The Prophetess Anna’s Letter to America / July, 2026
Stowe (VT) Community Church
Lewis (NY) Congregational Church
Isaiah 55.10-11 “Seed to the Sower” / Matthew 13.1-9, 18-23 Parable of the Sower
Practical Prophecy
Friends, the Bible is full of prophecy –
like this oracle in Isaiah comparing the word of God to a seed,
and yes, even like Christ’s parables,
comparing the sower’s seed to God’s word….
Parables are little prophecies.
Prophecy? Isn’t that passe’? Old fashioned? Archaic?
No! (LOL) God’s prophetic word is more urgent than ever! What a gift!
Prophecy, simply: human stabs at divine intention… so, today:
the words of a biblical prophetess without a prophecy – until today… Anna!
I retired from settled ministry feeling a call to prophetic writing.
Sounds grandiose, I know. You decide. I’m making it practical…
I’ve followed the call with the help of a spiritual guide
who challenges me to follow my dreams.
Out of this spiritual practice for me has come a closer relationship to the Holy
through a feminine figure I call Anna… Anna? Why Anna?
My first vague dream of her came just after Christmas,
in the annual reading in the lectionary from Luke 2 where Simeon and Anna appear
in the Jerusalem temple, receiving the Christ child with Mary and Joseph…remember?
And there was something in that text that hit me hard!
Luke calls Anna a prophetess but doesn’t quote her prophecy as he does Simeon’s!
And she began appearing in my dreams, in images, comforting and challenging.
I felt a call to listen to her, hear her, interpret her, understand her.
Her prophecies seem to come in letters. Today I’m reading her fifth letter – this time
a letter addressed to America! – on the occasion of our 250th birthday.
Anna wants to be known, hopes to be heard; she has a lot to say,
and has a pretty good sense of humor as well, as you will see… (LOL)
She seems to know the Bible, know our American history, and the history of the Church,
which confounds her. Try now to listen with open ears, open hearts…
Letter from Anna
Dear America!
Grace and peace of our God to you and yours!
Our faith in Christ brings joy and meaning to our lives
and I feel that joy to be with you in Spirit to share the gospel.
At the same time, I feel a sadness and anxiety in your country –
a grief I recognize because I felt it when I lived my mortal life 2000 years ago,
when Simeon and I greeted Mary and Joseph and their shining child in the Temple.
We were there in the temple praying for change, praying for the messiah to come
to save us from the oppression of our people at the hands of the Roman occupiers.
And wouldn’t you know it, out of our grief for the state of the world
came God’s clear anointing of this child! The child shined in their arms!
We somehow knew, out of our prayer practice – Simeon and I – that this was the one –
the one God sent to save us, to answer our prayer for a new world,
to give us God’s realm on earth as in heaven, as he would teach us to pray.
Now, fast forward two thousand years… I know that’s a stretch, but try me! (LOL)
Thanks to the gift of heaven, I’m still with the Christ child’s community –
you, here, today, in Spirit,and I have to tell you:
I’m feeling pretty concerned about your brave new world.
I’ll focus on America at your 250 th, and imagine what God sees,
for yes, I’m bold to speak for God! Somebody needs to! (PAUSE)
First of all, congratulations! You made it a quarter millennia – peanuts in God’s time
but a lot of governments die fast like the seeds in Christ’s parable which fell on rocks, got eaten by birds, or were choked by thorns.
Clearly the seed of God’s Word fell on good soil with your founders!
What an amazing harvest of democracy!
But that soil seems to be depleted. Your harvest is threatened. There’s grief in the air.
Here’s my sadness at what I see; here’s the grief of God: (PAUSE)
There seem to be two factions now in your American experiment –
a secularist faction and a fundamentalist faction.
I’ll be encouraging you to challenge them both with love, to hit the faithful center.
So, on the one hand the secular humanist community has seen the sins of religion
and rejects it all, can’t see the blessing of spiritual sight,
seems as blind to Love as to God, for God is Love…
Some in this secular community even consider empathy a weakness,
see no transcendent light as if from that shining city on the hill in your history.
These are the folks, my friends, that I see in your midst, who try to remove
all vestiges of God that they can from our common life –
whether in in the Pledge of Allegiance or in our national motto: “In God We Trust.”
