical year rhythm. What would practicing a version of the sabbatical year rhythm look like for us? How might we embody Jesus' teaching to feed the hungry and give to those in need?
Resources:
- Video: WeCrashed
During this season of Lent, David Wallace reflects on our journey of wanting to be on our own and how God continually invites us back home [Luke 15:11-32].
Reflection:
- Where are we being lured in our lives by Henri Nouwen's "three human lies" (I am what I have, I am what I do, I am what other people say or think of me)?
- Do we really believe that God's love is unconditional and limitlessly patient? Even lavishly so?
During this season of Lent, Gena St. David reflects on what stops us from coming to God as we are in the moments when we are most in need [Isaiah 55:1-3].
Reflection:
- What stops us from coming to God “unprepared?”
- In what areas of life are we feeling most “unsatisfied”?
- How might we come to God more quickly when we feel “unloved”?
During this season of Lent, Christopher Mack invites us to reflect on and consider awe and wonder as our guide towards the divine [Genesis 15:1-6].
Reflection:
- Where in your life have you experienced awe?
- Would you like to see awe open up some part of your life to more hope?
- How might you look to awe to guide and energize your journey?
Practice:
- Take a short walk. Even a few minutes to get out of the office or to walk through your own backyard can be a refreshing change. Read Luke 24:13-16. What things keep you from recognizing Jesus in your life?
- Go for a nature walk in a nearby park. Read Psalm 24 before you head out the door. What difference does it make to think of the whole earth and everything in it as the Lord’s?
- Take 5 minutes just as you are waking to set your intention for the day. You might say: “Today, I will be awake to the world.” Use all your senses. Take a moment to breathe. What aspects of nature do you notice that you might not otherwise? What is attracting you? Where is Spirit present?
Resources:
- Book: Days of Awe and Wonder (Marcus Borg)
- Book: Sacred Pauses (April Yamasaki)
During this season of Lent, Weylin Lee reflects on how we are invited to embody Jesus' solidarity with the powerless [Luke 4:1-11].
Reflection:
- What is our relationship with power and powerlessness in our lives?
- How are we invited to embody powerlessness or be in solidarity with those without power?
Practice:
- Solidarity with the hungry. Find ways to use our surplus to ensure an abundance for all. Volunteer with an organization like Keep Austin Fed.
- Downward mobility. How are we driven by our need for power and control? How might we consider letting go of power and privilege that we normally take advantage of?
Resources:
- Organization: Keep Austin Fed
- Speech: President Volodymyr Zelensky's Inaugural Speech
David Wallace reflects on our invitation to perceive the miracles in our lives that aren't possible from a human perspective [Luke 9:28-43].
Reflection:
- What are "old stories" in your lives that you're holding on to?
- What would new versions of these stories look like if you could perceive them differently?
Gena St. David reflects on how God is leaning toward the ones in need and suffering rather than the powerful [Luke 6:20-22].
Reflection
- What mistaken notions of God might we have inherited?
- Who are we being called to lean toward?
- What does a Christ-like response to violence look like?
Resources
- Book: Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
Christopher Mack reflects on how resurrection hope invites us towards the redemption of our world and partnership with God through an embodied life [1 Corinthians 15:12-20].
Reflection
- How have you been longing for transformation or groaning against injustice this week?
- How does Jesus’ embodied life challenge you to see the image of God anew in creation, community, or in your own beloved body?
Practice
- Breathing exercise (by Cole Arthur Riley). Inhale: This body is good. Exhale: I will not abandon it. Inhale: The sacred is in the physical. Exhale: There is wisdom in this breath.
Resources
- Book: God is a Black Woman (Christena Cleveland)
- Writer: Cole Arthur Riley
Weylin Lee reflects on our invitation to move toward Christ in this season of disruption and disconnection even in the midst of fatigue and uncertainty [Luke 5:1-11].
Reflection
- How are you creating space for the mystery and presence of God?
- What is Christ inviting you to consent to in this season?
- How is your calling being shaped right now?
Practice
- Welcoming mystery and presence. How are we making space for both the mystery and presence of God? How are we making space for non-dualistic conversations and interactions?
- Lowering friction in our lives. Identify the sources of friction that keep us from consenting to the way of Christ. Consider how to lower the friction in our response to Christ’s invitations
Resources
- Game: Wordle
- Book: The Cloud of Unknowing
- Video: Sky Brown Skates Mega Ramp
- Podcast: Hidden Brain (Creatures of Habit)
Christopher Mack reflects on how Jesus confronts power and violence by inviting us to consider what peacemaking looks like [Luke 4:21-30].
Reflection
- Where or what within your internal world are you struggling to be present?
- How might you be invited to exercise power through peacemaking this week?
Kelly Cutbirth reflects on how we might facilitate meditation of the heart especially in the challenging circumstances we face [Psalm 19].
Reflection
- What kind of song is your heart singing this morning?
- In what area of your life do you feel the need to hide parts of yourself? How does it feel to imagine yourself being fully known in that space and with God?
Practice
- Listen to a song or meditate with music.
- Write a psalm and send it to a trusted friend.
Resources
- Book: The Jesus Storybook Bible (Sally Lloyd-Jones)
- Audio: Frio River Audio (Laity Lodge)
Weylin Lee reflects on how the gifts of the Spirit invite us to a practice and experience of unity with each other [1 Corinthians 12:1-11].
Reflection:
- How would a lens of revelation impact how you see the gifts in others?
- What is an outlet where your gifts might contribute to the common good?
- Even in this challenging season, what might collective participation look like for you?
Practice:
- Examine and adjust our lens. How might we be looking through a lens of rivalry? How might we adjust towards a lens of revelation? List out how we experience God through the gifts of others.
- Consider an outlet for your gifts. What are some outlets where your gifts might contribute to the common good?
Resources
- Film: Encanto
Gena St. David reflects on some helpful images of what God's comfort might look like when we're walking through fear [Isaiah 43:1-3].
Reflection:
- How does your body respond to imagining God speaking your name?
- What fear feels most overwhelming right now?
- What superficiality in life might be starting to burn away?
Resources:
- Film: Death to 2021
- Film: 14 Peaks
As we begin a new year, Christopher Mack reflects on how wisdom and word are embodied with us through Christ and how that opens us up to grace [John 1:10-18].
Reflection
- How are you feeling at the start of this new year?
- How does the image of God moving into our messy and complex lives open us up to grace?
Weylin Lee reflects on what we are putting on ourselves that centers us around and embodies the love of God through the contemplative practice of Lectio Divina [Colossians 3:12-17].
Reflection:
- How might you clothe yourself with more compassion and kindness in this coming year?
- What would it look like for you to practice more gratitude in the coming year?
Resources:
- Photos: Year in Photos (NY Times)
- Lectio Divina
As we continue in the season of Advent, Gena St. David reflects on how experiencing embodied peace more often may lead us to sacrifice fewer things that are alive both inside and outside ourselves [Hebrews 10:5-10].
Reflection:
- What forms of sacrifice still tempt you today?
- Where are you learning to distinguish between the artificial and the real?
- How are you being “made holy” through embodied trust?
Practice:
- Discernment. Distinguish between what’s real and artificial through Scripture, listening prayer, our own bodies.
As we continue in the season of Advent, Weylin Lee reflects on what practices might invite us to embody joy as we continue to navigate distress and disruption both in and outside our lives [Philippians 4:4-7].
Reflection
- Who are those in our lives that we might need to embody gentleness towards?
- How might we hold the tension of practicing gratitude in the midst of difficult circumstances?
Practice
- Joy. How might our reflection on the full story and life of Christ become a source of joy in our lives?
- Gentleness. How might we imagine a posture of empowered gentleness would look like with those who are a source of distress in our lives?
- Gratitude. What experiences and people can we express gratitude for in the past year as we have navigated a challenging season?
As we continue in the season of Advent, David Wallace reflects on how we might be driven by obligation and what our invitation is to shed the false skin that covers our true selves [Luke 3:7-18].
