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MAY 2007 Pilgrimage or religious tourism Dear Editors, I recall many years ago, when I was his student minister, hearing Howard Hageman preach a sermon on being a pilgrim. Up to that time in my life, I had never considered it. Howard told the congregation we were all pilgrims. His point was that the pilgrim is a sojourner. Was our citizenship as the church primarily in the world, or was it in heaven? The sermon urged us to be pilgrims…

Mark Mulder As the NCA A basketball tournament neared, the issue of Native American mascots once again came to the forefront of the college sporting world. In late February the two University of Illinois students who portray Chief Illiniwek filed a lawsuit to end NCA A sanctions against the school. They are basing their claim on freedom of speech issues. A day later the board of trustees at the University announced that they were retiring the mascot. Some background: In…

A front-page article in USA Today recently highlighted cities around the U.S. who are posting "Welcome. We are building an inclusive community" signs at their city limits or in front of schools and city halls. The efforts, the article reports, are "a symbolic plea for greater tolerance."1 There's that word again: tolerance. Tolerance is certainly a buzzword of our age. It pops up daily in the media, in our conversations, and in mission and values statements that cross our desks…

MAY 2007 by Douglas J. Brouwer Early on the morning of August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina, the sixth-strongest hurricane ever recorded in the Atlantic, came ashore just east of New Orleans and brought with it a 21-foot flood surge. Many homes in the area survived the wind and rain, only to be wrecked by a crushing wall of water. In just a couple of hours, the old and improperly built levee system in New Orleans essentially collapsed, and thousands of…

MAY 2007 Nonviolent Communication and the Image of God by Theresa F. Latini I often tell my students that their most challenging moments in pastoral ministry will not be sermon writing, funeral preparation, pastoral care crises, or evangelism. As much as these practices and events stretch our practical theological imaginations, it is the entrenched interpersonal impasses and conflicts among staff, committees, consistories, and denominational factions that lead to the greatest anxiety, frustration, disappointments, and even burn-out in ministry. After citing…

MAY 2007 by Robert Lowes Living from one cracked egg in the frying pan to another, one peeled orange to another, I finger my way along a rosary strand of chores and mutter, "Don't forsake me, Father," as the toaster inwardly reddens with fine rage and the garbage grinder roars for the newly damned. I flip first thing to the obituary page of the morning paper, news I understand, because everyone is eulogized by a job: forty years of selling…

She had a sister named Mary, who sat at the Lord's feet and listened to what he was saying. But Martha was distracted by her many tasks... Luke 10:39-40a (NRSV) It has been more than twelve months since our baby boy arrived. It was close to his due date when I was reflecting on the similar situation Mary, the mother of Jesus, must have gone through. Some of my thoughts wandered to the outskirts of the circle--to those wise men…