Stargazing Evening Gathering

Stargazing Evening Gathering, June 11, 2023

What a fabulous Stargazing Evening Gathering at Fisher Farm. Creation guided our worship! We breathed as the sun slowly set around us. We delighted and shared stories of awe, wonder, and joy as the fireflies danced around us. As the stars emerged in the sky, we reflected on the sacred significance of stars woven throughout scripture and in our own lives. We remembered the epiphany story where the Magi followed the stars to find Love-enfleshed. We offered up evening prayers which sounded a lot like the psalmist who wrote poetry praising the stars for their beauty. The stars truly signified for us holy habitation among us.

Receive the blessing we shared at the end of the night:

That in the night

you will ­find

the path, the stars

that will draw you

into the day.

 

(Jan Richardson)

Blessing of the Animals

At the Gathering on Sunday, we joined in a Blessing of the Animals!

Below are a few photos of the those we blessed!

Blessing the Animals, by Jan Richardson

You who created them

and called them good:

bless again these creatures

who come to us

as a blessing

fashioned of fur

or feather

or fin,

formed of flesh

that breathes with

your own breath,

that you have made

from sheer delight,

that you have given

in dazzling variety.

 

Bless them

who curl themselves

around our hearts,

who twine themselves

through our days,

who companion us

in our labor,

who call us

to come and play.

 

Bless them

who will never be

entirely tamed

and so remind us

that you love

what is wild,

that you rejoice

in what lives close

to the earth,

that your heart beats

in the heart of these creatures

you have entrusted

to our care.

Deep South Pilgrimage 2023

Deep South Pilgrimage 2023

Our Deep South Pilgrimage (a dream that emerged from our Community Dreaming Day) was this week! 48 pilgrims journeyed together, 15 of which are pilgrims from Inclusion Community.
Below we’ve shared some of our reflections and photos!
Also, check out our posts on our Facebook Page and Instagram to catch a glimpse of what we experienced. 
Thanks to everyone who worked tirelessly behind the scenes to make the pilgrimage possible and for all those who prayed for us along our journey.

Our whole group at Dexter Avenue King Memorial Baptist Church.

Our group before walking across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, AL.

Below is a gallery of photos. Click to enlarge.

Where I'm From Poems

At the Gathering on Sunday, February 26, 2023, we reflected on the question “Where are you from?” and wrote I Am From poems. Below are a few written by our community

———

I AM FROM by Danny Lloyd

I am from yellow boats and reel-to-reel tape machines

I am from bricks and shag carpet the color of orange sherbet

I am from the rose gardens of my mother whose fragrance comforted and thorns pricked

I am from books and films from Ratliff and Stone and the locked memories of Hogan and Murphy

I am from the love of art and alcohol and from words of kindness and words of anger

I am from old men with old spirits and young men with old spirits

I am from Carolina and Chicago, all the salt and all the sugar, from death and Awakening, from Celts and Vikings

I am from those moments now stored away in dimensions unreachable for another time, another place and another rose garden.

———

 

I Am From by Cheri Baker 

 

I am from from the glistening mountains

from horse halters to dog collars 

from the ocean of blue and greens.

            

I am from from dirt that provides rich food

 

I am from boulders and blue sky

whose freedom allowed creative hikes

 

I am from the Robert and Greenough families

                                

I am from the hard work and service 

and from do your best and be kind

            

I am from the spirit of nature

I am from Iroquois and Cherokee

from corn on the cob and meatloaf

from surviving trauma to thriving

I am from Humor

       

I am from those moments of LOVE

———

I Am From by Frances Dawson

I am from pearl rings, cast iron skillets, scribbled bibles, and stamp collections, 

from Timmy the bear and recurring nightmares. 

I am from small homes to homes that speak of success, and back again. 

I am from the hydrangea at cousin Juanita’s 

whose size and wildness speak to its gardeners long ago. 

I am from Grandpa’s wall clock, Dad’s sake sets, age worn cookbooks and Fiesta stoneware, 

from Goodman and Maynard. 

I am from tension, confusion, and resilience, 

and from “mach schnell,” “chimleys,” and children should be seen and not heard. 

I am from devotees and atheists. 

I am from Mt. Clemens and Ireland and Appalachia, 

from creamed chip beef on toast, pots of coffee, pot roast, and sukiyaki. 