Reflection
- Reflect on the difference you feel when you say or do something out of obligation instead of a willingness in your heart?
- What "programs for happiness" are you attached to? How do they keep you covered with a skin that is not your true self?
Practice
- Reflect on what programs of happiness you might be attached to. (a. safety and security; b. affection, esteem, and approval; c. power and control)
As we enter the season of Advent, Gena St. David reflects on what is helpful for us to keep in mind and remember when things are being shaken loose inside us and how we can help one another hold onto hope [Luke 21:25-36].
Reflection
- What is being shaken loose inside you this advent season?
- How are you experiencing Christ in the presence of loved ones?
- After the shaking process, what are you hoping will remain?
Practice
- Reflect on your experience of being shaken. What is being shaken loose inside you? What is being removed because it no longer serves us? What do we imagine will remain which cannot be shaken?
Sarah Berson reflects on the story of Hannah and her experience through the movements of I am nothing, I am something, and I am anything [1 Samuel 1:4-20].
Reflection:
- What is your suffering stripping from you? What does your nothingness feel like?
- What belief grounds you in “I am something?” What space is created with your belief that I am something?
Resources:
- Poem: Untitled (by Jason Ikpatt)
Weylin Lee reflects on how we are invited to confront the different forms of oppression that Jesus warns about and how some may even be expressed by our own community [Mark 12:38-44].
Reflection:
- What are the ways we can be consumed with ourselves?
- How might we be able to lay down power in exchange for mutuality?
- Who are the vulnerable that we need to draw attention to and advocate for?
Practice:
- Identify our expression of narcissism. What are the ways that we can be consumed with ourselves? What are the ways we might embody the humility of Christ that doesn't carry entitlement?
- Releasing power for mutuality. What do we do with the power and influence that we might have in our own circles and systems? What would it look like for us to lay down our power and engage in mutuality?
Resources:
- Book: When Narcissism Comes to Church (Chuck DeGroat)
Christopher Mack reflects on what it means to no longer see ourselves and others as monsters and enemies and find ourselves on the border of more fully entering into and being transformed by God’s love [Ruth 1 & Mark 12].
Reflection:
- What haunted ways are you tempted to view yourself or a challenging situation in your life?
- How does being “not far” from God’s Reign of Love invite you to see yourself or situation differently as we come to the table?
Resources:
- Liturgy Interview: Christopher Mack
David Wallace reflects on our practice of prayer and our invitation to contemplative prayer [Psalm 34:1-8].
Reflection
- How might you see prayer as a relationship with God?
- What specific areas of life require you to seek refuge in God?
- Why does silent prayer seem inviting or fearful to you?
Resources
- Vox Workshop: Introduction to Centering Prayer
Nic Acosta reflects on pain and trauma and how we’re invited to explore and engage the tension and mystery that comes with it [Job 38].
Reflection:
- How can we bring our full selves to the table, both our joy and our pain, and still seek connection?
- What does it look like to lean into the mystery of Christ, leading us on our bright days and in our darkest hours?
Resources:
- Video: Doctor Distracts Baby from Shots
- Book: Hillbilly Elegy (JD Vance)
- Podcast: The Bruenigs
Gena St. David reflects on the center of the Christ story and what it means to be saved. What are we saved from? How are we saved? What are we saved for? [Mark 10:17-31]
Reflection
- How does your body respond to the image of nonviolent forgiveness in Jesus?
- What or who was Jesus trusting, and how did that trust enable him to respond nonviolently?
- What might become possible for us if we spent more time in embodied trust?
Weylin Lee reflects on how we are invited to center ourselves and our community around Christ in this next season together and we navigate reconnection and transition [Hebrews 1:1-4; 2:5-12].
Reflection:
- How can we center ourselves around the embodiment of Jesus' life and teachings?
- Where can we let go of power and privilege to embrace downward mobility?
- Whom are the suffering that we can be in solidarity with?
Practice:
- Reflect on who we center ourselves around. Who are the people we have intentionally or unintentionally chosen to center ourselves around? How can Vox be centered around embodying the life and teachings of Jesus?
- Downward mobility. Let go of power and privilege that you normally lean on. Experience a humiliation for your ego
Resources:
- Book: A Church Called Tov (Scot McKnight)
- Book: The Cross and the Lynching Tree (James Cone)
Virginia Cumberbatch reflects on what it looks like to praise in the midst of the difficult season we have all been enduring [Psalm 124].
Reflection:
- How are you giving yourself permission to share and express gratitude for God's preservation, presence and protection?
- How will you express praise this week/in this season?
Resources
- Song: Good (One House Worship)
- Song: You Keep On Getting Better (Maverick City Music)
- Song: In Your Nature (Zoe Worship)
David Wallace reflects on how our need for belonging can lead us to experiencing being othered and how Jesus invites us to see ourselves and others [Mark 9:38-50].
Reflection:
- Reflect on a time when you felt "othered" and a time when you "othered" someone else. What feelings come to the surface for each?
- Recall a moment that contributed to masking over the child-like nature of your True Self? How might you see your innocence and release its burden on you?
Gena St David reflects on where we might find comfort in the Christ story when we suffer rejection for living what God invites us into [Mark 8:31-37].
Reflection
- Which relationships help us endure rejection?
- Where might the Spirit be inviting us to risk rejection and wage “good conflict”?
- How might the Christ story comfort us when we suffer rejection?
Practice
- Name your five people – who helps us endure rejection?
- Name your loving reason – why is rejection sometimes worth it?
- Name your hope – what about the Christ story comforts us when we suffer rejection?
Weylin Lee reflects on our invitation to practice ordinary faith that's grounded in mercy as we push against celebrity culture [James 2:1-17].
Reflection:
- What does it mean for us to push against celebrity culture in our community?
- How can we make space to reflect on and receive mercy in our lives?
- How are we integrating the teachings and life of Jesus as an expression of our faith?
Practice:
- Examine our culture. Reflect on the culture of our Vox community and who it is that we welcome and engage. How have we shown preference for certain types of people at the expense of others?
- Reflect on God’s mercy. Make space to reflect on the ways we have recognized and received God's mercy toward us. How might we need to unpack and process the barriers that keep us from fully receiving mercy in our lives?
Resources:
- Podcast: The Rise and Fall of Mars Hill
- https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/podcasts/rise-and-fall-of-mars-hill/
Simone Talma Flowers reflects on Jesus' invitation to examine our hearts and to experience healing through God's love [Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23].
Reflection
- Are there areas of my heart that are hardened and shut off?
- How do I invite God in my life and heal my heart?
- How can God’s love be central in my heart?
James Alison reflects on what Jesus is inviting us to when he asks us to eat the bread and drink of the life that he offers us [John 6:51-69].
Reflection
- What is the difference between the Manna in the desert, and what Jesus offers in the Eucharist?
- Do Jesus’ words scandalize you?
- How do you understand “coming to be persuaded” that Jesus is the Holy one of God?
Naomi Jackson reflects on the life of Solomon and why God gave him what he asked for and what he didn’t ask for and how that impacts our understanding of wisdom [1 Kings 3:6-14].
Reflection
- What do we learn about the character of God from their response to Solomon?
- How does wisdom frame the relationship between humans and God?
- How does one discern scripture into application? How does one discern scripture into an experience with God?
Gena St David reflects on what it means to believe and considers whether it’s less a choice we make and more something that expands within us as we “say yes” to encounters with Jesus that prove trustworthy [John 6:35, 44-51].
Reflection
- How might I practice coming toward God with my hunger and thirst this week?
- How might I practice listening to God this week?
- How might I “taste” the life of Jesus this week?
Practice
- Prayer of Examen. What am I hungry for today?
- Listening Prayer. I’m listening...
- Eucharist. What does the Christ story reveal about God’s trustworthiness?
Jeff Chu reflects on where the Good News is as we continue to navigate difficult and disruptive transitions in our lives and those around us [Mark 6:14-29].
