​​​Dear LCC Community,

As I write this on July 3, I am aware that many of us wrestle with the 250th celebration of Independence Day. We are grateful for the world-changing, precious ideals that gave birth to our democracy, and yet we grieve for how often we have fallen short of them and for the threats to them today. During the past three Sundays we have reflected on this tension, seeking to find inspiration in our grief as well as our gratitude.

 

In a passage that has helped me this week, writer Mark Nepo reminds us that when we become discouraged by the world's brokenness and we are tempted to turn away or to harden ourselves, there is another possibility: “To keep the experiment alive in our own time,” he writes, “we are being asked to deepen where we look for meaning, to expand the circle in which we share that meaning, and to realize that we are more together than alone.”

 

We gather each Sunday to remember we are more together than alone… to remember the power of goodness to change the world within our reach … to support each other in following Jesus' simple and demanding command: “Love one another as I have loved you.”

 

Love asks us to tell the truth. It asks us to pursue beauty while working to heal our wounds and correct our mistakes. Through ordinary acts of courage and kindness: listening before judging, welcoming before excluding, giving before grasping, forgiving before condemning. We change the world through countless small acts of kindness. This is how I continue to feel hope even in difficult times. Not in the conviction that everything will work out as we wish, but in trusting that love will always flow through us and through everything, bringing healing and goodness and joy, even as we grieve.

 

As summer unfolds, I hope each of us will open to the beauty, spend time with friends, lend a hand where it is needed, and remember that we belong to one another. And so we will build a little of the beloved community that Jesus modeled, and that our nation's highest ideals are made to protect. May we celebrate with gratitude. May we grieve with honesty. May we find the courage to choose love.

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Peace and blessings,

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​

 Lee

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