Adopting a child. Does that have a warm feel for you? With three sons, in the 1980s my husband and I briefly explored adopting a baby girl while we were living in a third world country. Now I think about it, our motives at the time were pretty selfish. Fortunately or otherwise, we were not […]
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Are you the kind of person who rushes to help when someone falls? I once mistook the height of a curb in suburban Darwin and fell flat on my face on the footpath. People crossed the road to help me get up and supply Band-Aids. A couple left their coffee on an outside table of […]
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Do you recognise this painting? Rembrandt’s Return of the Prodigal explores Jesus’ story about an errant son coming home. Within a dark setting, Rembrandt represents the father’s warm love by his dramatic red cape and the light cast on his face and hands as he embraces his ragged son. The father’s welcome is unexpected. The […]
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I’ve had some great experiences in crowds. Football games when Eagles were winning! Joining a throng following giant French puppets through the streets of Perth a few years ago, along with a multitude of people also fascinated by them. In the London crowd during Queen Elizabeth’s Platinum Jubilee as she and the royal family appeared […]
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Do we want to live in a monoculture? A friend recently surveyed his local food court and observed that without foods from immigrant cultures, the selection of dishes would be very restricted. And sports writers are commenting on the increasing ethnic diversity of football (soccer) teams in the World Cup. Out of a squad of […]
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“Darkness is my closest friend.” What despair these last words of Psalm 88 express. God has taken away his friends and neighbours and left him desolate, the writer cries. Many biblical psalms shout anguish, but not all end in such dark lonely suffering. Most encourage us to bring our fears and pain to a listening […]
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In my favourite part of Australia, we hiked one year along a dry riverbed in the Flinders Ranges. Magnificent gum trees stretched overhead, seemingly growing without water. Though there was no evidence of it above ground, we knew that underneath was the water table, a river that fed and sustained these gums through long periods […]
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I love reading the biographies of daring and creative people. They widen my horizons and give me a taste of a world different to my own. But I always find myself wondering where the courage to cross new boundaries comes from. Or the daring to attempt outrageous actions. How can such people risk criticism or […]
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This website, The Together Project, was born out of a passion to reach out across the divide between men and women. Not by about asserting the rights of women, nor of men, but by exploring how to relate and work together. How to develop shalom between genders. Shalom, this Hebrew word for completeness, well-being, abundance, […]
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Ebola has broken out again in Africa. Until recently, I was often teaching at conferences for church leaders in many of these countries. Though not in the Congo. The previous outbreak began in 2014. At a Kenyan conference that year, among sessions on the Bible, counselling, mentoring, leadership, we added a new topic. It was […]
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