Reflection
- What are the things that, like Herod's worldly allegiances, keep you from the allure of holy mystery?
- What might help you remember the heart of why Jesus's name became known—the good news of love?
James Alison reflects on how we might be scandalized and what our response would be to the presence of Jesus [Mark 6:1-6].
Reflection
- What are you scandalized by and what does your scandal stop you from seeing?
- What does it mean to be scandalized by Jesus?
- Why are prophets likely to give scandal?
Jane Patterson reflects on the interaction Jesus had with the woman who touched his robe in order to be healed and what it means for our calling to serve others [Mark 5:21-43].
Reflection
- Who has touched you in the last year?
- Who has touched you in the last week?
- Who has touched us?
Resources
- Church: Holy Trinity Lutheran Church (Minneapolis)
- https://htlcmpls.org
Insil Kang reflects on how our community has been and will need to prepare as we come back together physically and continue the work that God is inviting us towards collectively [Mark 4:35-41].
Reflection
- How have we been preparing to come back together physically, to continue this ministry at Vox?
- What have we seen and heard in God’s working in us while we have been physically distant?
- How can we continue to prepare?
Practice
- Think of the “boats” that have been around you over this past year. Reflect on how they supported you and made you feel safe, even from a distance.
- Get a piece of stationary or a postcard, write them a note and physically mail it to them this week.
- As we consider this new opportunity of ministry and community at Vox, take time every day this week to pray for a member who comes to mind.
- Select a pump up song and play it LOUD as you dance and jump in anticipation of being back together.
Weylin Lee reflects on how we are invited to remain in the space of mystery as we begin to decompress from the past year and reimagine how our community might reconnect in new ways [Mark 4:26-34].
Reflection
- How might we release control in order to experience divine transformation?
- How are we invited to welcome the unexpected and offer safe space to the vulnerable?
Practice
- Releasing Control. Practice centering prayer or the welcome prayer. Embody the release of control by opening your hands.
- Welcome the Unexpected. Imagine our participation as we reopen liturgy again. Consider ways to practice obnoxious hospitality. Consider how to offer safe space to the most vulnerable.
Resources
- Article: Think Outside the Banana (NYT)
- https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/10/dining/banana-peel-recipe-nigella-nadiya.html
Gena St. David reflects on what helps us not lose heart in the midst of grief especially in our personal and communal experiences [2 Corinthians 4:13-16].
Reflection
- How is God renewing us as a Vox community?
- What do we need to grieve to make space for what’s next?
- And how might that grief moves us toward grace?
Practice
- Express Grief. Sit down with God, take a breath, say “I’m sad today”. Select 1-2 trusted friends, take a breath, say “I’m sad today”.
- Grief ritual. 1) Sadness – What has been lost? What do we miss? 2) Anger – What are we angry about? What do we regret? 3) Light – What memories do we wish to hold onto? What makes us laugh when we think about it? 4) Thanksgiving – What are we grateful for?
Weylin Lee, Lena Martinez-Wolfinger, Madyson Russell and Kimberly Culbertson reflect together on how Vox is invited to reimagine service in a season of transition and change [Jeremiah 29:4-7].
Reflection
- What have you appreciated and valued about the Vox community?
- How has this pandemic created an awareness of needs that you had not noticed before?
Practice
- What’s in the pantry? What personal resources do you currently have? What have you appreciated and valued about the Vox community?
- Observe the needs. What have you observed in the neighborhood around you? How has this pandemic created an awareness of needs that you had not noticed before?
Resources
- The Church Lab
- https://thechurchlab.org
- Texas Impact
- https://texasimpact.org
- Vesper
- http://vesperaustin.com/
- Vox Values
- http://voxveniae.com/values/
- Vox Midweek Groups
- http://voxveniae.com/mid-week-groups/
- Austin Mutual Aid
- https://www.facebook.com/AustinMutualAid/
Nic Acosta reflects on what it looks like for God’s chaotic goodness to interrupt our lives in disruptive and surprising ways [Ezekiel 37:1-14].
Reflection
- What are some ways that God's message of hope and redemption has come through into our lives in unexpected or surprising ways? What did we learn?
- What would it mean to live in such a way that, when God's chaotic goodness interrupts the world, we're receptive to it?
Resources
- Video: Twin Peaks - Albert’s Path
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kf0ZvY2usbY
Gina Bastone reflects on how we might need to reconsider what it means to invite God to bear witness and consider the evidence of love around us [1 John 5:9-13].
Reflection
- Where have you seen the evidence of love recently, especially in our community?
- Where in your life (past wounds or experiences, current anxieties or fears) do you need God to bear witness? Where do you need validation?
- Where is God calling you to take responsibility for harm you may have caused? How can God’s witness help you grow and heal from that harm?
Practice
- Notice the spots in your life where you need God's validation. Start with something small, and invite God to bear witness to your pain and anxieties. Also notice where you have caused harm (intentionally or unintentionally), and investigate how you can begin to take accountability for that harm. God is with you in this process!
- Reflect on where you’ve seen the evidence of love in our community. Where have we shown up for each other in the last few months? Where have you born witness for others in our community?
Resources
-
- Podcast: You’re Wrong About
-
-
- https://yourewrongabout.com
-
-
- Book: Undrowned (Alexis Pauline Gumbs)
-
-
- https://www.amazon.com/Undrowned-Feminist-Lessons-Emergent-Strategy-ebook/dp/B084T5S2DQ
-
Weylin Lee reflects on our practice of love in light of what is happening around us and how we’re invited to reflect the love Christ modeled for us [John 15:9-17].
Reflection
- How do you imagine God's loving gaze toward you?
- What would it look like to lay down your ego and practice non-transactional love?
- How are we creating a more loving community and becoming more loving people?
Practice
- Image of the Towel and Water Basin. Reflect on the ways you've been loved. Meditate on the image of the towel and water basin and imagine Jesus washing your feet. Receive the loving gaze of God.
- Non-transactional Love. Reflect on where our love and relationships are transactional. What would it look like to lay down our ego, our selfish motives, our narcissistic tendencies?
Resources
- Book: Love is the Way (Bishop Michael Curry)
Virginia Cumberbatch reflects on God’s invitation for us to experience both individual and collective freedom in the midst of our fears [1 John 4:17-21].
Reflection
- After a year of quarantine, how will you seek freedom and rest for yourself this spring?
- As we witness the hate and injustice of the world, how will you support the liberation of others?
- How will you allow God’s love to “fully form” in you this week?
Practice
- How will you abide in God’s love to navigate you through the fog (fear) of our current conditions? Inhale: God, meet me in this fear. Exhale: Bring rest to my restless mind.
- How will you allow God’s love for us to model and direct our pursuit of collective freedom and community justice? Inhale: We were meant for freedom. Exhale: I will not settle for less.
Resources
- Instagram: @BlackLiturgies
- Podcast: gen/activist
Weylin Lee, Kristy Robinson and Joe Arenella reflect together on how they are receiving and integrating Psalm 23 in the context of how this past year has invited them into the green pastures and dark valleys [Psalm 23].
Reflection
- What are the green pastures you're invited to remember from this past year?
- How have you seen glimpses of God's grace and hope in the midst of the valley?
Naomi Jackson reflects on how Jesus' interaction with his disciples after resurrection invites us to our own experience of restoration [Luke 24:36-48].
Reflection
- How do we see the marks of death we see in ourselves? And how have they been transformed?
- How do you need to reintroduce yourself to your community?
- Where do you need to experience restoration?
Rebecca Wheeler-Waltson invites us to locate ourselves in the story of Nehemiah and how it plays out in ways that’s familiar with what’s currently happening in our country [Nehemiah 2:1-8].
Reflection
- Where would you place yourself in this account? As the exiled? The emperor? Or an eyewitness?
