acceptance on Moral Choices

Carl Jung, one of the early pioneers of modern psychology, wrote this from his years of experience as a therapist: The acceptance of oneself is the essence of the moral problem and the epitome of ...

Ronald Rohlheiser tells a true story of a Jewish boy named Mordechai who could not be coaxed into going to school. When he turned six years old, his mother forced him to go, but the process was misera...

It’s an act of our will to choose to see people simply as wildly loved by God, to assume their beauty before guessing their depravity.”

Preaching Commentary Leaving Home I moved away from my hometown for graduate school when I was just shy of 30. I never went back. When I struck out from home, I lived in cities larger and more dive...

Ancient Lens What can we learn from the historical context? The Samaritan Woman in a Male-Defined World In the ancient world, your place as a woman was defined by your connection to a man: Father...

Whatever happens to me in life, I must believe that somewhere, In the mess or madness of it all, There is a sacred potential— possibility for wondrous redemption In the embracing of all that is.

Several times in my ministry people have expressed the fear that self-acceptance will abort the ongoing conversion process and lead to a life of spiritual laziness and moral laxity. Nothing could be m...

AIM Commentary Ancient Lens What can we learn from the historical context? The Samaritan Woman in a Male-Defined World In the ancient world, your place as a woman was defined by your connection...

Preaching Commentary Paul’s Prize Fight Paul pulls no punches in this letter to the church of Ephesus. It is an onslaught of theological intensity from the first ring of the bell. Like a prize figh...

Fitting in is about assessing a situation and becoming who you need to be to be accepted. Belonging, on the other hand, doesn’t require us to change who we are; it requires us to be who we are

Leaving Home I moved away from my hometown for graduate school when I was just shy of 30. I never went back. When I struck out from home, I lived in cities larger and more diverse than anything I had...

A blessing for the courage to try Blessed are you, faced with the impossible.  You who do not take your eyes away  from what threatens to swallow you whole.  You who stare down reality,  tho...

If it’s free, it’s advice; if you pay for it, it’s counseling; if you can use either one, it’s a miracle.

Religion says, "I obey; therefore I am accepted." Christianity says, "I’m accepted, therefore I obey."

We didn’t have a lot of rules [at the food pantry at St. Gregory, an Episcopal congregation in San Francisco]. You could be a drunk or junkie, but you couldn’t volunteer if you were high. You couldn’t...

Ancient lens What’s the historical context? A Historical Clue The superscript of Psalm 51 gives us a historical clue about the composition of this Psalm, “A Psalm of David. When Nathan the prophe...

Death is not an eventuality that with luck, waits for another day. It is today’s cup from which God now insists you drink. If you think that somehow you can choose today not to carry the deaths of you...

The word “acceptance” has an interesting origin. It comes from the Latin ad capere, which means to “take to oneself.” What does that mean? It’s a paradoxical truth, but in order for us to accept other...

Most people don’t lead their life, they accept their life.

Romans 6 shines a bright spotlight on the dangerous half-truth, currently fashionable, that ‘God accepts us as we are.’ Will ‘God’s acceptance’ do as a complete grounding of Christian ethics? Emphatic...

We all have shadows and skeletons in our backgrounds. But listen, there is something bigger in this world than we are, and that something bigger is full of grace and mercy, patience and ingenuity. The...

What's been important in my understanding of myself and others is the fact that each one of us is so much more than any one thing. A sick child is much more than his or her sickness. A person with...

God, give me grace to accept with serenity the things that cannot be changed, Courage to change the things which should be changed, and the Wisdom to distinguish the one from the other. Living one day...

It would have been sad for me to spend my life just trying to superimpose stuff on people rather than trying to encourage them to look within themselves for what's of value.

In the Second World War, a group of soldiers were fighting in the rural countryside of France. During an intense battle, one of the American soldiers was killed. His comrades did not want to leave his...

One saint used to say that she was the type of woman who advances more rapidly when she is drawn by love than when driven by fear. She was perceptive enough to know that we are all that type of person...

Pastor: O people, return to the Holy One your God, who is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. All: Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world. ...

I have a word for you. I know your whole life story. I know every skeleton in your closet. I know every moment of sin, shame, dishonesty and degraded love that has darkened your past. Right now I know...

We must accept life for what it actually is - a challenge to our quality without which we should never know of what stuff we are made, or grow to our full stature.

I can face things that are out of my control and not act out of control.