I am from Sunday school in the Appalachians, 

and from once a year ice cream straddled atop the fence outside coal miners housing. 

I am from moving trucks and corporate ladders. 

I am from recreating myself and internalizing the feedback in each new town. 

I am from those moments that scattered us – away from family, and story, and roots. 

— — —

I Am From by Barbara Gage

I am from a large cedar tree in the front of my grandparents’ home under whose drooping branches I played with my sister, sought shade on a hot day, hid from those calling me to do chores, from a big, yellow teddy bear named Tiny Tim who absorbed my tears and became worn from my hugging and from a sewing machine with bobbins, needles, and colorful spools of thread, upon which fabrics were turned into shiny, slick lame color guard flags, satin prom dresses, costumes for school plays and Halloween, Christmas presents, Native regalia, and quilts sewn with love.

I am from Oklahoma red dirt and clay, an old white house on a corner lot, a sister shared bedroom, tornado sirens, blistering summer heat, and ice storms that broke tree branches, turned the streets to ice rinks, closed school and halted daily life.

I am from music on 33 LP vinyl records --on a brown console stereo, volume up for dancing and singing when parents weren’t home and later from a turntable in the living room entertainment center. From music which holds visceral memories that bring smiles and tears.

I am from a suitcase ready for an adventure with a passport hungry for new stamps on the pages. I like the bustle of airports but not the long lines, the aroma of new foods and trying local cuisine, the language I do not understand, and the indigenous clothing and textiles that I bring home in that suitcase.

I am from J.D. and Imogene, the Holts, and Gages and from “It will all come out in the wash” and “Don’t use my good scissors!” I am from classrooms over the decades—mine, my mother’s, my daughter’s and my nieces’--chalkboards, erasers, white boards, dry erase markers, and smart boards; grade books, pencil and paper, computer, Chrome book, online learning; from dresses, hose, and heels to casual jeans and tee shirts, from open doors and windows to metal detectors and scanned badges; from nuclear attack drills to shelter in place drills.

I am from Segmekwe, Mother Earth, whose life sustains us as we abuse Her, from sweetgrass, sage, cedar and tobacco. I am from Potawatomi and Cherokee, and Jagenagomnan-all those who came before me and from the drum beat that calls me to the arena to dance after I smudge myself with smoke, from the tinkling sound of jingles from colorful jingle dresses, from sacred eagle feathers and prayer circles where the smoke burns my eyes and in which ceremonies and culture are passed down.

I am from Chinese Thanksgiving on the Friday after Thanksgiving, and decorated sugar cookies for holidays. My granddaughter and I roll out the dough, use cookie cutters shaped like trees, stars, eggs, pumpkins, flowers---whatever the season --to make trays of cookies to decorate with sticky, sweet icing. She prides herself on decorating the quirkiest, funniest ones she can and we send pictures to Uncle, who shares her sense of humor.

I am from all the ancestors who walked on before me and from Mother Earth …….

2022 Christmas Eve Eve Service

2022 Christmas Eve Eve Service

Well, it was below freezing, so we moved our gathering indoors. Enjoy these photos from our Eve Eve service. There are some really beautiful candlelit ones towards the end. What joy!

Thanks to everyone for making it happen- our readers, greeters, Danny and Melanie, Chuck for directing folks from outside, Kathi for overseeing our Welcome Table, and everyone for participating and offering the gift of your presence.

Thanks to our guest musician, Karla Kincaid! https://www.facebook.com/karlakincaidmusic/

Thanks for the photos, Juan Zambrano! https://juanzambranophotography.com/

2022 PAPER BAG LIVE NATIVITY

2022 Advent Luminary Labyrinth Photos!

Thanks to everyone who came out to wander in wonder through our Advent Luminary Labyrinth!

Julie's letter to the United States


Throughout October and November, Haley Hamblin led a small group called “Koinonia: A Journey of Justice and Belonging with the Apostle Paul.”  During our final week, Haley invited us to write letters to a community, fashioned by Paul’s letters. This practice was deeply meaningful, so we are going to share some of the letters we wrote:

Julie Crandall’s Letter:


To my fellow Americans, with whom we collectively imagine how best to live, work, serve and govern in the spirit the common good. Brothers and sisters (as aren’t we all formed from the same source of love and life? aren’t we all struggling with the same pain and fear and uncertainty in this life? And aren’t we all headed toward the same sure final destination, whether it be hour or minutes or decades from this very moment?)…. Greetings, peace, love. Whatever is you deepest need, may you be blessed with it within a community of shared longing and concern for other.

