Part of my time this week has been taken up with writing Thank You cards for various gifts I received from friends, family, and parishioners. While doing so I remembered a gift I was given for Christmas 25 years ago. Have you ever had the experience of receiving a truly strange gift? For Christmas 1993 [...]

A true story about a man names Nels Ferre who was born to a poor family in Norway. Although he was a very bright boy and a good student, Nels' family couldn’t afford to educate him. An aunt and uncle in America wrote and invited Nels to come to the U.S. where they would pay [...]

They had thought that they would wait before having kids -- get a bigger house and more money in the bank first. Those were their hopes and plan. The pregnancy had been a surprise, somewhat unwelcome at first. But that all changed with the first sonogram and the baby stared kicking. They had neither the [...]