- As you ponder what's happening in this country today (anti Asian hate, Darin Chauvin trial), can you see the exiled, the emperor, the eyewitnesses? What response is the Spirit stirring in you?
On Easter Sunday, Weylin Lee reflects on how the unexpected nature of Jesus’ resurrection invites us towards groundedness and good news [John 20:1-18].
Reflection
- How have we been accompanied in the losses we have experienced?
- How are we invited to a path of healing and restoration that Jesus offers?
- What restorative work are we being invited to participate in?
Practice
- Reflect on losses and accompaniment. Hold space for both the unexpected losses and the ways you were accompanied. Write out all the unexpected losses this past year has brought. List the names of those who have accompanied you in them.
- Observe the gardens around us. Notice and observe the gardens and natural landscape around us. Sit with and reflect on the restoration that is happening through our plants. How are we invited to a path of healing and restoration that Jesus offers us?
Resources
-
- Film: Feels Good Man
-
-
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZEiqZWw5vYs
-
Rachael Clinton Chen reflects on the groaning work of God as we enter Holy Week and how we’re invited to look for Jesus in our story of ache [Mark 15:25-39].
Reflection
- Will you let Jesus, the Messiah, enter your ache this Holy Week?
- Where hope feels weary or foolish, will you let God (and others) groan with you and for you?
Resources
-
- Instagram: @aapi.liturgy
-
-
- https://www.instagram.com/aapi.liturgy/
-
Sarah Berson reflects on what a new Covenant means for us and how the love of God is available for all of us even in the midst of the challenging year we have been collectively navigating [Jeremiah 31:31-34].
Reflection
- What grounds you?
- What are you moving from? What are you moving toward?
Practice
- Think about the mile markers from this last year. Think of a safe person you can share your year with. Offer to listen to another person's story of what this year has been.
Title: Poison and Its Remedy
James Alison reflects on how Jesus’ death undoes the world of sacrifice from within [John 3:14-21].
Reflection
- Is Jesus’ death really a sacrifice?
- How did Jesus’ death undo our whole world of judgment and condemnation built on sacrifice?
- The little word “so” in the most famous verse in the Bible has two possible meanings. “For God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son”. Or “For God loved the world in this way: that he gave his only Son”. Which do you think John meant, and why?
Weylin Lee reflects on how even though we typically fast and deny our body during Lent, we might also be invited to connect with our bodies and practice embodiment to connect with God [John 2:13-22].
Reflection
- How are you invited to embody disruption towards injustice this Lent?
- What are the "thin places" you can explore and experiment with this Lent?
Practice
- Embodying disruption. Make space and sit with our deeper responses to injustice. How might we embody disruption that’s in alignment with God’s heart for the oppressed? How might we give space to our anger to disrupt unhealthy patterns and injustice?
- Explore “thin places”. Experiment and explore what the thin places are for you in experiencing God's presence. Discover God's embodied presence in people and places we haven't considered before.
Matt Inman reflects on how disorientation invites us to create space to honor both our hardship and a deepening gratitude and love. Erin Inman and Jason Ikpatt also share reflections from their own experiences [Mark 8:29-33].
Reflection
- What experiences do you find most difficult to validate or legitimize?
- Where were you most surprised by where love or connection showed up for you this past week?
Jennifer Cumberbatch reflects on how we wait as we wait in the liturgy of our lives during this season of Lent [Malachi 3:1-4].
Reflection
- What areas are you called to act as priest and mediator in your spheres of influence?
- What areas are you invited to expand the kingdom of God?
Resources
-
- Song: And He Shall Purify (Handel's Messiah: A Soulful Celebration)
-
-
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-vyOk09uxUc
-
-
- Song: Hallelujah Chorus (Handel's Messiah: A Soulful Celebration)
-
-
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGbXPvWR79o
-
Weylin Lee reflects on how Jesus' transfiguration invites us to transformation and change as we enter this season of Lent [Mark 9:2-9].
Reflection
- How might you be invited to expand your symbols of God?
- How is listening to Jesus being embodied in your life?
- How are you being invited to sit in the paradox of wholeness and woundedness?
Practice
- Expanding our symbols for God. Use a different image or word to refer to and connect with God. How does this new image or word expand the container you’ve placed God inside?
- Listening to Jesus exercise. Read the Gospels during Lent and pay attention to what Jesus said and did. Use a different translation or listen to the text. In your listening, wrestle with and discern how to embody his words and actions.
Resources
-
- Book: Wearing God (Lauren Winner)
-
-
- https://smile.amazon.com/Wearing-God-Clothing-Laughter-Overlooked/dp/0061768138/
-
Judy Peterson reflects on how the incarnation of Jesus invites us to live our faith in an embodied way [Luke 7:11-22].
Reflection
- What do you long to see made manifest in this world?
- When was the last time you were moved from your innermost being and how did you respond?
Title: True Authority
Kelly Cutbirth reflects on how Jesus modeled another way of authority and how we’re invited to embody this truer way of authority as we lead and follow others [Mark 1:21-28].
Reflection
- What ideas about authority am I being invited to let go of?
- How can I use my authority to care for and restore freedom to others?
Practice
- Authority grounded in love. Practice caring by writing a note to a leader whose authority has inspired you. Or, as a leader, write a note to someone who follows your authority letting them know you care about them.
- Authority restoring freedom. Next time you’re overwhelmed by an emotion, try taking three long belly breaths. See if you can restore some of your freedom.
Resources
-
- Video: Ted Lasso
-
-
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3u7EIiohs6U
-
James Alison reflects on how the good news of God is God’s own self and the invitation for us to repent which is meant to soften our hearts [Mark 1:14-20].
Reflection
- Why does the good news of God have anything to do with repentance?
- Why Galilee? Why fishers? And why brothers?
Jane Patterson reflects on how we might practice courageous speaking and listening that makes space for discerning God's truth and guidance in these times of difficult conversations [1 Samuel 3:1-10, 11-20].
Reflection
- What do you know from your own experience of courageous speaking: what factors help others listen to you?
- What do you know from your own experience of courageous listening: what makes it harder to listen? What helps you listen?
- If you could write a letter to the future about the times we are living through, what wisdom would you want to hand down?
As we enter a new year, Weylin Lee reflects on what our invitation is toward a new way of being and experiencing transformation [Mark 1:4-11].
Reflection
- What area of your life is in need of truth-telling?
- How are you invited to consent to God's unconditional love in this year?
Practice
- Confession. Acknowledge your choice of deception over truth. Invite yourself to return to the original goodness God created you with. How can you sit in the tension of those two things this week as you reflect on what's happening in our world and what's happening within you?
- Examine your discomfort. Examine the moments and seasons of discomfort that you have encountered. Be curious about how the Spirit might be inviting us to change and transformation in that discomfort.
Resources
-
- Podcast: On Being (Louis Newman)
-
-
- https://onbeing.org/programs/louis-newman-the-refreshing-practice-of-repentance/
-
MWG Discussion Questions
- What facilitates spaces of truth-telling for ourselves? When have you experienced a meaningful moment of truth-telling?
- How might the experiences and seasons of discomfort be opening opportunities for change and transformation? Why might it be difficult to recognize the Spirit’s work in those moments?
- How has your understanding and practice of repentance and confession been driven by guilt and shame? How might God’s unconditional love and our invitation back to our original goodness change our experience of repentance and confession?
Jeff Chu reflects on God's grace and how our gratitude for that grace is the driving force for whatever work we do in the world [Isaiah 61].
Reflection
- Where do you see evidence of God's grace in your life?
- How can you cultivate a discipline of holy gratitude?
Practice
- Spend time in the presence of oak trees. Reflect on God's craftsmanship and grace that allows oaks to grow. Reflect on how oaks can survive in isolation, but they thrive in community and how that informs our invitation to live a life of righteousness and justice together in community.
Resources
-
- Book: The Hebrew Bible
-
-
- https://www.amazon.com/Hebrew-Bible-Translation-Commentary-Three/dp/0393292495/
-
Weylin Lee reflects on the hope of restoration as we come to the end of this heavy year through the contemplative practice of Lectio Divina [Isaiah 61:10-62:3].