In their defense, I can see that it’s due to the trauma these folks felt
from an arrogant church, from “religious” people who condemn to hell
those who don’t follow their particular sectarianism, their vice grip on Truth,
their rigid reading of the Bible… which brings me to the fundamentalist faction:
Here’s what I see: (PAUSE)
I see people of faith who are afraid of change, though change is at the heart
of the Lord’s Prayer when we pray for God’s new realm to come on earth,
such as, for example, the abolition of slavery that even your great founders
stumbled over, missed because of their own resistance to change.
I see a tendency for arrogant preachers to claim Truth on only their terms,
consigning to hell those who disagree with their narrow vision.
I see angry bigots claiming the American flag as theirs alone,
claiming white Christian identity for America as an entirely “Christian” nation,
interpreting the founders as somehow having that intention.
Well, yes, the founders were people of faith – a very diverse faith:
Presbyterians from NJ, Quakers from PA, Congregationalists from NE,
Baptists from RI, Catholics from MD, Anglicans from VA, and yes,
though he’s dressed in Christian clothes, even a De-ist like Jefferson
who said “I am a sect myself” and who fought hard for an ecumenical gospel,
a gospel that had room for hearty disagreement and new populations
like, eventually, Jewish, Muslim, and Buddhist communities, for example,
all of which practice – except for extremists – a divine kind of love
that our Christ gave his life for, showed us how to practice in hard conflict.
Friends in Christ, may I first say as humbly as I can that these irreconcilable factions
will tear you apart if you don’t challenge them both with careful compassion.
I understand that you are a “community church” which seeks the center of the gospel,
and, with other people of faith, believe in our one God for one world
with one word of compassion, justice, and peace for all,
not just for some, not just for those who toe the line of theologies of intolerance and fear
but for all! … as in your beautiful pledge of allegiance to “liberty and justice for all.”
So, please challenge with loving compassion your neighbor fundamentalist.
On the other hand – and it’s just as hard, I grant you that! –
challenge with love the atheist / secularist community to imagine how
“God” can be the transcendent, tenacious, force of Love and Justice that Christ intended.
Engage and connect with atheist and secular neighbors who may be as curious about you
as you are about them.
And what ever you do, don’t be tied to the idolatrous scourge of manipulative media
which floods the airwaves with prejudice that ignores our common humanity,
drives wedges between the factions, doesn’t accept that conflict is natural,
doesn’t seem to know that listening ears always trump deaf ears,
like the fertilizer of compassion comes now with my visit
to enrich the depleted soil so masterfully planted with the seeds
of God’s transcendent word of shalom – peace, love, justice.
In this fresh fertilization of the soil of your Declaration and your Constitution,
comes a softening of hardshell demonization
and a hardening of a soft gospel that doesn’t confront with love
those who diminish or ignore the love that is at the heart of Christ’s gospel…
Ah, friends, I fear I’ve gone on too long!
As you’ve been kind to welcome me, I’ll be kind to stop! (LOL)
Please just remember: the seed of God’s word of love
grows well in good soil that, when depleted, is fertilized
by your tenacious, diverse, and compassionate faith.
Grace and peace be with you! Amen.
Rev Dr Michael Caldwell is a member of the international ecumenical Iona CommunityThe Prophetess Anna’s Letter to America / July, 2026
Stowe (VT) Community Church
Lewis (NY) Congregational Church
Chesuncook (ME) Village Church
Isaiah 55.10-11 “Seed to the Sower” / Matthew 13.1-9, 18-23 Parable of the Sower
Practical Prophecy
Friends, the Bible is full of prophecy –
like this oracle in Isaiah comparing the word of God to a seed,
and yes, even like Christ’s parables,
comparing the sower’s seed to God’s word….
Parables are little prophecies.
Prophecy? Isn’t that passe’? Old fashioned? Archaic?
No! (LOL) God’s prophetic word is more urgent than ever! What a gift!
Prophecy, simply: human stabs at divine intention… so, today:
the words of a biblical prophetess without a prophecy – until today… Anna!
I retired from settled ministry feeling a call to prophetic writing.
Sounds grandiose, I know. You decide. I’m making it practical…
I’ve followed the call with the help of a spiritual guide
who challenges me to follow my dreams.
Out of this spiritual practice for me has come a closer relationship to the Holy
through a feminine figure I call Anna… Anna? Why Anna?
