This post originally appeared on the author’s blog at www.catherinemcniel.com. My first encounter with the local elementary school crossing guard was six years ago, the year my oldest child was in Kindergarten. In my eyes, it seemed the height of …
Read moreA Goblin Crossing Guard & the Beauty of Public School
Sunday night. A group of friends huddle inside their upper room, doors locked, afraid. Can you blame them? Two days ago their friend and teacher was brutally and publicly executed. No wonder they’re hiding. I doubt I’ll ever understand the…
This post originally appeared on the author’s blog at catherinemcniel.com. Like many churches, we have a Palm Sunday procession to mark the beginning of Holy Week. When I dropped my Kindergartner at her class [on Palm Sunday several years ago], …
Read moreThe Treasonous Act of Small Children Waving Branches
This is part of an ongoing series during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic. To engage further in the #QuarantineSoulCare series, click here. Lenten means “springtime” in Middle English, which itself comes from the word lengthen. The sun arches back toward us, …
Read moreQuarantine Soul Care: Lent, Spring, & Doubling Back Toward Life
Tramping through the snow, I stop for a moment. Everything around me is perfectly still. Only my footprints break the surface of the pure, white snow, and even these are behind me and out of sight. As far as my …
The first-frost smells of slightly frozen autumn are transcendent. Last night’s temperatures brought all but the heartiest of this year’s bounty to an end; yet when the first rays of early morning sun warm this frozen world, the result is …
Summer is the height of extremes. Gone is the subtlety of spring with its pastel colors, mild temperatures, and tiny beginnings. Here instead comes the vibrancy of summer—bold colors, loud noises, overindulgences, exaggerations, and excesses everywhere. The sun burns hot, …