Posts

Service of Ordination

SERVICE OF ORDINATION 2020 I wish you knew What it’s like How it feels To watch your kitchen table tyrant wrapped in a red cloak of victory

Dear Askie: I’m Changing Calls!

Dear Askie, I have just accepted a new call! It’s very exciting but also very sad. You see, I’m leaving my current call after almost eight years. I love the people, and we have done some amazing things together. I want to leave well—for me and for them—but I am not really sure how to […]

Dear Clergy: A Letter for November

My dear, weary, fierce colleagues in ministry, It’s been a year, hasn’t it? None of us knew going in to 2020 what would come; none of us expected to spend the majority of the year figuring out how to minister to and with people we couldn’t be within an arm’s reach of. And yet, here […]

Update to YCWI Membership Policy

Young Clergy Women International has been, since its beginning in 2007, an organization for the professional development and care for the youngest of clergy women. Eleven years later, our commitment to the community of women under the age of forty who serve as clergy continues. YCWI exists to equip young women with spiritual and practical […]

All of the Fun, None of the Work?

“All of the fun, none of the work.” It’s the phrase I frequently hear from clergy when I tell them that I’m an Associate Rector. It’s the “truth-in-jest” description of associate clergy. You don’t have the highest level of responsibility and the buck doesn’t stop with you, so you don’t have to deal with the […]

Embracing Fluidity

Two months ago I ended my position at a parish where I served for six years as the associate rector. Leaving was the best option for my family, my health, and my desire to pursue another kind of ministry. It was time for something new. I initially thought I would stay until I had my […]

Spiritual Safety

Wardrobe choices. That’s what my husband and I were fighting about that evening. It was like an episode of “What Not To Wear” was playing in front of our closet.

The Power of Plastic

I remember the moment vividly. I sat across from my Koine Greek professor, the woman with wild red hair and a penchant for saying, “Okie dokie, Smokie!” Her dark-rimmed glasses slipped down on her nose as she leaned in toward me. “You’re a petite, young-looking woman. How will you claim pastoral authority?” Now, perhaps I […]

What’s News? Young Clergy Women Share Their News Sources

A favorite line of shop talk among preachers is that we must preach with the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other. (This quote is frequently attributed to 20th-century theologian Karl Barth, although trustworthy sources, like Princeton Seminary’s Barth Center, say there’s no proof of this exact quote, just similar statements by […]

Turbulent Waters: Discovering Church

Sleepily nursing my eight-day-old daughter after sending my one- and three- year olds off to school, I considered that it was Wednesday. Not just any Wednesday, but Ash Wednesday. I felt something stir deep within my exhausted, still healing body: “I want to go to church today.” Not to preside, but to be present at […]