Free Stuff
My sheet music and other free resources are available here. Just follow this link.
These things are under a Creative Commons license that allows you to download them and copy them freely—for any non-commercial use.
Enjoy!
Store
I have books, CDs, and a video series for sale from my store page. (I wish I could just give everything away, but one must eat!)
I’m especially excited about my new book, now available: My Burden Is Light: A Pastor’s Plea for Rationality, Honesty, and Humility.
About
Merry, Mystical Missives
Here you’ll find everything I’ve sent out to the mailing list for The Merry Mystic.
I Don’t Believe in You Any More
I wrote this song for a man I met back in my seminary days. He told me he was Vietnam veteran. I told him I was a seminary student. He told me he didn’t believe in God—and he told me why. I wrote this song to honor his story.
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I think about him often, and when I think about him, all I have are questions. I never saw him again; what became of him? I don’t know that I was any help to him in our conversation; what might I have done differently? Why is there destructive suffering in this world—not the kind that strengthens people, like a refining fire, but the kind that grinds people down beyond their ability to resist? How can we help build a more peaceful world, a world where military men and women are not asked to do things that make them feel that “all the lights are dimmer since the war?” And what better theology could we teach our children—what understanding of God that won’t buckle under the heavy burdens life may require them to carry?
As always, I value your thoughts on these matters.
I Think
Do you know where you will spend eternity? I don’t! But I do have a conjecture…
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I think that one of the reasons why Christianity is speaking to fewer people these days is because skeptics are the growth demographic. Claiming to know exactly what happens to us when we die just makes us look superstitious and gullible. But that’s what I think — leave a comment below, and tell me what you think.
The Eucharistic Twinkie
There’s no way to sugar-coat it: in this video, I read a poem and take a bite out of a Twinkie. (You might notice a bit of a bow to Julian of Norwich at the end of the poem: hazelnut to her, Twinkie to me.)
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I think this was the first Twinkie I’ve tasted since I had a deep-fried specimen at the Bureau County Fair in Illinois, years ago. But what do you think: can a Twinkie be full of the Spirit of God? Is there even room in there, amid the sodium stearoyl lactylate and xanthan gum?
Be Still
This week’s message is a guided contemplative practice called a stilling chant. It’s a quiet chant that gets progressively shorter, until you are left with a speaking silence between you and God. For this practice, you want to be in a safe and quiet place—or, at least, some place where you can sit comfortably and pray with your eyes closed.
Be still, and know that I am God. —Psalm 46:10
Because your eyes will be closed, there’s no video this week, but only audio. The audio lasts about six minutes; the time that follows can last as long as you like. You can pray, or meditate, or contemplate, or just drift off to sleep—whatever your body and spirit need!
(For those wanting to lead a group in this practice, sheet music is available in our Free Stuff area.)
If you use the practice, please leave a comment below. What was your experience?
These are the (mostly video) messages sent out to The Merry Mystic mailing list.
Sermons and Such
Every week, I preach in the Open Prairie United Church of Christ in Princeton, Illinois. I’m not sending most of these out to The Merry Mystic mailing list; but on the outside chance you’d like to see a sermon, here they are.