My first vague dream of her came just after Christmas,
in the annual reading in the lectionary from Luke 2 where Simeon and Anna appear
in the Jerusalem temple, receiving the Christ child with Mary and Joseph…remember?
And there was something in that text that hit me hard!
Luke calls Anna a prophetess but doesn’t quote her prophecy as he does Simeon’s!
And she began appearing in my dreams, in images, comforting and challenging.
I felt a call to listen to her, hear her, interpret her, understand her.
Her prophecies seem to come in letters. Today I’m reading her fifth letter – this time
a letter addressed to America! – on the occasion of our 250th birthday.
Anna wants to be known, hopes to be heard; she has a lot to say,
and has a pretty good sense of humor as well, as you will see… (LOL)
She seems to know the Bible, know our American history, and the history of the Church,
which confounds her. Try now to listen with open ears, open hearts…
Letter from Anna
Dear America!
Grace and peace of our God to you and yours!
Our faith in Christ brings joy and meaning to our lives
and I feel that joy to be with you in Spirit to share the gospel.
At the same time, I feel a sadness and anxiety in your country –
a grief I recognize because I felt it when I lived my mortal life 2000 years ago,
when Simeon and I greeted Mary and Joseph and their shining child in the Temple.
We were there in the temple praying for change, praying for the messiah to come
to save us from the oppression of our people at the hands of the Roman occupiers.
And wouldn’t you know it, out of our grief for the state of the world
came God’s clear anointing of this child! The child shined in their arms!
We somehow knew, out of our prayer practice – Simeon and I – that this was the one –
the one God sent to save us, to answer our prayer for a new world,
to give us God’s realm on earth as in heaven, as he would teach us to pray.
Now, fast forward two thousand years… I know that’s a stretch, but try me! (LOL)
Thanks to the gift of heaven, I’m still with the Christ child’s community –
you, here, today, in Spirit,and I have to tell you:
I’m feeling pretty concerned about your brave new world.
I’ll focus on America at your 250 th, and imagine what God sees,
for yes, I’m bold to speak for God! Somebody needs to! (PAUSE)
First of all, congratulations! You made it a quarter millennia – peanuts in God’s time
but a lot of governments die fast like the seeds in Christ’s parable which fell on rocks, got eaten by birds, or were choked by thorns.
Clearly the seed of God’s Word fell on good soil with your founders!
What an amazing harvest of democracy!
But that soil seems to be depleted. Your harvest is threatened. There’s grief in the air.
Here’s my sadness at what I see; here’s the grief of God: (PAUSE)
There seem to be two factions now in your American experiment –
a secularist faction and a fundamentalist faction.
I’ll be encouraging you to challenge them both with love, to hit the faithful center.
So, on the one hand the secular humanist community has seen the sins of religion
and rejects it all, can’t see the blessing of spiritual sight,
seems as blind to Love as to God, for God is Love…
Some in this secular community even consider empathy a weakness,
see no transcendent light as if from that shining city on the hill in your history.
These are the folks, my friends, that I see in your midst, who try to remove
all vestiges of God that they can from our common life –
whether in in the Pledge of Allegiance or in our national motto: “In God We Trust.”
In their defense, I can see that it’s due to the trauma these folks felt
from an arrogant church, from “religious” people who condemn to hell
those who don’t follow their particular sectarianism, their vice grip on Truth,
their rigid reading of the Bible… which brings me to the fundamentalist faction:
Here’s what I see: (PAUSE)
I see people of faith who are afraid of change, though change is at the heart
of the Lord’s Prayer when we pray for God’s new realm to come on earth,
such as, for example, the abolition of slavery that even your great founders
stumbled over, missed because of their own resistance to change.
I see a tendency for arrogant preachers to claim Truth on only their terms,
consigning to hell those who disagree with their narrow vision.
I see angry bigots claiming the American flag as theirs alone,
claiming white Christian identity for America as an entirely “Christian” nation,
interpreting the founders as somehow having that intention.
Well, yes, the founders were people of faith – a very diverse faith:
Presbyterians from NJ, Quakers from PA, Congregationalists from NE,
Baptists from RI, Catholics from MD, Anglicans from VA, and yes,
though he’s dressed in Christian clothes, even a De-ist like Jefferson
who said “I am a sect myself” and who fought hard for an ecumenical gospel,
a gospel that had room for hearty disagreement and new populations
like, eventually, Jewish, Muslim, and Buddhist communities, for example,
all of which practice – except for extremists – a divine kind of love
that our Christ gave his life for, showed us how to practice in hard conflict.
