After seeing the news on Facebook about the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting, I sank into my living room chair, phone glued to my hand as I scrolled for more information about what had happened and why. My shoulders began to shake …
Writing Tips From the Pros: Brittany Bergman
Brittany L. Bergman is a writer and editor living in the suburbs of Chicago with her husband and her daughter. She is passionate about living simply, savoring motherhood and finding the sacred in the everyday, and you can find …
The Death and Resurrection of Faith: Reflections on Good Friday
A year ago on Good Friday, I admitted something out loud that I’d known for some time: my faith, at least as I knew it, was dead. I made my admission to a trusted friend, telling her that if being …
Advent 2017: Stealing Joy
Right around this time two years ago, I was expecting my first child. One of my biggest fears was that I would get sick right before my daughter was born, leaving me contagious and unable to kiss her tiny lips …
Five Practices to Navigate Touchy Conversations
Dinner conversation looks a bit different than it used to for me and my husband. After our daughter was born, many of our mealtimes were marked by few words – not because we were angry with each other, but because …
It’s Too Dangerous to Love Myself
My story is not unlike those of countless other postpartum moms: pregnancy changed my body in ways I didn’t expect, and even once I lost most of the “baby weight,” I struggled to accept that my body had rearranged itself. …
The Path of Most Beauty
For many years, I believed God’s calling on my life had to be something I didn’t want to do. I’d heard story after story of people who believed they had been called not just outside their comfort zones but outside …
The Way She Mothered Me
My mom always smelled faintly of Rapture perfume and Suave hairspray. When I close my eyes and try to conjure what it felt like for my five-year-old self to hug her, I can feel the soft knit of a worn-in …