October 2011

I quietly ache that my two fabulous, bright, funny, inquisitive, thoughtful, imaginative twenty-something sons aren’t really part of any faith community. I can tell myself that they’ll wander back into a church when they get married and have kids. They’re just kids themselves, exploring life. Most of their pals aren’t in faith communities.

In July I wrote a blog asking prayers for those out of work. The statistics are discouraging, hardly a budge in the unemployment rate. But beyond the numbers, there is the anecdotal evidence.

Just the other day I asked a friend if his wife had gotten the job she had interviewed for, a position that seemed perfect for her. “No,” he said, “they called her to let her know that she was their second choice.”

The other morning I was running in the park on a day when the rain seemed to be lifting. To the east the sky was blue and the sun was pushing above the horizon but there were still clouds to the west, hugging the palisades.

As I plodded down the hill I spotted a magnificent rainbow. The arc didn’t connect at the top but the trunks of it sank from the middle of the sky and almost touched the river below. What a pot of gold for all of us joggers and early risers.

I came up to another runner behind a curtain of trees and asked her, “Did you see that rainbow?”

I was having a late lunch, sitting on some steps in front of a building near our office on a bright October day. A fellow in a black jacket and a tie was sitting nearby, but I wasn’t paying much attention to him. I was enjoying the sun, the New York street traffic and my lentil soup.

Out of the blue the guy said, “What do you do when you feel stressed?” I turned to him. He was youngish, late 20s, with dark hair, a slight mustache and an earnest expression. I wasn’t sure how to answer.

I’ve been reading Biblical scholar T.J. Wray’s new book, What the Bible Really Tells Us. She has a gift for taking in a lot of information and summarizing it in a helpful way, especially when talking about prayer. In my prayer life I can get lost in the details. She helps me see the big picture. Here’s her take on what the Bible says about prayer:

I was thrilled by today’s announcement that Leymah Gbowee has been made one of the winners of the Nobel Peace Prize.

In 2003 in Liberia she led thousands of women in protests against the war that killed 250,000 people. Dressed in white, as though “in sackcloth and ashes,” the women sat with placards at the fish market in Monrovia, praying for peace through sweltering heat and pouring rain. Sustained by faith, they did not give up.