Friends in Christ, may I first say as humbly as I can that these irreconcilable factions
will tear you apart if you don’t challenge them both with careful compassion.
I understand that you are a “community church” which seeks the center of the gospel,
and, with other people of faith, believe in our one God for one world
with one word of compassion, justice, and peace for all,
not just for some, not just for those who toe the line of theologies of intolerance and fear
but for all! … as in your beautiful pledge of allegiance to “liberty and justice for all.”
So, please challenge with loving compassion your neighbor fundamentalist.
On the other hand – and it’s just as hard, I grant you that! –
challenge with love the atheist / secularist community to imagine how
“God” can be the transcendent, tenacious, force of Love and Justice that Christ intended.
Engage and connect with atheist and secular neighbors who may be as curious about you
as you are about them.
And what ever you do, don’t be tied to the idolatrous scourge of manipulative media
which floods the airwaves with prejudice that ignores our common humanity,
drives wedges between the factions, doesn’t accept that conflict is natural,
doesn’t seem to know that listening ears always trump deaf ears,
like the fertilizer of compassion comes now with my visit
to enrich the depleted soil so masterfully planted with the seeds
of God’s transcendent word of shalom – peace, love, justice.
In this fresh fertilization of the soil of your Declaration and your Constitution,
comes a softening of hardshell demonization
and a hardening of a soft gospel that doesn’t confront with love
those who diminish or ignore the love that is at the heart of Christ’s gospel…
Ah, friends, I fear I’ve gone on too long!
As you’ve been kind to welcome me, I’ll be kind to stop! (LOL)
Please just remember: the seed of God’s word of love
grows well in good soil that, when depleted, is fertilized
by your tenacious, diverse, and compassionate faith.
Grace and peace be with you! Amen.
Rev Dr Michael Caldwell is a member of the international ecumenical Iona CommunityThe Prophetess Anna’s Letter to America / July, 2026
Stowe (VT) Community Church
Lewis (NY) Congregational Church
Chesuncook (ME) Village Church
Isaiah 55.10-11 “Seed to the Sower” / Matthew 13.1-9, 18-23 Parable of the Sower
Practical Prophecy
Friends, the Bible is full of prophecy –
like this oracle in Isaiah comparing the word of God to a seed,
and yes, even like Christ’s parables,
comparing the sower’s seed to God’s word….
Parables are little prophecies.
Prophecy? Isn’t that passe’? Old fashioned? Archaic?
No! (LOL) God’s prophetic word is more urgent than ever! What a gift!
Prophecy, simply: human stabs at divine intention… so, today:
the words of a biblical prophetess without a prophecy – until today… Anna!
I retired from settled ministry feeling a call to prophetic writing.
Sounds grandiose, I know. You decide. I’m making it practical…
I’ve followed the call with the help of a spiritual guide
who challenges me to follow my dreams.
Out of this spiritual practice for me has come a closer relationship to the Holy
through a feminine figure I call Anna… Anna? Why Anna?
My first vague dream of her came just after Christmas,
in the annual reading in the lectionary from Luke 2 where Simeon and Anna appear
in the Jerusalem temple, receiving the Christ child with Mary and Joseph…remember?
And there was something in that text that hit me hard!
Luke calls Anna a prophetess but doesn’t quote her prophecy as he does Simeon’s!
And she began appearing in my dreams, in images, comforting and challenging.
I felt a call to listen to her, hear her, interpret her, understand her.
Her prophecies seem to come in letters. Today I’m reading her fifth letter – this time
a letter addressed to America! – on the occasion of our 250th birthday.
Anna wants to be known, hopes to be heard; she has a lot to say,
and has a pretty good sense of humor as well, as you will see… (LOL)
She seems to know the Bible, know our American history, and the history of the Church,
which confounds her. Try now to listen with open ears, open hearts…
Letter from Anna
Dear America!
Grace and peace of our God to you and yours!
Our faith in Christ brings joy and meaning to our lives
and I feel that joy to be with you in Spirit to share the gospel.
At the same time, I feel a sadness and anxiety in your country –
a grief I recognize because I felt it when I lived my mortal life 2000 years ago,
when Simeon and I greeted Mary and Joseph and their shining child in the Temple.
