Women Who Speak In Church

04/06/2026

On March 31, President Trump issued an Executive Order (EO) titled “Ensuring Citizenship Verification and Integrity in Federal Elections.”

This EO will make voting by mail more difficult and restrict who can vote by mail.

AAPD is highly concerned that if any aspects of this EO go into effect, voters with disabilities and other marginalized communities will be disproportionately harmed. Already, disabled voters face increased challenges in accessing their right to vote because of policies and practices that make voting difficult. For many people with disabilities, voting by mail is the only way they can participate in elections. An attack on vote by mail is an attack on disabled voters.

Fewer people voting is not good for democracy. Voting should be easy and accessible for all eligible voters.

ID: White text on a dark blue background that says "Attacks on vote by mail are attacks on voters with disabilities."

01/24/2026

Micah 6:8---What does the Lord require of you but to do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with your God?

Do justice----when something is unjust, God wants us to DO something to change that, to address the cause of the unjust situation, to change an unjust policy or systemic injustice. If someone is treated unfairly or discriminated against, God requires us to change that. If someone is being oppressed or unjustly incarcerated, God is requiring us to set them free.

Love kindness (mercy)--- If we love kindness, God requires us to negate meanness and hatred and disregard and disrespect, and also thoughtless language and insults and judgmental behavior. God is telling us to care for one another, not to dismiss others' concerns or needs. This means not mocking others or belittling them. Kindness is not the currency of our culture today, but it could be if we make it so.

Walk humbly with our God---- God requires this, not because God wants to be the King of the Hill and order all of us around, but because God loves every single person! When we as mere humans humbly accept that we don't know everything and we certainly don't know everything that others are going through, we can take a step back and know that the only way to love others is to fight for justice for all and to always, always be kind to everyone. How do we know that? Because every person is made in God's image. beloved of God. And, although we are not God, that image makes us capable of loving others, and that shows itself in doing justice and loving kindness. Being humble leads to gratitude to God for being both just and kind to us.

01/19/2026

Once in a while, I have to face head-on that there is so much evil in the world. So much violence, so much tragedy, so much meanness and hate. For most of my life, I have been able to look the other way enough to carry on as usual.

Lately, the evil outweighs the good by so much that it takes center stage. And I struggle to remember that "the light shines in the darkness and the darkness does not/cannot overcome it!" How hard it can be to believe that! How hard to find the joy and the hope and the promise!

And then I remember what a friend once said to me, "Everywhere I go, I see God going in front of me." If I repeat that to myself, I can start to see God in front of me, too. And then I realize, God is in the hard places, not only with me, but in front of me---showing me how to survive, how to find the good, even now. That there is nowhere I can go that God has not been first, and I am never alone, never in the darkness without that light.

12/19/2025

My latest published piece---

Visit our website today to enjoy our John 3:16-21 Devotional from 2025. If you have any thoughts or questions, please contact us.

08/03/2025

Recently I heard a male preacher brag that for years he had changed "This is the day the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it!" to "We SHALL rejoice and be glad in it."

This raised my hackles. It makes it an order, not an invitation. Or maybe it just reflects determination? At any rate, if it's said in church every Sunday, at what point does it start to seem like there is no time ever for lamentation or grief or even righteous anger?

It was said without a hint of joy, without any reason given to celebrate. Is it any wonder that it bothered me so much?

07/18/2025

I preached this sermon the Sunday after the ICE raids began in LA.

Service Bulletin: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1AEYu-lNuCEI0eaJjQsg48pJcwWbfboi-/view?usp=drive_link2024 Church Copyright Licenses CCLI Licens...

12/14/2022

Women have always spoken in church!

Archaeologists have discovered a treasure trove that reveals a brief period in medieval English history where pagan and Christian traditions melded together, and women held positions of power in the church.

02/16/2022

Struggling with "Love Your Enemy"? Maybe this perspective will help.

Luke 6:27-38 is one of the difficult passages of scripture. Loving your enemies, do good to those who hurt you, turning the other cheek---it makes me think that Jesus didn't really understand being human at all. In my Bible the heading for all of this is "Behaving as God's children." That makes me think about what my parents taught me. My siblings and I fought at times, as children do, but I don't remember Mom and Dad telling me to turn the other cheek. I do remember, "No fighting!" and being told more than once to be nice to my little brother because "someday he will be bigger than you," a prediction that came true and now I am grateful I was mostly nice to him! But turning the other cheek when fights occasionally became physical--no way!
Outside of the family, though, this becomes more difficult. I remember the context, then, with this passage being part of the Sermon on the Plain, right after the Beatitudes and the Woes. Since the playing field will be leveled when those who weep and mourn will be comforted and rejoice and those who laugh and are comfortable will weep and be in need, does this help us to love our enemies? Knowing that those who are laughing and partying while others suffer will soon be the ones needing help, does that make it more possible to see them as human and "just like us"? Maybe.
I think many of our problems today come from us/them thinking. "They" are not like "us." "They" are the enemy that has everything we want or they hurt us or exploit or abuse us. And all that can be true and still not mean that they are less human, that they are monsters, that God hates them.
And if God doesn't hate them, does God love them? I actually want to believe that God does. Because I am not perfect and I am sometimes less than generous, less compassionate and responsive to the needs of others than I could be, and God still loves me.
And if God loves even a person who can mess up like I do, maybe God can love anybody. Even people that I label "them." Even people I find it very, very difficult to love.

And because I am a child of God, I will find a way to love "those people" too.

01/31/2022

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