Reflection
- In light of this past year, what are the things we hope for in this coming year?
- How might we be open to a new way of being?
Resources
-
- Photos: Year in Photos (NY Times)
-
-
- https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/world/year-in-pictures.html
-
-
- Lectio Divina
-
-
- https://voxveniae.com/lectio-divina/
-
As we continue in the Advent season, Matt Inman reflects on the Christmas story from the perspective of Mary and how we are invited to be grounded and not overlook the divine in our lives [Luke 1:26-38].
Reflection
- Where in your life does love tend to get overlooked in your life?
- What memory of Christmas sticks out to you as loving and intimate? How did love grow in your life to help make such a beautiful moment come into being?
Practice
- Where do you find yourself managing acceptance and reflection in your life right now? Notice what stories and emotions come up for you.
- Pick an aspect of life you struggle accepting and work through Tolle's suggestion of doing on oof the three actions: 1. Remove it (let it go) 2. Change it 3. Fully embrace it (accept it)
As we continue in the Advent season, Weylin Lee reflects on the things that God is and has been revealing about ourselves and others and God this past year [John 1:6-8, 19-23].
Reflection
- What are the glimpses of divine light we have seen even in our moments of darkness?
- How might we live more from our authentic self and embrace who God has made us to be?
- What are the voices we are hearing that are crying out in the margins for God's justice and mercy?
Practice
- Lighting candles. Gather some tea light candles. Remember the glimpses of hope and comfort and guidance that you experienced in darkness. Light a candle for each glimpse of comfort.
- Reflection of personal actions. Examine an action or choice or decision that involved other people. “Was I living out of my ego or was I living out of my rooted and fully loved authentic self?”
MWG Discussion Questions
- What has this past year revealed to you about yourself and the world around you? What was expected? What was unexpected?
- What has been a glimpse of divine light in your experiences this past year? How have you seen God’s comfort, guidance and hope in the moments of darkness?
- How has the pandemic removed the exterior layers that we tend to live from? What parts of your authentic self has been revealed to you this past year? How have you been holding the tension of living out of who God has made you to be?
As we continue in the Advent season, Nic Acosta reflects on what it means to experience the deep comfort that God promises [Isaiah 40:1-5].
Reflection
- What kind of comfort do we long for?
- What would it take to live as though our lives are God’s home, and to consider God as the most hospitable, comforting host?
Practice
- Compile a list of what God’s comfort means to you. List reflections under one column for “What is comfort in God like?" and another column for "What keeps me from this comfort?
Resources
-
- Song: Come On Up to the House (Tom Waits)
-
-
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wFrqclcm8pU
-
As we start the season of Advent, James Alison reflects on what the Holy Spirit is seeking to prepare us in this season [Mark 13:33-37].
Reflection
- What did Jesus mean by talking about a “coming” and then setting up a parable about a “going”?
- Why is it so difficult for us to understand the ancient Hebrew way in which the Prophet is not so much asking for some blanket forgiveness from God, but begging God to make possible a human way of finding ourselves able to forgive and be forgiven – even blaming God for God’s failure to do that so far?
Virginia Cumberbatch considers a reframing of what a radical and relentless grace is asking of us especially in the season we are living in [Ezekiel 34:11-16].
Reflection
- How can you extend grace to yourself in this season and in reflection of this year, as a part of your healing?
- As we navigate discord, challenge one another in love, and continue to disrupt injustice to work toward shalom / equity what does active, radical grace look like this week and in the weeks to come for those I’m in community with?
Resources
-
- Song: Love is a Miracle
-
-
- https://youtu.be/MRkZj0UoK4A
-
Judy Peterson reflects on how Jesus invites us to love our nearby neighbors with whom we have conflict with [Luke 10].
Reflection
- You are sheep and not a wolf. How would you approach your nearby neighbors with whom you have conflict differently if you believed not only that you are sheep, but also that there is a Good Shepherd involved?
- How might you consider letting Jesus turn your "Fire" into "Woe"?
MWG Discussion Questions
- Who are the nearby neighbors in our lives that we have conflict with? Who do we hold a grudge towards and how holds a grudge against us? What is the source of the conflict that comes between us and our nearby neighbors?
- When Jesus invites his disciples not to take any possessions with them as they are sent out, what would it look like practically for us not to take our ideologies, theologies, and loyalties to defend when we interact with others? How might that impact our conversations?
- If the one who shows mercy is a true neighbor, what would showing mercy look like with our neighbors we have conflict with? How might we begin to break down barriers that have been put up over time? How can we rely less on their response and more on our invitation to love and extend peace?
Weylin Lee reflects on how we are invited to live in the gap between what is and what could be, especially in a divisive season and political landscape [Psalm 70].
Reflection
- What is our lament in this current moment and season?
- How are we moving away from or toward God’s active presence as we live in this gap?
Resources
-
- Book: Healing the Heart of Democracy (Parker Palmer)
-
-
- https://smile.amazon.com/Healing-Heart-Democracy-Courage-Politics/dp/1118907507/
-
-
- Book: Prophetic Lament (Soong Chan Rah)
-
-
- https://smile.amazon.com/Prophetic-Lament-Justice-Troubled-Times/dp/0830836942/
-
MWG Discussion Questions
- What is your tendency towards expressing lament during moments or seasons of struggle and challenge? How has your personal or faith upbringing impacted your practice and approach to lament?
- How do the images of consolation (moving toward God’s presence) and desolation (moving away from God’s presence) provide a framework for discerning your internal movements during times of distress? How might you describe what a movement of consolation has looked like in your own life? How about a movement of desolation?
- How would you describe the tension between effectiveness and faithfulness as you have seen it in your own experience? What might a practice of faithfulness look like for you right now in this moment and season of your life?
On All Saints Day, Scott Erickson reflects on how we connect to God through our vulnerabilities and the shame we house in our bodies [Luke 7:36-39, 44-50].
Reflection
- In what ways do you feel on the outside of a religious gathering?
- In what ways are you “seen” by Jesus?
Resources
- Book: Honest Advent
-
- https://smile.amazon.com/Honest-Advent-Awakening-God-Us/dp/0310361877/
Weylin Lee reflects on how Jesus reminds us to center ourselves and our lives around love especially in these divisive and heavy times [Matthew 22:34-40].
Reflection
- In this current season, what would it look like to shift from being right to being more loving?
- How might you practice fully loving both your neighbors and yourself?
Spiritual Practice
- Put on a lens of love. Take out our lens of judgement, or comparison, or critique. Use a lens of love to soften our gaze towards people.
- Explore love with playfulness. Incorporate playfulness in how you engage and connect with God this week. Consider the different ways God has made you to express love and care.
Resources
Video: Ted Lasso https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3u7EIiohs6U
MWG Discussion Questions
- What are the tensions we experience when we explore whether it’s more important to be right or be more loving with certain people in our lives? How are those practices opposed to one another and how might they be in alignment with each other?
- What does it mean to us when we hear that God invites us to love with all our heart, soul, mind and strength? If we adopt a more playful posture and perspective, what might be some expressions of love that we have not considered before?
- How have you experienced loving your neighbor and loving yourself? How might one come at the expense of the other and how has that looked like in your life? Which of these practices might you need to lean into more this current season and why?
James Alison reflects on how Jesus navigated the tension of rivalry between divine and human power [Matthew 22:15-21].
Reflection
- How might we re-imagine our obedience to God to be without rivalry to others?
- How might the tension of divine and human law invite us towards following God?
Insil Kang reflects on why we might turn down an invitation from God and how we might make space to navigate our response toward participation [Matthew 22:1-14].
Reflection
- What are the reasons I refuse an invitation to a party/event?
- How does the dynamic between an invitation by God and my response actually play out in my day? How is it affected by the dumpster fire of 2020?
