Faith, Grace, and Hope

This is an article I wrote for this month's edition of Bold Café- an online magazine for young adult women (or anyone who reads it). The magazine is a ministry of the Women of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA). The article has a companion faith reflection (see previous post). I saw the pair of shoes on the shelf near the window, when I was almost out the door. Their eye-catching color and unusual heel shape pulled me like a magnet. “Please don’t be my size, please don’t be my size,” I chanted, as I lifted the right one. Phew! The number suggests they’ll be too large. “You never know until you try them on,” whispers a little voice in my ear.    I shake my head to clear it and firmly say out loud, “Cargo cult.” I put the shoe back and walk out of the store, completely empty-handed.     The little bag of yarn reels me in like the catch of the day. With eight balls of coordinating yarn, I think of the fun little projects I could make. Sure I h...

This is a faith reflection I wrote that was published in this month's issue of Bold Cafe- an online magazine for young adult women (or anyone who reads it). It is a ministry of the Women of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA).   A recent advertisement from a  cosmetics company went viral  on television and on the Internet. In the commercial, women described themselves to a forensic artist who could not see them. He made a second sketch based on a description from a stranger who encountered the woman in the waiting room. The drawings from the women’s own characterizations of themselves were often more grim and less attractive. Many did not actually resemble the person depicted. This was not the fault of the artist, though, because the second drawings, made from a stranger’s description, were easily matched with their real-life counterparts. Each woman’s face, as described by a stranger, was more open and far more realistic to her appearance and demeanor. ...

When I heard  Julia Scheeres  had a new book coming out, I jumped on it. I read  her memoir,  Jesus Land ,  several years ago and found it fascinating. I was even more eager to read the new book:  A Thousand Lives: The Untold Story of Hope, Deception and Survival at Jonestown . I was not disappointed. Scheeres was working on a novel about a charismatic preacher from Indiana, when she looked up Jim Jones and then discovered the released, but untapped FBI archives, audio files and documents, of Jonestown. In her introduction, Scheeres writes, “I believe that true stories are more powerful, in a meaningful, existential way, than made-up ones. Learning about other people’s lives somehow puts one’s own life into sharper relief… You won’t find the word  cult  in this book, unless I’m directly citing a source that uses the word… The word  cult  only discourages intellectual curiosity and empathy. As one survivor told me, nobody joins...