Welcome to my blog — a place to reflect with me on God's abundant healing of soul, community, and creation. I hope you will visit often and be part of this sacred conversation.
Wednesday’s Sharing Circle at the TRC (see earlier blog) also invited a former teacher to give voice to her difficult experience in a school in Saskatchewan. She arrived as a new, young teacher eager and ready for her vocation. Then she saw the dreadful basement room in which she and her students were expected to spend their days.
Bearing witness to truth is a first step toward healing and reconciliation. Facing one another as we speak truth holds the promise that we might truly listen to the depth of our own truth and the depth of others’ truth, that we might hear the cry of our own souls and the cry of others’ souls.
As mentioned in my earlier blog, yesterday I was given the honour of speaking on behalf of The United Church of Canada at the Opening Session of the first national gathering of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, along with TRC Commissioners and other leaders (Aboriginal, government, and church leaders). I began by making clear that I spoke not only for our church as Moderator but also for myself.
Day one of this first national gathering of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission began at 5:19 a.m. yesterday with the lighting of the Sacred Fire at sunrise here at The Forks in Winnipeg.
This morning I head to Montreal for a weekend of helping United Theological College mark the completion of its Designated Lay Ministry Residential program. Another poignant few days in a week marked by countless and varied 85th anniversary celebrations for The United Church of Canada.
Groups are gathering in various regions of the world today, June 8th, to mark World Oceans Day, learning and taking action about ocean change, along with climate change.
My prayer times are extended these days with so many troubling incidents of violence and distress calling to be held in God’s love, peace, and justice.
Yesterday morning I spoke with the Rev. Bill Millar as he and his congregation of Knox United in Winnipeg prepared for worship. They’d been through quite a shock. On Friday a portion of the building’s stone spire fell as a thunderstorm rolled across the city. A 6,000 lb. chunk of Tyndall rock came crashing down, narrowly missing a nearby parked car. Amazingly, no one was hurt.
Last Saturday I had the distinct privilege of meeting Kathryn Randsdell at a full-day regional event held at Highlands United Church in Vancouver.
She approached me at the end of the day to talk about how we, as people of Christian faith, might best respond to the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. She moved me to begin adding prayers for plankton to my daily morning prayers.
I greet you at Pentecost with words of blessing written by my friend Jim Ball:
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