Scott Erickson reflects on how not having it together allows us to connect with God and God’s grace [John 1:43-51].
Reflection
- What activities in your life seem to draw you to God? What activities in your life seem to pull you away from God?
- When or where are you most likely to be aware of God’s presence? When or where are you least aware of God’s presence?
Gena Minnix reflects on how learning to humble ourselves might help us live into our unique, authentic story as individuals and collectively as the church [Philippians 2:5-8].
Reflection
- What’s on the inside of the masks we’re wearing?
- How might our humble stories be a doorway to our authentic calling?
Spiritual Practice
- Benedictine practice of humbling ourselves. Connecting with the created world. Embodied practices. Small experiments.
- Reflect on your story. What is our unique story? How might we practice humbling ourselves and owning it?
Resources
- Video: The Masks We All Wear (Ashanti Branch)
- Song: The Last Leviathan (Fisherman’s Friends)
Weylin Lee reflects on how our generosity can more accurately reflect the divine generosity that God offers us [Matthew 20:1-16].
Reflection
- How might we practice generosity in a way that’s more expansive and inclusive?
- How does our value and desire for fairness impact our ability to receive and practice generosity?
Spiritual Practice
- Expand your circle of generosity. Examine who you already practice generosity with ease. Consider stepping outside your circle of generosity with one person this week
- Imagine being the late worker (Ignatian practice of reflecting on Scripture). Imagine standing in the marketplace all day waiting to be hired. Imagine being offered a job at the end of the day. Imagine getting paid for the whole day after working only an hour. How does that imagination impact your perspective and experience of divine generosity?
Gideon Tsang reflects on what our invitation is to be born and live as people of the Spirit [John 3:3-8].
Reflection
- Where have you seen the delightful breeze of God’s Spirit in your life?
- What might it look light to pause and listen for the breeze of the Spirit this week?
Jason Minnix reflects on how we’re invited to live in a debt we’re never meant to repay [Romans 13:8-14].
Reflection
- How do I live in the debt of love I’m never meant to repay?
- Where do I sense invitation into the love that liberates this week?
Spiritual Practice
- Surrender to your debts of love this week. Let go of repayment.
- Where is my love for self and others asleep now? Where is it waking up?
Resources
- Video: Love Liberates (Maya Angelou)
Scott Erickson reflects on our invitation to create a space of silence and solitude to hear and listen to God’s voice in our current season [Matthew 6:5-6].
Reflection
- Where have been the places, spaces or moments in this season that you feel like you can connect with God?
- What have been your experiences with silence and solitude? And what has come from them?
Gena Minnix reflects on how Jesus' loving response to his enemies revealed that God is non-punishing and utterly trustworthy. [Matthew 16:13-18].
Reflection
- How does reflecting on God as Jesus help restore my trust?
- As my trust in God increases, how will that change the way I respond to my enemies?
Spiritual Practice
- Who is Jesus? What word or phrase captures the core of who Jesus is to you? Notice perceptions that are in us and open ourselves up to the possibility of Jesus revealing something surprising about who God is which we may not have perceived as clearly before.
Weylin Lee reflects on how we might be blocking the flow of mercy in our lives and what barriers we might have built that limit the flow [Matthew 15:10-28].
Reflection
- What expectations and hidden biases do we have that limit our flow of mercy?
- How might we practice mercy as a mutual flow that feeds the cycle of giving and receiving?
Spiritual Practice
- Journal Our Expectations of Others. Reflect on people we have difficulty extending mercy to. List out what expectations we’ve put on them. Examine which expectations are actually limiting your ability to practice mercy.
- Seeking Understanding. Life experiences or relational trauma we haven’t been through. Cultural backgrounds and upbringing we’re not familiar with. Being a different gender or ethnicity in the workplace.
Resources
- Podcast: Cancel Culture (NYT The Daily)
- Podcast: Mahzarin Banaji (On Being)
Virginia Cumberbatch reflects on the promises of God and how our calling and purpose invite us into living out “good trouble” [Psalm 85:8-13].
Reflection
- What is God calling you to in this moment?
- How can you show up in a meaningful way to be a purveyor of #goodtrouble?
Spiritual Practice
- Create time to meditate on what God has promised you and us as people of God (ex: peace, assurance, strength, vision, calling, etc.). Reflect on how those promises can and are manifesting in this moment, despite uncertainty, despite “trouble.”
- Prayerfully identify what gifts / resources God has bestowed to you that can show up this week in a meaningful way that pushes “love and truth to meet [one another] in the street”, in your community. Write down what God is unearthing in this moment for you around your purpose and your calling to bring shalom to your neighborhood, our city, or this country.
Resources
- Ideas and organizations to consider in being a purveyor of “good trouble”:
- Voting rights: The Poor People’s Campaign, She the People
- Racial justice: Black Lives Matter
- Just Policing: Austin Justice Coalition, Measure Austin
- Covid-19 impact on vulnerable communities: Community Resiliency Trust
- Education equity: Community Resiliency Trust
MWG Discussion Questions
- What are some of God’s promises that you’re reminded of during challenging and difficult times? In what ways to do we let those promises guide our choices? How might we have disregarded those promises?
- What does the image of righteousness and peace (or truth and love) kissing in the street bring up for you? How might they seem to conflict with each other? What meaning and invitation do they capture for you?
- How has our own faith experience encouraged us to participate in what John Lewis calls “good trouble” and how has our faith sometimes discouraged us from participating? What might be some practical opportunities for us to consider during this current season?
Jason Minnix explores how new possibilities open up when we bring our real struggles into our connection with God [Genesis 32:23-31].
Reflection
- Where am I being called to pull away and be with my deeper work?
- How am I being invited to wrestle with God?
- Where do I sense a new day emerging?
Spiritual Practice
- Take an hour for solitude this week and meet God in your shadow. (Take any intense emotion or judgment you have of another person and see it as a mirror to your own healing and unfolding.)
- Forgive your life for being what it is.
- What kind of wrestling is meaningful to me now?
Resources
- Video: Sheena Melwani
MWG Discussion Questions
- How does the metaphor of our unaddressed struggles as a beach ball, forced underwater until they break out above the surface with equal force resonate with you? In what ways have you experienced this dynamic?
- If “shadow boxing” with God is where we learn to process the negative emotions that can be overlooked/buried/blamed on other people, how might this practice look like for you and how can solitude help in that process?
- If God seeing the dirty, messy, and undone parts of you is a sacred opportunity to build intimacy with him, what are the challenges that prevent us from engaging in this way (e.g. our need for control)?
- Wrestling with God can be as diverse as playful banter or cursing God out. Do either of these (or the other examples) feel particularly resonant to what you’re experiencing in your life right now? Are there any that make you feel uncomfortable? Are there ways you can bring more joy to your struggle with God?
Matt Inman invites us to reflect on where God’s love is working within our story during this season [Matthew 13:33].
Reflection
- How has love matured you in the last 5 years?
- Where do you sense love wanting to work in your life in this season?
Spiritual Practice
- Meditation. Consider where Love became active in your life. Spend time meditating in that mental and emotional space of love and enough-ness.
- Journaling. Journal through what facets of your life you struggle accepting or receiving in this current season. If you were to receive in Love into that internal space, what experiences might open up to you? (Rest? Repentance? Celebration? Good Trouble?)
Resources
- Framework: Johari Window
MWG Discussion Questions
- When was the kingdom/love first activated in your life?
- Matt asked, “the kingdom is not coming TO us, but INTO us. Not affecting us, but infecting us.” What does this call your attention to today?
- How does the Johari window help us conceptualize the kingdom working through all of our self/all of our present moment?
- Where might Love be speaking care and confrontation to our default settings?
Jane Patterson reflects on Jesus’ parable that invites us to discernment in the spaces of judgment in our lives [Matthew 13:24-30].
Reflection
- What is the difference between being discerning about someone's actions and judging them?
