Friendship, Listening, and Empathy: A Prayer GuideDraw Near: A Lenten Devotional Two Hands: Grief and Gratitude in the Christian LifeSabbath Keeping: Finding Freedom in the Rhythms of Rest Fasting: Spiritual Freedom Beyond our AppetitesA Renewed SpiritualityNurturing Hope: Christian Pastoral Care in the Twenty-First CenturyThe Power of ListeningJoy Together: Spiritual Practices for Your CongregationPrayers of the New TestamentPrayers of the Old TestamentPersonality Type in CongregationsSabbathA Garden of Living Water: Stories of Self-Discovery and Spiritual GrowthDead Sea: A NovelDeadly Murmurs: A NovelDeath in Dunedin: A NovelBeating Burnout in CongregationsReaching Out in a Networked WorldEmbracing MidlifeFriendingAdvent Devotional

Quotations I love: Try softer

Lynne Baab • Wednesday May 12 2021

Quotations I love: Try softer

“If trying harder doesn't work, try softer.” —Lily Tomlin

“Trying softer isn't about knowing or doing the right thing; it's about being gentle with ourselves in the face of pain that is keeping us stuck. Because no matter how hard we try, we can't hate or shame ourselves into change. Only love can move us toward true growth. This is the love given to us by a gentle, kind, compassionate, good God — and  the love we are invited to give ourselves too.” —Aundi Kolber, Try Softer

Our son Mike, a journalist, has done quite a bit of research and writing on the impact of stigma...

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Quotations I love: Memory

Lynne Baab • Thursday April 15 2021

Quotations I love: Memory

“Memory is many things. . . . It is a call to resolve in us what simply will not go away.” —Joan Chittister (born 1936), American Benedictine nun, theologian, author, and speaker

For most of my adult life, I would have read Joan Chittister’s words a certain way. For me, what wouldn't go away in my memories was pain, and I would have said we must face into pain from our past in in the company of others. I would have said that the unresolved memories in us that keep coming up should be dealt with in inner healing prayer, therapy/counseling/coaching, and in...

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Quotations I love: The answer is in a story

Lynne Baab • Wednesday March 17 2021

Quotations I love: The answer is in a story

“The answer is in a story and the story is being told.” —Pádraig Ó Tuama, poet, theologian, mediator, and leader of the Corrymeela Community in Northern Ireland [1]

There are a handful of people in my life who really bug me. I’ve heard that when people irritate you or make you mad, you should look at your own life to see if something you don’t like in yourself is being revealed. I’ve done that. I’ve talked about my relationships with these individuals in spiritual direction and therapy, and I have gotten some insight, but not very much.

Year after year, these relationships continue to be...

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Quotations I love: G. K. Chesterton on doing things badly

Lynne Baab • Friday January 29 2021

Quotations I love: G. K. Chesterton on doing things badly

I was in my early thirties when a friend said she had come across a very helpful quotation. “Anything worth doing is worth doing badly,” she said. She told me she had been raised to do things well, and she found living up to that standard to be paralyzing. She talked about the fact that she never wrote thank-you notes after her wedding because she knew they had to say something kind about the present, and she wasn’t able to do that. So she did nothing.

She told me that she had learned to write, “Thanks for the present,” then sign her...

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