Today’s poem is, well, not a poem. Rather, it is a portion of a speech given by Teddy Roosevelt at the Sorbonne, in Paris, in 1910. I was introduced to it by reading Brene Brown’s recent book, Daring Greatly, which is not only a fantastic read but whose title is inspired by Roosevelt’s...

I have been thinking a lot of late about how much of our lives is shaped by fear – fear of failure, fear of not being enough, fear of not being accepted, fear of falling short. I am plagued by those fears as well, but lately I’ve been caught by a greater fear: the fear of allowing my fears...

As I’ve often said, although I don’t understand prayer, I still do it. And this poem, John Daniel’s “A Prayer among Friends,” gets at part of the reason why: the very act of prayer calls things to mind that we might not otherwise notice. Prayer invites a measure of attention, and in...

From time to time I’ll hear Christians discuss the merits of happiness. Oddly, as wonderful as happiness might at first glance appear, in these conversations I often hear it discussed with a measure of suspicion. Happiness, they say, is fleeting, transient, and too often an object of desire,...

The leaves are turning in our neck of the woods. There’s something so gloriously alive about the fall, and yet a tinge of sadness as well. Which is probably what put me in mind of Robert Frost’s familiar Nothing Gold Can Stay. I don’t know that Frost had this at all in mind, but it...