In the days after a fire destroyed a six-bay garage at the ARC Retreat Center as well as three cars, two years’ supply of firewood, and all my belongings, I was numb; I wandered around wearing other people’s clothes trying to remember who I was and what I believed. Had God abandoned me? The ring […]
Recently I attended a secular conversation at which the word “Source” was batted around the way religious folks use the word “God.” I find “Source” a helpful term, although perhaps not big enough to encompass my sense of divine presence. But it got me thinking: What’s a writer’s source? What grounds us and inspires us?
Silence: A Writer’s Source Read More »
My friend Michael Bischoff gave a talk recently in which he publicly declared his participation in the “cult of personal development.” Like so many of us, Michael strives to be a better person, a better leader, and to help make the world a better place. What could be wrong with that? Of course, a lot
Karen Hering’s new book, Writing to Wake the Soul: Opening the Sacred Conversation Within, hits the bookstores next week, and I want to encourage everyone interested in writing as a spiritual practice to get a copy. In her role as literary minister at a Unitarian Universalist congregation, Hering developed what she calls Contemplative Correspondence, a
A Fresh Look at Writing as a Spiritual Practice Read More »
Every day I become more convinced that the pressing social justice issue of our times, the single most important problem that individuals and congregations and governments need to address, is our warming planet. And every day I’m more convinced that an essential (perhaps the essential) source of a solution rests in our faith—not necessarily the
Communal Faith and Climate Change Read More »
I’ve known for a while and repeatedly told my students that writing continues to offer us invitations to spiritual and personal growth even after we’re finished. Publishing and publicity can become opportunities to deepen our integrity, expand our communities, and understand the world more accurately. Of course in the mess of book production and the
The Story about the Story Read More »
Here’s what excites me about our climate crisis: It invites us to change. “We face a choice that is starkly simple: We must change or be changed,” writes Wendell Berry. “If we fail to change for the better, then we will be changed for the worse.” Okay, so the alternatives are either exciting or terrifying,
Write, or Be Written Read More »
Because I’m gearing up to market my first novel, Hannah, Delivered, in a bit less than a year, I’ve been thinking quite a bit about what it means to put creative work into the world. Most writers I know, myself included, assume their job is to write. Writing is where we’re creative. Writing is what
The New Market–with thanks to Seth Godin Read More »
Three weeks ago, our neighbor brought Gwyn a tiny monarch caterpillar crawling on a milkweed leaf. We made a home for the little guy with an ice cream bucket and mosquito net, and watched in amazement as the leaf got gnawed and caterpillar poop appeared. In no time flat our very hungry caterpillar was huge
What does it mean to be a Minnesotan writer? In this age of placelessness—sitting in a Starbucks or Motel 6 or airport lounge or on a Facebook page, you could be anywhere—even our literature is without landscape or regional identity. Especially literature from the Midwest, which, when compared with New York City writing or the
A Midwestern Identity Read More »