‘Good Stuff’ = articles I’ve read this week that inspired, educated, entertained, or moved me.
Which for a Free Range Priest, means reading more amazing, inspiring things about God, the church, the universe, and running.
Here’s this week’s roundup:
'The institutional church is collapsing and we're not sure what to do'
If you want to know more about Free Range Priest - START HERE!
God stuff
‘Redemptive Suffering is a myth’ by Jim Keat. ‘It’s not that suffering satisfies God. Suffering is where God shows up. What if the cross doesn’t change God’s mind about us — what if it changes our mind about God?
’How to Pray When You’re Drowning’ by Holly Pettit. ‘That’s the bare-bones prayer. It’s what we’ve got when words dissolve in our mouth. When we can’t see more than a few inches in front of us, and what we see looks black.
This is combat prayer. It may sound like ‘oh God, oh God, oh God.” It may be complete silence, and maintaining an open channel.’
Church stuff
‘25 Essential Anglican Writers’ by Mark Clavier. ‘A tradition isn’t merely a collection of things our predecessors happened to believe. It’s an inheritance of arguments, prayers, habits, failures, insights and discoveries, handed from one generation to another for the rather dangerous purpose of allowing the next generation to make use of it. The point of inheriting a tradition isn’t to preserve it in amber. It’s to have something substantial enough to argue with and learn from.’
‘Allowing a Church to Die’ by Annie Neely. ‘Allowing a church to die, then, is not indifference. It is not the absence of hope or care. Sometimes it is the difficult work of discerning together when faithfulness means continuing to fight for renewed life and when faithfulness means releasing what we love into the hands of God.’
Other stuff
’I’d like to be less responsible’ by Tove Danovich. ‘Years ago, when I was overwhelmed with grief and indecision, my therapist told me if I was having trouble figuring out what I wanted the best thing to do was to practice it. Go to the store and buy a peach if you really want to buy a peach. Linger a little bit on the question of what you want to wear. Practice following your impulses. It was good advice though I fall in and out of the habit. I think it’s time to give it another try.’
‘We should all aspire to be a Dolly’ by Maura Casey. ‘Yet what her death made me think about wasn’t just Parton, whom I admired but never met. I began to think about other Earth angels, other “Dollys” that I have been blessed to know.’
What I wrote this week:
‘I’m Father Cathie*, and I am your Free Range Priest’. ‘It felt like it was the other way around: communities and ministers seemed more preoccupied with propping up the institution than sharing the Gospel - because their survival depended on it. I thought: there has to be a better way. We should be able to figure out a new way to share Good News in the 21st century.’
‘What is the end of the journey?’ Written by Loren Richmond Jr. (for Substack Seminary).
And finally…
At Free Range Priest, we’re bringing church to people.
Bite-sized ways that YOU can re-imagine ministry and get ‘unstuck’.
Subscribe to re-discover ministry JOY.
Sign up for the Newletters - and manage your preferences HERE.
