Everyday Heroes

As I walk along the road that meanders beside the waterfront of my hometown, I take in the sights and sounds of an early spring day in the Pacific Northwest: the gradient gray sky, the salty Salish Sea mist, the snow-capped Olympic mountains, the sporadic groupings of daffodils brightly declaring spring. I’ve walked this stretch…

Read More

The Strange Side of Compassion

“So, how did it actually feel to have dinner with a serial killer?” my colleague at the law firm asked. Shuffling depositions between color tabbed manila folders, I quickly changed the topic to billable hours for a client. I’d avoided this topic for so many years. Even when an author asked permission to use the…

Read More

Expanding the Boundaries

A mind that is stretched by a new experience can never go back to its old dimensions. – Oliver Wendell Holmes Growing up in a religiously conservative, white community in America’s heartland, my view of the world was rather small. My community included our family farm and my grandparents’ house, which was next door to…

Read More

New Jesus

I’ve always wondered what it would be like to have God speak into my innermost being. I grew up hearing people talk about this intimate experience, which left them reeling in the emotional connectedness of being seen by a higher power. I’ve felt suspicious of such accounts and have held a firm stance that anything…

Read More