Easter is here. So that you can have a truly incredible and worshipful experience, our teams of staff and volunteers ministers have put a lot of thought into logistics. If you regularly attend our parish, consider some of these options so that first-time or infrequent visitors, those unfamiliar with our campus and programs, will find […]
Year: 2016
Next week begins Holy Week, the most sacred time of the year for the Church. It’s also the most hectic, if you work in a parish. Our first job is to make the worship experience worthy of the occasion. Anyone who has ever worked to pull off an Easter liturgy knows there are just too […]
In this week’s post, I’d like to introduce you to something we’ve started at Church of the Nativity. We’re pretty excited and we think you will be too. It’s called: the Rebuilt Parish Association, or the “RPA” for short. We officially launched the RPA during our Matter.15 conference this past November. Based on all the […]
This past week, our team of staff who plan our message series’ (what we call the “Message Oval”) set aside a day to draw up a rough sketch of the topics and themes of what I will be preaching about in the upcoming year. Yes, I did say year. We make it a point to […]
This week Nativity’s Strategic Leadership Team (there are 6 of us) took a day for an off-site retreat to reflect on and assess how things are and where they are going. Our retreat was not prompted by any major issue or particular problem, but by the consistent, ongoing evaluation that characterizes any healthy, growing organization. […]
Right now our Lenten message series at Nativity, called “Attitude Adjustment,” is all about the virtue of humility. Of course, the more you think you have it, the less you really do. Even blogging about it is a little awkward. I’ve heard it quoted that humility isn’t thinking less of yourself; humility is thinking of […]
“I will suffer and be killed, and then I will be raised.” Luke 9.22 Reading this Gospel passage I always wonder what the original disciples must have felt when they heard these words spoken by Jesus. His message is suffering and death and then a strange promise they did not understand. Furthermore, he tells his disciples, if you […]
Sometimes I like to use this blog as an opportunity to keep readers up-to-date with what’s happening here at Nativity, travels, books, etc. Despite the presidential campaign trail, I’m a little busy with a different kind of “congress” this month. These next few weeks will be Catholic “congress” season. Right now, we’re right in the […]
Did you know that medical textbooks need constant updating? It’s not because the human body changes- it’s because constantly new methods and information about the body become available that compel doctors to evaluate and revise their practice of medicine. Perhaps there’s an important lesson here for the Church and our practice of ministry. Jesus Christ […]
Leadership is more art than science. That means it grows through practice and willingness to learn from your mistakes. Your effectiveness and success as a leader gets compromised when you fall into unhealthy “traps” of thinking and acting. Here are just five traps I’ve seen and experienced time and time again. If any of these […]