We are in a battle for the vision of who we, as citizens are and who we want to be in world. At times we’ve forgotten the suffering of others…the desperate need of those fleeing hunger and violence in places where darkness has overcome rules and laws. We’ve slammed doors in the faces of those who don’t look like us or speak the same language; but brothers and sisters, they bleed the same as we do, they weep for their children too; they’d risk everything to see a brighter light on the horizon. These are the people who formed our country.

Inside our wall we’ve often chosen to not see the suffering our ancestors caused to humans they enslaved, treating them and their descendants as less than human and ignoring a legacy of horrors, evils and wrongs. We’ve forgotten that divine light shines in all people and that when we sweep away the past it always grows larger in the distance, gaining energy and power that threatens a great reckoning.

We’ve let lies and fear cause us to turn inward, to see those beyond our own small groups as the enemy, as the ones to be feared, the ones we must crush before they crush us.
But don’t you see that in crushing anyone, we are crushing ourselves? When there is violence toward anyone’s parents, it is violence toward our own parents? When there’s a mass shooting at any school, it’s at our own child’s school? When a million souls die from a virus that we can help stop from spreading, each of those souls are as beloved as you are or your spouse or your best friend.

Beloveds, you’ve never ceased to be worthy of love and belonging, but neither has the one who is mocked, made fun of, abandoned, beaten or abused. We must protect those who are weak, lack power, are without homes, those suffering any kind of pain. Each and every one of these is the Christ.

We must move closer to each other and in so doing, we move closer to God. Do we not reflect that which is holy when we reach out again and again to those in our schools and neighborhoods and work places, on the street and in the grocery store and on Facebook and in the nursing home and prisons?

Stay awake to the humanity of each person you encounter.
Only then do we experience true community. Koinonia.
Justice be among all; only then there will be true peace.

 

Chuck York’s Letter: “A Letter to the Travelers United”

Throughout October and November, Haley Hamblin led a small group called “Koinonia: A Journey of Justice and Belonging with the Apostle Paul.”  During our final week, Haley invited us to write letters to a community, fashioned by Paul’s letters. This practice was deeply meaningful, so we are going to share some of the letters we wrote:

Chuck York’s Letter: “A Letter to the Travelers United”

To my fellow travelers who live vicariously through the journey of our sister Haley in the land of Missouri Show-Mes, grace and peace to each of you and thanks for all you do.

First, my apologies for not being able to be present as oft as I would have liked with this journey we shared, but know my heart and spirit were with you even as my body failed and in one case the internet interruptus raised its head. The learning has been fruitful for me personally, and I hope for you as well in the community.

When we learn, when we study or just have that aha moment, our mission should be singular, to accept the learning, and to look for others who might want to hear, to learn, to question, or to refute.

Community is a safe conversation; our commitment to community ends not with these sessions, but the sessions to come, the continuing search for connection with others in and outside our spheres.

Our lessons have been many, and as many as we are individually for certain. I know this now because of our journey together – we are called to go to places safe, where we can be builders, or to places not so safe, and to find ways to unite our spirits in a quest for more love, for more peace, for more power and grace.

Be strong, fellow travelers. We are called to reach up and reach out. May we be blessed to do both and to revel in the glory of that calling.

 
 

Jack Salt's Letter to Inclusion Community

Throughout October and November, Haley Hamblin led a small group called “Koinonia: A Journey of Justice and Belonging with the Apostle Paul.”  During our final week, Haley invited us to write letters to a community, fashioned by Paul’s letters. This practice was deeply meaningful, so we are going to share some of the letters we wrote:

Jack Salt’s Letter:


Dear Inclusion Community,

I dedicate this letter to you – a progressive community centered on justice, belonging, empathy, creative worship, and spiritual nourishment. 