We were there in the temple praying for change, praying for the messiah to come
to save us from the oppression of our people at the hands of the Roman occupiers.
And wouldn’t you know it, out of our grief for the state of the world
came God’s clear anointing of this child! The child shined in their arms!
We somehow knew, out of our prayer practice – Simeon and I – that this was the one –
the one God sent to save us, to answer our prayer for a new world,
to give us God’s realm on earth as in heaven, as he would teach us to pray.
Now, fast forward two thousand years… I know that’s a stretch, but try me! (LOL)
Thanks to the gift of heaven, I’m still with the Christ child’s community –
you, here, today, in Spirit,and I have to tell you:
I’m feeling pretty concerned about your brave new world.
I’ll focus on America at your 250 th, and imagine what God sees,
for yes, I’m bold to speak for God! Somebody needs to! (PAUSE)
First of all, congratulations! You made it a quarter millennia – peanuts in God’s time
but a lot of governments die fast like the seeds in Christ’s parable which fell on rocks, got eaten by birds, or were choked by thorns.
Clearly the seed of God’s Word fell on good soil with your founders!
What an amazing harvest of democracy!
But that soil seems to be depleted. Your harvest is threatened. There’s grief in the air.
Here’s my sadness at what I see; here’s the grief of God: (PAUSE)
There seem to be two factions now in your American experiment –
a secularist faction and a fundamentalist faction.
I’ll be encouraging you to challenge them both with love, to hit the faithful center.
So, on the one hand the secular humanist community has seen the sins of religion
and rejects it all, can’t see the blessing of spiritual sight,
seems as blind to Love as to God, for God is Love…
Some in this secular community even consider empathy a weakness,
see no transcendent light as if from that shining city on the hill in your history.
These are the folks, my friends, that I see in your midst, who try to remove
all vestiges of God that they can from our common life –
whether in in the Pledge of Allegiance or in our national motto: “In God We Trust.”
In their defense, I can see that it’s due to the trauma these folks felt
from an arrogant church, from “religious” people who condemn to hell
those who don’t follow their particular sectarianism, their vice grip on Truth,
their rigid reading of the Bible… which brings me to the fundamentalist faction:
Here’s what I see: (PAUSE)
I see people of faith who are afraid of change, though change is at the heart
of the Lord’s Prayer when we pray for God’s new realm to come on earth,
such as, for example, the abolition of slavery that even your great founders
stumbled over, missed because of their own resistance to change.
I see a tendency for arrogant preachers to claim Truth on only their terms,
consigning to hell those who disagree with their narrow vision.
I see angry bigots claiming the American flag as theirs alone,
claiming white Christian identity for America as an entirely “Christian” nation,
interpreting the founders as somehow having that intention.
Well, yes, the founders were people of faith – a very diverse faith:
Presbyterians from NJ, Quakers from PA, Congregationalists from NE,
Baptists from RI, Catholics from MD, Anglicans from VA, and yes,
though he’s dressed in Christian clothes, even a De-ist like Jefferson
who said “I am a sect myself” and who fought hard for an ecumenical gospel,
a gospel that had room for hearty disagreement and new populations
like, eventually, Jewish, Muslim, and Buddhist communities, for example,
all of which practice – except for extremists – a divine kind of love
that our Christ gave his life for, showed us how to practice in hard conflict.
Friends in Christ, may I first say as humbly as I can that these irreconcilable factions
will tear you apart if you don’t challenge them both with careful compassion.
I understand that you are a “community church” which seeks the center of the gospel,
and, with other people of faith, believe in our one God for one world
with one word of compassion, justice, and peace for all,
not just for some, not just for those who toe the line of theologies of intolerance and fear
but for all! … as in your beautiful pledge of allegiance to “liberty and justice for all.”
So, please challenge with loving compassion your neighbor fundamentalist.
On the other hand – and it’s just as hard, I grant you that! –
challenge with love the atheist / secularist community to imagine how
“God” can be the transcendent, tenacious, force of Love and Justice that Christ intended.
Engage and connect with atheist and secular neighbors who may be as curious about you
as you are about them.
And what ever you do, don’t be tied to the idolatrous scourge of manipulative media
which floods the airwaves with prejudice that ignores our common humanity,
drives wedges between the factions, doesn’t accept that conflict is natural,
doesn’t seem to know that listening ears always trump deaf ears,
like the fertilizer of compassion comes now with my visit
to enrich the depleted soil so masterfully planted with the seeds
of God’s transcendent word of shalom – peace, love, justice.
