Prove There is an Audience!

We have a unique opportunity to prove there is an audience for better--more beautiful, more just, more virtuous--faith stories. Purchase our dramatic reading of the Cain & Abel and Noah sagas. I promise a person doesn't have to be Christian to appreciate these stories--virtue is virtue.

Give them as gifts to random young people... and adults. Guilt your parenting friends into buying it. Insist every youth person at your church each have their own copy. Let's change the world to reflect the real virtues of our faith traditions one sacred myth at a time!

By the way, v.1 can be found here.

Guess Who's Coming to Dinner... or Not—Episode 4

<<Read the fifth episode in the Noah saga.

(based on Genesis 7—a story of creation)

There was a lot of back and forth about whether he should, but the decision had already been made. Noah saddled the mare. Though not quite as fast, she was much more sure-footed and not as skittish as her mate.

One of the large heavy doors creaked open, Noah dashed out. Ham move quickly to close it. Watching the water roll back toward the opening, he couldn't help but think that slanting the deck for the first five feet of the entrance was a stroke of genius on his wife's part. . . . Finish the story!

Guess Who's Coming to Dinner... or Not—Episode 3

<<Read the fourth episode in the Noah saga.

(based on Genesis 7—a story of creation)

Pair by pair Noah and Naomi, Shem and Varda, Ham and Ital, Japheth and Nitzan led the walking animals into their stalls or cages 14 clean (as in kosher to eat) animals of each species and 2 unclean (not so kosher) or two-by-two, depending on which part of the biblical narrative you're reading. The flyers found space to roost for themselves.

It had to be more than a little unnerving to escort the first predator across the gangplank. Do you push them? Do you pull them? How much force is too much? If you you tie a rope around their necks and pull, how much lead do you give yourself? Do you dare turn your back to them? Do you think they've eaten already? . . . Finish the story!

It Could Have Been Different, by Carolyn Kennedy

In our impromptu Stories that Compost workshop at the Wild Goose Festival 2011 we reflected on the biblical narrative of Hagar the Egyptian slave who bore Abraham's first son, Ishmael.

Carolyn Kennedy was one of only two workshop participants who wrote fully developed stories during our writing time. Sadly, I only captured one (technical difficulties). Even more sad, I don't remember the other woman's name, so I can't track her down. All I can remember is that her story angle intrigued me. She was a mature women, real pleasant smile, with salt-and-pepper hair cut in a bob, kinda like Anne Rice if I remember correctly (then again, maybe not). But her smile reminded me of Anne's, and I know I've seen her before. If anyone who was there happens to know who I'm talking about, please let me know.

Carolyn is a soft-spoken-yet-hardy mid-western mom and minister who lives in one of those cold northern-most states. I appreciate her telling this story from Hagar the outsider's perspective. Carolyn saves me the trouble of having to write a version of this story myself ;-).

God With Us—Episode 2

<<Read episode 1 first.

(taken from Genesis 4—a story of creation)

If we are fortunate, we live long enough to regret a few things. Feelings of regret suggest that we have learned a bit along the way and that we would do some things differently were we to have the chance. This is not a bad thing.

Experience teaches, but there are many things we need not learn from experience. As assuredly as there are situations we would love to handle differently were they to come up again, there are just as many choices the results of which we wish we could undo, but we can't. Our choices often set off a chain of reactions that are far beyond our ability to control. We can only choose the seeds we plant and what we feed them, but we don't get to choose whether, when or how they grow.

Humanity doesn't seem particularly mindful of this truth in our story . . . Finish the story!

God With Us—Episode 1

(taken from Genesis 4—a story of creation)


The story of the talking snake is often told as the story of how sin entered the world, and perhaps it is—if not in terms of an exact event, definitely the story of how humans foolishly make room for sin time and time again. However, neither change nor changeability were sin. So even though much changes after the man and the woman's encounter with the talking snake, the creation saga says nothing to suggest that before this point the world was static and sterile, unchangeable and unchanging. To the contrary, the way the stories are told, life was full of promise and possibility, action and adaptability. God would make a move (God created); then humanity would make a move (humanity named): Creator initiating, creation responding, creation initiating, Creator responding: round and round it goes. And if the creation stories are given their due, these moves had likely been happening for some time: all creation growing, learning, evolving, changing.

Perhaps the most impressive thing about the creation saga is that no matter how poor humanity's choices are Elohim chooses to come with them. They never endure the consequences of their short-comings alone. In fact, Elohim never takes back her initial judgment that, as far as she is concerned, humanity is "good". The man and the woman's choices and misconceptions haven't changed Elohim's mind; the man and the woman just misplace their God-given imaginations for that good. I guess it's true: what we don't use, we lose. But that's not to say it has to be lost forever.

So Eden becomes unwelcoming or uninhabitable. The man and the woman are forced out into the wilderness to make their way in the world, and where is God? Right there coaching them through it.

I can imagine Elohim initiating a conversation that goes something like, "So where are we going?"
"What do you mean 'we?'"
"I'm going with you, of course."
"But your place is there, back in the garden, back in paradise."
"Says who? . . . Finish the story!