Like Paul, we are each on a journey where we encounter different communities throughout the course of our lives. I feel like I stumbled upon Inclusion Community serendipitously even though it’s only a few miles down the road from where I went to college. I found this community after a series of decisions that now seem interconnected: I took some education policy courses my senior year of college which led me to realize my passion for education and apply to work for the College Advising Corps which placed me at Hopewell High School where I met Teresa Costa. Teresa would periodically invite me to Pub Theology, Inclusion’s monthly hangout at Old Town Public House in Cornelius, and I would usually make some excuse not to go until one night I finally showed up. That night, we were debating the theological arguments for and against tattoos and people were sharing their tattoo stories and I thought this was the strangest religious community I’ve ever encountered. It was so different from anything I had ever experienced. And yet I was drawn to it.

Before finding Inclusion Community, I didn’t feel connected to church. Worship felt rigid, I didn’t really know members of my congregation beyond small talk, and I didn’t feel like I could relate to the sermons or prayers. 

But Inclusion Community taught me what it means to be a progressive Christian and worship in a way that recognizes our individual and collective humanity. I’ve found myself painting during church service, giving communion to my peers, watching candles be lit for loved ones, engaging in community conversation, and in what happened to be the most unforgettable service of all – improvising lines as Joseph during the paper bag nativity day. 

Inclusion Community taught me that worship is artistic, empathetic, justice-centered, solemn, emotional, and hilarious. I learned that worship isn’t passive but one filled with a variety of experiences and emotions with a community of people that wrestle with what it means to be human.  

So, I call on Inclusion Community to continue to find people like me: those that are curious but disconnected from church; those struggling with religious trauma and exclusion and in need of a welcoming, inclusive space; and those who want to express vulnerability at church and in front of a community that will love them as they are.

The world would be a better place with more communities and spaces like this one.

With love,

Jack Salt



2022 Transgender Day of Remembrance

Read a letter from our beloved Stephanie on this Transgender Day of Remembrance:


Today, November 20, is the Transgender Day of Remembrance. It is the day in which we name aloud those that we know in the trans and gender non-conforming communities that were murdered in the past year. That number in the U.S. is 32 although that number almost certainly falls far short of the actual number. The majority in the list are transgender women of color, a trend that persists every year. The number also does not include those who die by suicide, lack of access to proper health care, and many causes related to gender identity.

The transgender community has enjoyed greater visibility in the past decade. This has also brought greater notoriety and organized hate against the trans community. In some ways, it was easier when we were not as well known. We as a community could fly under the radar. In the past two years, the number of anti-trans laws at the state level has increased substantially especially with regard to trans youth and athletes. Trans youth, their parents, and doctors are at risk of having decisions regarding their own bodies taken away from them. Trans athletes, even though so few in number, are being targeted with exclusionary laws. This is in addition to all the laws forbidding teachers from speaking about LGBT issues.

So what can we do to be an ally to the trans community?

  1. Use their correct pronouns. If you don't know, ask!

  2. Educate yourself on trans issues. Don't rely on the trans community to do all the work here. Search out websites, blogs, authors, etc.

  3. Vote for LGBT friendly candidates, and then hold them accountable! Also let the lawmakers who write anti-trans bills know as well.

  4. Speak up when you hear transphobic jokes or language.

  5. Check in on your trans friends. Even a simple text or note saying you're thinking of them will help.

All of the above increases your proximity and understanding with the trans community and their issues. Bryan Stevenson of EJI alluded to this in his speech at Davidson College a couple of years ago. Over time, the hate decreases as it simply becomes unacceptable. We better understand the beautiful people in the trans community, their gifts, their perspective, their talents. Each life cut short is a loss for all of us due to the potential lost. Each person is valuable. Each person is enough. They don't need to apologize for being their most authentic selves. On this Transgender Day of Remembrance, let us commit to remembering those who had that opportunity snatched away and be the supporters for those still here.

Thank you and all my love,

Stephanie

Southeastern Jurisdictional Conference

Read a letter from Pastor Sarah about SEJ

Did you know that Pastor Sarah is a delegate to the Southeastern Jurisdictional Conference? 
 

Hi beloveds, 

As you may know I am a delegate to our United Methodist Southeastern Jurisdictional Conference which will take place at Lake Junaluska, NC on November 1-4, 2022. One dimension of our work is the discernment of episcopal leadership (aka bishops) for the Southeastern Jurisdictional Conference (SEJ).

