We have to keep finding ways to widen the circle of care and concern.

In order to be welcoming, the systems of power and privilege in our spaces need to be actively dismantled.

North, South, East, and West, Angel, visible, ahead of me, Angels hidden by forests around me, And everywhere God....

The innkeeper isn’t part of most Nativity sets. No one sings carols about innkeepers. There don’t seem to be any paintings that include them. But we can imagine the scene: Bethlehem is crowded with people coming home for the census. It’s late at night when the innkeeper responds to a knock on...

"Where are you a pastor?" It's not an uncommon question when you've chosen to do ministry in a small, rural town, especially when you wear a clerical collar much of the time. I'm getting used to the puzzled looks on people's faces as they struggle to reconcile a genderqueer body in this...

"Diversity is being invited to the party; inclusion is being asked to dance."...

People ask me sometimes, “Is this a gay church?” It is a privilege to answer: “Ours is absolutely, gladly, hopefully and humbly, gaily, a gay church, a gay tradition, where everyone, including heterosexual members and friends, is welcome, where everyone is needed, where everyone’s experience...

Radical hospitality. Radical means “out of the ordinary,” “revolutionary,” even. So what would it mean to receive someone—a stranger—with a presence that was not just polite, but to receive them with revolutionary generosity? Activist Rosemarie Harding remembers her growing-up days, in...

Why should we intentionally work for diversity? The responses to this question vary widely. Of course, hard demographic realities suggest much. But for me, beyond any demographic or sociological justification, there is a theological imperative....