Finding Common Ground

To all my sister-friends who have ever struggled with your faith walk, who have ever questioned your place in the church, especially in churches where women are "silent," (but not so silent that they can't make up most of the singers in the choir, teach most of the children's Sunday School classes, or run Vacation Bible School), who have tried to cling to faith rituals that have lost their meaning, who bristle at the jokes and stories told from the pulpit that are at your expense and the expense of all women everywhere, who long to be truly seen, heard, and welcomed into your own faith community, and may have given up and walked away in despair and disillusionment -

to those who have asked God to speak, to move, to act, and have wondered at the gaping silences, to all people, men and women, who are seeking a deeper faith walk while struggling to make sense of how crazy and lonely and uncertain it sometimes makes you feel to pursue Someone so unknowable and unspeakable -

I want you to know that you are not alone.
That there are others in the same place.
That there is common ground.

Know that all the ground between you and me,
between each of us on this halting, stumbling, confusing,
life-altering, exhilirating, inexplicable journey of faith -
all the ground between us, between all of us, is holy ground.


And if you are in a city where the movie, Higher Ground, is showing,
please go see this movie.
Please, please, please, go see it.
And then stop back by here and tell me what you think.

I saw it yesterday with my daughter.
I plan to go see it again - soon.
I hope to read the memoir it is based upon.


In the meantime, at all times, and in every situation,
remember, you are not alone.
There is common ground.
Stay on the pathway of faith, the way, el camino.

I wish you peace, courage, and hope.
Deep peace.
Profound courage.
Boundless hope.