Bespoke

Spirituality

Religion and Life

  • Icebergs in Corn Fields

    When Belinda Carlisle of the Go-Go’s sings “Heaven is a place on earth” I stop whatever I’m doing and sing along. ‘Ooh baby do you know what that’s worth, you make heaven a place on earth’ It happened today, in… Continue reading

  • Reading to my Children

    I’m a lousy Dad. At least it feels that way sometimes, the feeling you get that you didn’t say enough or share enough or that you put on a mask and didn’t reveal your inner self to your children, that… Continue reading

  • Walking to Heaven in Twenty Mile Moments

    I stood in the tiny foyer of the holy of holies two days ago, the old knotty pine auditorium of the Tabernacle church of Christ, remembering my wedding day, June 15, 1985, and Thom Mason is fidgeting and pacing, preparing… Continue reading

  • My German Vacation Journal 8: Facebook in 1517 on a church door

    Thursday was wild card day so we chose a city of interest between Friday’s Berlin walk-about and Rothenburg. Martin Luther is a famous catalyst for the Protestant reformation and in the year 1517 he posted 95 reasons why indulgences, buying… Continue reading

  • My German Vacation Journal 5: Cathedrals in Our Hearts

    After breakfast we opened the French doors as a breeze gently entered our room off sun-drenched Lake Alster. Just as a breeze blew in on Pentecost in the book of Acts. Just as that same breeze ripples through the lives… Continue reading

  • The Color of God

    The bus crossed the 7th street bridge and I peered over the rail through an open window at the eddies of a muddy river, swirling coffee relentlessly shaping the bank of naked earth. On my first day of junior high… Continue reading

  • Discovering the Holy Among the Profane in Fifteen Minutes

    I grew up in a home that severely limited my creative outlet of language…I wasn’t allowed to curse, nor was I given the freedom to vent with words that hinted of the real four-letter curse words, the baby curse words… Continue reading

  • The Heavens Dark Matter and the Andy Warhol Swing

    Once in my youth, I felt heaven unreachable, sterile, a place of thou shalt not have fun, and my fervor was not equal to the pill-box hatted lady sitting in the pew in front of me blocking my view of… Continue reading

  • The Best Shortstop I Ever Saw

    A Gatorade cooler dumped on my head moment of clarity regarding my diminishing skills as a shortstop happened one summer evening in the hole between short and third as I reached down across my body for a grounder and caught a… Continue reading

  • Magical Monotonous Christmas

    At the age of four, I doubted Santa for the first time. Not his girth or beard or constant jolliness, but rather my own worthiness to receive his gifts, and the weight of guilt rang in my ears with every… Continue reading