- In what ways have you been corrected in a way that was creative for you?
Resources
- Article: After a Trail of Tears, Justice for Indian Country
- Poetry: Joy Harjo
MWG Discussion Questions
- How do we hold the tension of embodying Jesus’ righteousness and mercy at the same time? What do we have a tendency to emphasize? How is that shaped by our own experience of faith?
- In what ways do we rationalize our judgment of others? What are the challenges of living in a way where our project is not one of sorting out, but of growing together so that all will flourish?
- When our communities are disturbed or disrupted, what does God’s invitation for us to stop look like because of what we do not know? What does it mean for us to practice discernment and not knowing at the same time (e.g. in light of divisions and conflicting values and perspectives of politics, racial justice, pandemic, etc)?
Jason Minnix reflects on what is really nourishing and giving us life right now. Dave Schwab also shares his reflections on this text [Isaiah 55:1-13].
Reflection
- How am I being invited to attend to my deeper desires?
- Where do I sense invitation into God’s expansive presence today?
- What is the nourishing love I’m being invited to sow now?
Spiritual Practice
- Practice noticing what’s inside this week. Take some time to be with the interior thoughts and feelings this week. Write out a stream of consciousness with as little judgment as possible.
- Take a moment to experience mercy today.
- What is the nourishing love I’m being invited to sow now?
MWG Discussion Questions
- What, if anything, is nourishing my soul right now?
- Why do we settle for something that does not satisfy?
- What within ourselves holds us back from experiencing the joy of being?
- In what ways can we experience God’s nourishment in mercy? Why is this practice so hard for many of us to remember?
Jason Minnix reflects on how Jesus invites us to experience levity in the midst of the current weights in our lives [Matthew 11:25-30].
Reflection
- Where am I being invited to release my assumptions and receive new eyes?
- What truth, if any, offers me rest and ease now?
Spiritual Practice
- Don’t ask Google everything and embrace the joy of being wrong.
- Take some time this week to have a direct spiritual experience (take a walk, pay attention to your body more closely, begin to experience the saturation of your life with God’s presence)
- Pay attention to the impact of any teaching/content on your body this week.
Resources
- Podcast: On Being (Jason Reynolds)
Weylin Lee reflects on what a meaningful posture and practice of welcome might look like for us in our current season. Autumn Barker also shares her reflections on this text [Matthew 10:40-42].
Reflection
- How might we be able to create brave space in our practice of welcoming others?
- How is welcoming others inviting us into vulnerability?
Resources
- Practice: The People’s Supper
- Film: Just Mercy
James Allison reflects on the Feast of the Sacred Heart and the love that we’re invited to receive and give [1 John 4:7-16].
Reflection
- How can we move from a cognitive to a relational understanding and practice of love?
- How are we invited to meekness in our attempt to love well and to receive love?
Resources
- Video: Vox Online Liturgy Replay
MWG Discussion Questions
- In what ways has love been more of a cognitive experience versus a relational practice? What are the barriers that make it difficult to practice love?
- What associations have you made between the heart of Jesus and the love of God? How have they been disconnected in your experience of faith? In what ways have they been aligned with each other?
- How has our own experience of God's love (how we receive or don't receive it) impacted our ability to love others?
Scott Erickson reflects on hope in the midst of our current circumstances [Romans 5:1-8].
Reflection
- What particular conversations are happening in your life because of these current circumstances?
- In what ways are you fighting being a student by trying to be a teacher?
Resources
- Video: Vox Online Liturgy Replay
MWG Discussion Questions
- How do we tend to respond to disappointment in our lives? What is that disappointment based in?
- What has been our experience of perseverance? Is it more about will power? How might a framework of perseverance as an invitation impact our experience (i.e. exploring what we might be invited to consider versus just getting through it)?
- How do we experience the tension of the reality we experience in today's world (e.g. pandemic, racial injustice) and the hope that Jesus offers and promises? What are things that keep us from hope? What are some practices that might help us move towards hope?
Jason Minnix reflects on how we’re invited to notice the intention of beauty amidst devastation. Nic Acosta also shares his reflections on this text [Genesis 1-2:4].
Reflection
- Where am I being invited to practice antifragility and fragility?
- How am I being invited into beauty this week?
Spiritual Practice
- Pick a practice that may be either supporting your fragility or your antifragility. Journal, therapy, melancholy music, exercise, All or Nothing documentaries, act rather than just feel and think about things, take a break from action to think and feel, move out of empathy into strength, move out of strength into empathy, show up for your friends who are more vulnerable now, recommit to the paths you’ve discerned.
Resources
- Resources for Co-Laboring
- Book: Antifragile (Nassim Nicholas Taleb)
MWG Discussion Questions
- What strikes you as the difference between “good” and “beautiful”?
- Does changing the connotation of “good” change my views about how God views His creation?
- In what ways do I take on more than the world needs me to do? In so doing am I ignoring anything that is my unique task?
- What in my personal history has yielded anti-fragility in me? How does that show up now?
On Pentecost Sunday, Gena Minnix reflects on how the Spirit transforms our embodied selves and wounds into unique gifts that enliven the body of Christ. Molly Clack also shares her reflections on this text [1 Corinthians 12:4-12].
Reflection
- When you’re feeling most alive in your embodied self, what are you usually doing?
- How might your unique gift to the community of Christ come from your own place of woundedness?
Spiritual Practice
- This week, notice what you’re doing when you feel most alive and at home in your embodied self -- how might that point to a gift of the Spirit unique to who you are?
- Spend time this week reflecting on a part of yourself you think of as wounded, weak, or imperfect -- how might that wound be transformed into an embodied gift needed by the community of Christ?
Resources
- Video: Vox Online Liturgy Replay
- Book: New Seeds of Contemplation (Thomas Merton)
- Song: Serenade by Franz Schubert (Itzhak Perlman on violin)
- Movie: All or Nothing: New Zealand All Blacks
Weylin Lee reflects on what God is inviting us into during our season or experience of waiting. Kelli Knight and Kristy Robinson also share their reflections on this text [Acts 1:6-14].
Reflection
- How can we participate in unexpected ways during our season of waiting?
- What might be some things we’re invited to let go of as we wait in loss?
- What could be some meaningful practices of prayer as we wait?
Spiritual Practice
- Welcome Prayer. Welcome, welcome, welcome. I welcome everything that comes to me today because I know it's for my healing. I welcome all thoughts, feelings, emotions, persons, situations, and conditions. I let go of my desire for power and control. I let go of my desire for affection, esteem, approval and pleasure. I let go of my desire for survival and security. I let go of my desire to change any situation, condition, person or myself. I open to the love and presence of God and God's action within. Amen.
Resources
- Video: Vox Online Liturgy Replay
Gideon Tsang reflects on how we’re invited to dwell in our present moment. Danielle Dalsey Kimball also shares her reflections on this text [John 14:15-17].
Reflection
- Are you present to what's alive in you?
- What practices can bring you back to the present moment this coming week?
Spiritual Practice
- Contemplative Prayer. Breathing in, I calm my body. Breathing out, I smile. Dwelling in the present moment, I know this is a wonderful moment.
Resources
- Video: Vox Online Liturgy Replay
- Podcast: On Being (Ocean Vuong)
Gideon Tsang reflects on how we can slowly practice getting out of the hell of our minds and into the experience of heaven that’s at hand. Christina Cotham and Judy Peterson also share their reflections on this text [Acts 7:54-60].
Reflection
- What does heaven on earth feel like for you?
- How can you cherish the moments when you're at home without shame in this world?
Spiritual Practice
- Contemplative Prayer. Breathing in, I calm my body. Breathing out, I smile. Dwelling in the present moment, I know this is a wonderful moment.
Resources
- Video: Vox Online Liturgy Replay
Jason Minnix reflects on our needs and how God is present in our deepest desires. Caroline Cody also shares her reflections on this text [Psalm 23].
Reflection
- What does it look like to invite God to be with me in my longing?
