Friendship at the Margins is the kind of book I've been waiting for in the midst of my own spiritual crossroads (tumbleweed and all). There are models of missionary life that I've come to terms with - the word itself "missionary" being a hesitancy in my messy evangelical conscious. 

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My husband, Joe, has been reading a bit about monastic tradition and spiritual disciplines lately.  I think this is what brought on the $2 a day idea.  But sometimes he just suggests crazy things that turn out to be great, so it could have been that as well.  For example: moving into community with other couples.  He suggested it and I thought it was a little crazy, but he was excited about it.  When Joe is excited about something, things usually happen kind of fast, before I've fully digested the idea. 

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He fit the profile. He was in worn clothes, a bright red jacket, dirty white shoes, and hadn't shaved for weeks. His mustache curled precariously over his upper lip and glasses sat as an ornament on the ridge of his nose. There wasn't much else to do standing in the remnants of the rain shower we just had fall on us, so I decided to strike up a conversation with James.

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Date: Christmas Season, 2009 To: Mr. Right, who may be just a dream, but perhaps is real and in training even now, gaining the skills and insight necessary to Be My Husband. From: Ms. Recently Unemployed and Elated at the Next Possibilities Re: Jewelry and Much Bigger Things   Hello again. I hope that during this stage and season of your life, your arms, he...

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Here come the holidays.  I've already got my Thanksgiving plans made, including where I am going and what I am cooking.  I'm working out what to do at Christmas.  Some people I know already have their trees up and decorated.  Others are ticking off how many gift-buying days remain.  A lady told me the other day that she's already done shopping and wrapping.  Wow.

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Our first day in Swaziland Pastor Gift told us about Maswane and asked if we would be willing to go pray with her. When she was five years old she was raped which is how she contracted HIV. She was raped again when she was seven and has never once consented to sex with a man. One of the men who raped her has died, and the other is free; he escaped to South Africa. Her virginity as well as her life has been brutally ripped away.

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There is something interesting about people living in poverty. Most of the time we don't like to admit that we have nothing, that we are taking each day at a time praying that maybe God will send someone with something to meet our needs.   Living out in Nsoko is heart-breaking. Living in Swaziland is hard enough for most Americans, being away from the comforts that we all love so much...

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Singer/songwriter and Compassion blogger Shaun Groves posted a tongue-in-cheek blog last week about his recent trip to Kolkata, India, criticizing churches in the developing world for "doing it all wrong." He cites churches that he's visited in India, Africa, and Latin America that have made worship centers not just places where the religious parade their spirituality on Sundays.

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I had read bits and pieces of her life through other works - who she was and who she is helping others become through her story.

Dorothy Day was the founder of the Catholic Workers Movement, along with "co-founder/conspirator" Peter Maurin. 

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