Wait, what's the SEJ? Well, the green map above shows the Annual Conferences that together make up the SEJ. Inclusion Community is a part of the Western North Carolina Conference. 
What's a delegate? I am one of 20 clergy delegates that were elected at the 2019 WNC Annual Conference to represent the Western NC Conference at SEJ. There are also 20 lay delegates. Here's the full list. 
What's the role of a bishop? A bishop is an ordained elder set apart for a ministry of servant leadership, general oversight, and supervision. You can read more here. 

I write to invite you to join me in lifting in prayer or holding space for all of the episcopal nominees, our current bishops, and our delegation as we discern. We will need to discern and elect 3 new bishops during our time at Lake Junaluska. You can read and learn about the episcopal nominees here: https://www.sejumc.org/episcopal-nominees  As you'll see they've shared written a bio, shared answers to theological questions, shared videos and websites for you to learn more about them. (They've put a great deal of effort into them!)

As we can only imagine, this process is a journey unto itself. This journey asks for an enormous amount of physical-emotional-mental-spiritual energy of our episcopal nominees. They have discerned God's call within themselves and in community. If elected they would be elected for life! They will be assigned a particular area to serve for a four-year term. New bishops are not typically initially assigned to the area they have served as a pastor. You can read more here about the actual process. 

I invite you to join me in praying for them by name, and if you'd like to take it a step further, below are the times that they will be participating in a Q&A with delegates, such as myself, from across the whole southeast. (Sorry, some have already passed.) These Q&A are not open to the public, but only to the Jurisdictional Delegates to aid in their discernment. However, I invite you to consider taking a moment to light a candle or say a prayer for them at that time:

Kenneth Nelson (SC) - Saturday, September 17 - 9:00am ET

Tom Berlin (VA) - Tuesday, September 20 at 7:30pm ET

Byron Thomas (NGA) - Thursday, September 29 at 7:30pm ET

Iosmar Alvarez (KY) - Monday, October 3 at 7:00pm ET

**Amy Coles (WNC) - Tuesday, October 4 at 7:00pm ET. (**Our Conference's Nominee!)

Sharon Austin (FL) - Thursday, October 6 at 7:00pm ET

Edie Gleaves (NC) - Tuesday, October 11 at 6:30pm ET

Connie Shelton (SEJ Clergywomen & MS) - Monday, October 17 at 12:30pm ET

Sharon Bowers (HOL BMCR) - Thursday, October 20 at 7:00pm ET

Here is the list of our current bishops. 

Curious to know more about the Jurisdictional Conference?
Here is a link to more information about the SEJ Jurisdictional Conference. 

Please also hold me, my fellow delegates, and our whole connection in your prayers through this critical season of discernment and transition.


I'm more than happy to talk about this process with you or answer any questions you may have. I want you all to be well informed. Please do not hesitate to reach out! 


Thanks for reading and praying along with me during this season. I appreciate you!


Deep peace be with you,
Pastor Sarah
sbelles@inclusioncommunity.org

Happy 12th Birthday Inclusion Community!

Happy 12th Birthday Inclusion Community!

Story Slam & Potluck

We hosted our “annual” Story Slam to celebrate our 12th birthday! Kari, Chuck, Adele, Julie, and Steve told 5-minute stories and we wrote one-sentence stories about the theme “Table.” What beautiful stories- humorous, humbling, heart-wrenching, and holy! A special thanks to our story tellers!

Our Tapestry of Prayers, Hopes, & Dreams

The 12th anniversary gift is a tapestry/linen, so we created one together. We’ve been writing our prayers, concerns, celebrations, hopes, and dreams on ribbons this summer and put them on the altar. Today we write hopes and dreams for the next 12 years of the life of Inclusion Community’s ministry! Together we wove the ribbons into a tapestry to use on our altar table!

