At the church I’ve joined this year, my pastor includes in her closing benediction, just before the words, “go in peace,” a direct and calm command to us: “Be not afraid.” She pauses a little each Sunday...
Carmen Acevedo Butcher takes us on a journey of self-examination, drawing a path through our imperfections from identification to acceptance to thanksgiving.
When I met Rachel at a leadership development event, she was in her early thirties. She was clearly a bright and gifted leader and held a high level of authority for her age and experience. As we talked, her ideas about her work and leadership were thoughtful...
“Are you already taking Clomid?” the fertility doctor asked me, a note of astonishment in her voice as she stared at the screen in front of her. “No,” I replied. “What’s Clomid?” She didn’t answer my question...
Our 1925 bungalow kitchen opens onto what was once a small porch and is now a small, poorly-insulated mudroom — a “three-season room.” In the summer, we can tolerate the heat waves that emanate from that space, but in the winter...
This summer, we watched and waited as our garden unfurled. Andrew and I are renting a house that only recently became a rental, and the people who owned it and lived in it before us left a beautiful batch of perennials...
I sometimes imagine my life as a journey on a physical road, marked with a large signpost that reads “God’s Way.” I think — hope — that I’m headed the right way, and a smooth path and clear skies would seem to confirm that...
In my first week teaching, I printed my syllabi four times. The first time I mistyped dates (despite all my careful checking), the second time I mistyped dates again, and on the third attempt I set the copier to single instead of double sided copies...
“How many of you are leaders?” I asked, looking out at a sea of female faces in my seminar. I knew that every one of them was a leader, given the roles they held and the authority they had been given. And yet...only a few hands were raised...
This past summer, after taking five months off to be with my newborn, I went back to work. My department chair was, I think, trying to do me a solid, and he assigned me to teach two online classes. This made my days completely flexible...