- How am I being held amidst the unsettling meal before me?
- Where have I been followed by goodness and mercy in my journey?
Spiritual Practice
- Bring the tension of wanting and not-yet-getting into God’s guiding presence. Speak or read Psalm 23 slowly with your breath. Name the tension you’re in as best you can. Close with another slow reading of Psalm 23.
- Make an object out of a difficult emotion for you this week and see how you relate to it.
- Name the threads of goodness and mercy that are returning you to a deeper life.
Resources
- Video: Vox Online Liturgy Replay
Virginia Cumberbatch reflects on what it means to listen during this season of isolation and separation. Candice Boehm and Jennifer Cumberbatch also share their reflections on this text [Psalm 113].
Reflection
- How have you listened to yourself and God during the quarantine?
- What does it look like this week to create intentional space to listen?
Resources
- Video: Vox Online Liturgy Replay
- Video: Quarantine Goals
- Song: I’m Listening (Chris McClarney)
Weylin Lee reflects on the spaces in our lives right now where we’re invited to experience peace. Kelly Cutbirth, John & Catie Brewster and Liz Schepel also share their reflections on this text [John 20:19-29].
Reflection
- How might we engage our senses in order to experience peace and extend peace to others?
- What are our spaces of disbelief that might offer ways to experience peace in an unexpected way?
- How might wounds serve as a reminder that our story isn’t finished?
Spiritual Practice
- Embodied Peace. What do you need to touch, see, hear, smell or taste to feel peace? How can you share embodied peace with someone else?
Resources
- Video: Vox Online Liturgy Replay
- Podcast: Brene Brown and David Kessler on Grief
Gideon Tsang reflects on the paradox of rebirth on this Easter Sunday. Matt Inman, Gena Minnix and Virginia Cumberbatch also share their reflections on this text [Matthew 28:1-10].
Reflection
- What have you experienced during this gestation period before an eventual rebirth?
- How can you hold the paradox of fear and joy this week?
Spiritual Practice
- Create a tomb in your home to place the sources and feelings associated with loss that you have experienced.
- Leave yourself a reminder to “embrace the suck” during this challenging season.
Resources
- Video: Vox Online Liturgy Replay
As we observe Palm Sunday and experience our first online liturgy, Jason Minnix reflects on our places of thirst during this global pandemic and season of physical separation. Claudia Harding and Brittany Acosta also share their reflections on this text [Exodus 17:1-7].
Reflection
- What are my places of thirst today?
- If I had permission to complain, what would I say during this time?
- Could God be a place of standing for me when the world’s on fire?
- What is my honest prayer this morning?
Spiritual Practice
- Name the places of thirst.
- Prayer of Complaint: Make a place to post your prayers and complaints to God this week
- Have an honest conversation with God this week about how you’re doing, about what’s happening.
Resources
- Video: Vox Online Liturgy Replay
- Podcast: On Being (Padraig O Tuama)
As we continue in the season of Lent, Matt Inman reflects on how our faith intersects with our belonging [Romans 4:13-17].
Reflection
- What parts of your story might need to be honored more for you to feel a greater sense of belonging?
- What kinds of new conversations do you long for? Who in your life do you trust enough to allow them to interrupt you?
Spiritual Practice
- Journal through these three questions. Where have you felt loving connection with your parents/guardians? Where might your parents have struggled to know how to love you? Imagine what acceptance and belonging might have looked like in those spaces.
- Conversation. Have a conversation with a friend or a colleague about where fear of punishment finds its way into your faith, thoughts, relationships and dreams.
Resources
- Film: Billy Elliot
As we enter the season of Lent, Gideon Tsang reflects on what we need to remember about God’s goodness [Psalm 103:1-6].
Reflection
- What does it look like to bring your shame into the magnitude of mercy this week?
- How does it make you feel knowing God wants to satisfy your needs with goodness as long as you live?
Spiritual Practice
- Marinate in the vastness of mercy. Where’s the furthest place you’ve been on earth? Drop off your shame on a trip across the world.
Resources
- Film: Portrait of a Lady on Fire
- Music: Only One (Kanye West)
Gena Minnix reflects on the Transfiguration and what it means to allow Jesus to come alongside us in our fear and to trust enough to take a small leap towards authentic love [Matthew 17:1-8].
Reflection
- How is fear shrinking my perspective on God, myself, others, or what’s possible?
- What would happen if I allowed Jesus to come alongside me and give me a new perspective?
- What "leap" am I afraid of taking in my relationship with God?
Spiritual Practice
- Breath Prayer. “God, even though I’m afraid… help me choose love.”
- Breath Prayer. “Jesus I can’t, you can… I’ll let go.”
Resources
- Video: Yes Theory Bungee Jumping with Will Smith
Weylin Lee reflects on our spiritual growth and how we can tell if our faith is maturing or not [1 Corinthians 3:1-9].
Reflection
- What life-giving rhythms are we feeding ourselves to experience growth?
- Who do we view through a lens of rivalry and how can we look for the movement of God that’s stirring in us and them?
Spiritual Practice
- Craft a Rhythm of Life. Select intentional rhythms and practices that are appropriate for your emotional development. Personal rhythms (scripture, prayer, generosity). Communal rhythms (liturgy, sharing resources). Missional rhythms (hospitality, neighbor, partnerships).
Resources
- Book: Emotionally Healthy Spirituality (Peter Scazerro)
- Rhythm of Life
- Podcast: Fresh Air (Bryan Stevenson)
- Film: Parasite
Judy Peterson reflects on the feminine Epiphany of how Jesus arrived and what it means for our ability to view our own bodies more charitably [Luke 1].
Reflection
- What would it look like for us to step away from the dualistic thinking that says we are either holy or sinful and instead simply acknowledge that sometimes we are just human and that's more than alright?
- Is it possible that the hidden, vulnerable or even shame-filled part of your life or story might just be the exact portal through which God wants to be delivered into this world?
Gideon Tsang reflects on what we might find in God’s home, which is us [Psalm 84].
Reflection
- How is God inviting you into yourself this week?
- Where are you in your pilgrimage to find your own strength?
Spiritual Practice
- Reflect on how comfortable we are with ourselves. Are you comfortable with yourself? What parts are you not comfortable with? What parts are you comfortable with?
- Reflect on your pilgrimage. What part of this pilgrimage are you on? What is your valley? Do we trust that we’ll find springs in the valley?
Resources
- Video: Dave Chapelle at DC Improv
- Video: Space12 Move
Jason Minnix reflects on how Jesus carries light to bring people into their calling [Matthew 4:12-23].
Reflection
- Where do I sense the light that seems too good to be true?
- How can I begin or continue to listen to my deeper desires?
Spiritual Practice
- Attending to the Light of Desire. Are my desires being sacrificed for my habits, or are my habits supporting my deeper desires? Examine your habits over time to see if they help you realize your deeper desire.
- How has way closed behind me? Am I doing a bunch of good things, or am I getting closer to the best things to invest in? Take some time to look back and name some limits more visible now in the things that haven’t worked out. Ask someone you trust if they agree with your list of limits and sense of what you’re best at.
Resources
- Book: Let Your Life Speak (Parker Palmer)
Weylin Lee reflects on how are we invited to live a life of service that’s sustainable and connected to what God is doing [Isaiah 49:1-7].
Reflection
- If you listen to your life, what is it revealing about your calling?
- How might you live a life of service in more sustainable ways?
- Similar to light, in what ways are you simply revealing God’s love?
Spiritual Practice
- Personal Compass. Use the image of a compass to reflect on your life. Reflect on the four directions and what they each represent. Allow your life to speak back to you and help you begin to discern your calling. (exercise link below)
- Centering Prayer. Practice consenting to God’s presence and action. Consider service from a second half of life framework.
Resources
- Book: Let Your Life Speak (Parker Palmer)
- Book: Journaling as a Spiritual Practice (Helen Cepero)
- Personal Compass Exercise