A Snapshot of our Inclusion Community Dreaming Day

A Snapshot of our Inclusion Community Dreaming Day:

RESULTS OF OUR DISCERNMENT WORK

After some deep discernment together, here were the top results of our Dreaming Day:

PURSUE JUSTICE

INTENTION: Offer a Deep South Pilgrimage to reckon with racial injustice (spring of 203) *invited Mount Zion UMC and Hunters Chapel UMC to partner and journey with us

PRACTICE COMMUNITY:

INTENTION: Contact Cornelius Elementary School to find out any resource or volunteer needs they have and commit to meeting one of those needs

INTENTION: Provide a Dinner Church/Experiment with Dinner Church model of church

INTENTION: Provide Baguetting to Know You Part 2

EXPLORE SPIRITUALITY

INTENTION: Offer and Embodied practice: CONSPIRE (during Advent)

INTENTION: Offer a Spiritual Writing Retreat (spring of 2023?)

INCLUSION COMMUNITY GOES TO CLT PRIDE 2022!

A Mother's Day Prayer

Beloveds,

Mother’s Day can evoke a variety of experiences and emotions. Whether Mother’s Day is your greatest joy, deepest heartache, or barely a passing thought, you will be welcome at the Gathering tomorrow. To best create a space of belonging for all, we will not center our Gathering on a Mother’s Day theme. To anyone who might wish to read a Mother’s Day blessing, I offer you one written by another young clergy woman which I find particularly meaningful.

Deep peace be with you,

Pastor Sarah

 

I want you to know I'm praying for you if you are like Tamar, struggling with infertility, or a miscarriage.

I want you to know that I'm praying for you if you are like Rachel, counting the women among your family and friends who year by year and month by month get pregnant, while you wait.

I want you to know I'm praying for you if you are like Naomi and have known the bitter sting of a child's death.

I want you to know I am praying for you if you are like Joseph and Benjamin, and your Mom has died.

I want you to know that I am praying for you if your relationship with your Mom was marked by trauma, abuse, or abandonment, or she just couldn't parent you the way you needed.

I want you to know I am praying for you if you've been like Moses' mother and put a child up for adoption, trusting another family to love the child you birthed into adulthood.

I want you to know I am praying for you if you've been like Pharaoh's daughter, called to love children who are not yours by birth (and thus the mother who brought that child into your life, even if it is complicated).

I want you to know I am praying for you if you, like many, are watching (or have watched) your mother age and disappear into the long goodbye of dementia.

I want you to know that I am praying for you if you, like Mary, are pregnant for the very first time and waiting breathlessly for the miracle of your first child.

I want you to know that I am praying for you if you, also like Mary, have watched your beautiful, black or brown-skinned baby murdered by the empire. And even still all you can do is weep and rage.

I want you to know that I am praying for you if you are a queer mama, or a trans mama doing the work of mothering your babies in a radical way that was not modeled for you.

I want you to know that I am praying for you if your children have turned away from you, painfully closing the door on relationship, leaving you holding your broken heart in your hands. And like Hagar, now you are mothering alone.

I want you to know that I am praying for you if motherhood is your greatest joy and toughest struggle all rolled into one.

I want you to know that I am praying for you if you are watching your child battle substance abuse, a public legal situation, mental illness, or another situation which you can merely watch unfold.

I want you to know that I am praying for you if you like so many women before you do not wish to be a mother, are not married, or in so many other ways do not fit into societal expectations.

I want you to know that I am praying for you if you carry the beautiful, exhausting, maddening, heart breaking, wonderful labor of mothering even though you do not have children of your own.

I want you to know that I am praying for you if you see yourself reflected in all, or none of these stories.

This Mother’s Day, wherever and whoever you are, we walk with you. You are loved. You are seen. You are worthy.

And may you know the deep love without end of our big, wild, beautiful God who is the very best example of a parent that we know.

Amen.

 

- A prayer for Mother's Day by Heidi Carrington Heath (based on a version originally by Amy Young)

Blessings from our Sacred Reading with Students Group

Blessings from our Sacred Reading with Students Group

During our Sacred Reading Group, Jack Salt and Haley Hamblin shared with us the sacred practice of offering blessings. They invited us to write a blessing for one of the characters in Celeste Ng’s Little Fires Everywhere. Take a peak at some of the blessings we wrote:

Haley Hamblins's Blessing:

Lord, bless our hands, 

Some are nimble, dainty, or sore

Others are strong, calloused, or scarred. 

Bless the curvatures of our fingers; 

How they tell stories of struggle, work, and activity. 

Bless the veins and creases, the lines of life.

May you bless our hands as they reach out in love, 

Hold others with care,

Write stories of peace and justice,

And do the work of reconciliation. 


Lord, bless our eyes, 

As they strive to see the world around us. 

Bless the eyes that see beauty and suffering 

And the heart that tries to reconcile the existence of both.

Bless our eyes that see the brightness of the sun and darkest depth of night.

And give us the power to discern the shadows present within each.

Bless the eyes that see – truly see– the essence of another

The eyes that do not judge, gaze voyeuristically, or sit idle, 

But eyes that pierce the veil of niceties and respectability 

To love all, just as they are.


Lord, bless our hearts, souls, and minds,

The most intimate parts of ourselves;

The places of our wrestling, 

The source of connection to community and world.

Bless those parts of our innermost being that only You can reach. 


Lord, bless us in our reading 

Bless the hands that hold the book,

The eyes that read the words,

The mind that seeks to understand,

The heart that connects with characters and stories,

And the soul that seeks for the sacred present in it all. 

Amen. 

A Blessing for Mr. Richardson by Kathi Callaway

God, bless Mr. Richardson as he defends his clients

May he see them as the wonderful friends and neighbors they are

May he see their qualities as Mirabelle’s parents shine through

May he see the gratitude they have at finally having a baby of their own to raise

May he see the horrible struggle they are going through during this trial


God, bless Mr. Richardson as he defends his clients

May he see Bebe as the wonderful person she is

May he see Bebe’s qualities as May Ling’s mother shine through

May he see the gratitude that Bebe has at being able see and interact with May Ling

May he see the horrible struggle she is going through during this trial


God, bless Mr. Richardson as he defends his clients

May he have the strength to defend his clients even in the face of his doubts

May he have the grace to defend his clients even in the face of those doubts

May he have the integrity to do his job, while having the right to have those doubts

God, may he have the faith in You that he needs to get through this trial with this internal struggle going

on in his soul


Prayer by Cristy Carroll

I come with a thankful heart to give thanks for my passion, my energy, and my drive.

Help me to discover the right path, my path, my path toward belonging.

Lord, help me find my place and to marry my passion with my desire to fit in, to fully belong.




Blessing by Cristy Carroll

Bless those who are making impossibly difficult choices.

Bless those parts of us that make those choices, our heart, and our mind.

Bless us when the consequences of the choices are absolutely life-giving and when

they are life taking or send a life into new challenges far beyond our comprehension.

Bless us for not letting those choices be made for us, but when we are courageous

enough to make those choices for ourselves.

Bless those who make choices in love in the midst of struggles that I cannot fully appreciate.




A Prayer & Two Blessings by Don Carroll
The theme I went with which resonated for me was the uncertainties of the lives of the characters; certainly Mia and Pearl, but also all the Richardson teenagers; we live with important, but taken for granted decisions each day maybe more than we realize.

 

Prayer for One Day

 

Loving God,

Just for today, I pray to experience your love

that I might receive clarity about the truth of each moment

to discern your will for me in this unfolding day;

I pray for curiosity to be teachable that I might

respond to life not out of fear or anger, but from your love;

I pray for patience to wait for your guidance

to become experienced and manifest

I pray for courage that knowing your will, I will follow

the path you have chosen for me;

I pray for joy knowing as your love unfolds

through me, my path is one of astonishment and beauty; and

I pray for humility to experience that at the end of the day

 you have done for me what I could not do for myself

and that I might abide in your peace for a good night’s rest.

Blessing for the Kingdom

As the Lord did bless the loaves and fishes

         may he bless our passionate wishes

 

May our little fires burn bright

         that his Love will warm the night

 

So when ‘morrow brings the sun

         closer may His Kingdom come

 

 

Blessing for Artists

         for Mia

May those whose creative gifts

         are not seen or supported

 

Who work in darkness

         as the world spins by them

 

May the closeness of their lives

         to loss and desperation

 

Open hearts to an unexpected Love

         never reflected by family or friends

 

So that the fires of their imaginations may

         whet the longings of Love in the world

 

To bring a new way to see ourselves

         a new way for us to understand each other

 

For a way in either desperation or abundance

         for souls to embrace authentic creation

 

so blessings of Love pour from imagination’s fire

         to mend together our fragile world.

 

 

Not pictured: Susan Little & Steve Cloniger.