In this fresh fertilization of the soil of your Declaration and your Constitution,
comes a softening of hardshell demonization
and a hardening of a soft gospel that doesn’t confront with love
those who diminish or ignore the love that is at the heart of Christ’s gospel…
Ah, friends, I fear I’ve gone on too long!
As you’ve been kind to welcome me, I’ll be kind to stop! (LOL)
Please just remember: the seed of God’s word of love
grows well in good soil that, when depleted, is fertilized
by your tenacious, diverse, and compassionate faith.
Grace and peace be with you! Amen.
Rev Dr Michael Caldwell is a member of the international ecumenical Iona CommunityThe Prophetess Anna’s Letter to America / July, 2026
Stowe (VT) Community Church
Lewis (NY) Congregational Church
Chesuncook (ME) Village Church
Isaiah 55.10-11 “Seed to the Sower” / Matthew 13.1-9, 18-23 Parable of the Sower
Practical Prophecy
Friends, the Bible is full of prophecy –
like this oracle in Isaiah comparing the word of God to a seed,
and yes, even like Christ’s parables,
comparing the sower’s seed to God’s word….
Parables are little prophecies.
Prophecy? Isn’t that passe’? Old fashioned? Archaic?
No! (LOL) God’s prophetic word is more urgent than ever! What a gift!
Prophecy, simply: human stabs at divine intention… so, today:
the words of a biblical prophetess without a prophecy – until today… Anna!
I retired from settled ministry feeling a call to prophetic writing.
Sounds grandiose, I know. You decide. I’m making it practical…
I’ve followed the call with the help of a spiritual guide
who challenges me to follow my dreams.
Out of this spiritual practice for me has come a closer relationship to the Holy
through a feminine figure I call Anna… Anna? Why Anna?
My first vague dream of her came just after Christmas,
in the annual reading in the lectionary from Luke 2 where Simeon and Anna appear
in the Jerusalem temple, receiving the Christ child with Mary and Joseph…remember?
And there was something in that text that hit me hard!
Luke calls Anna a prophetess but doesn’t quote her prophecy as he does Simeon’s!
And she began appearing in my dreams, in images, comforting and challenging.
I felt a call to listen to her, hear her, interpret her, understand her.
Her prophecies seem to come in letters. Today I’m reading her fifth letter – this time
a letter addressed to America! – on the occasion of our 250th birthday.
Anna wants to be known, hopes to be heard; she has a lot to say,
and has a pretty good sense of humor as well, as you will see… (LOL)
She seems to know the Bible, know our American history, and the history of the Church,
which confounds her. Try now to listen with open ears, open hearts…
Letter from Anna
Dear America!
Grace and peace of our God to you and yours!
Our faith in Christ brings joy and meaning to our lives
and I feel that joy to be with you in Spirit to share the gospel.
At the same time, I feel a sadness and anxiety in your country –
a grief I recognize because I felt it when I lived my mortal life 2000 years ago,
when Simeon and I greeted Mary and Joseph and their shining child in the Temple.
We were there in the temple praying for change, praying for the messiah to come
to save us from the oppression of our people at the hands of the Roman occupiers.
And wouldn’t you know it, out of our grief for the state of the world
came God’s clear anointing of this child! The child shined in their arms!
We somehow knew, out of our prayer practice – Simeon and I – that this was the one –
the one God sent to save us, to answer our prayer for a new world,
to give us God’s realm on earth as in heaven, as he would teach us to pray.
Now, fast forward two thousand years… I know that’s a stretch, but try me! (LOL)
Thanks to the gift of heaven, I’m still with the Christ child’s community –
you, here, today, in Spirit,and I have to tell you:
I’m feeling pretty concerned about your brave new world.
I’ll focus on America at your 250 th, and imagine what God sees,
for yes, I’m bold to speak for God! Somebody needs to! (PAUSE)
First of all, congratulations! You made it a quarter millennia – peanuts in God’s time
but a lot of governments die fast like the seeds in Christ’s parable which fell on rocks, got eaten by birds, or were choked by thorns.
Clearly the seed of God’s Word fell on good soil with your founders!
What an amazing harvest of democracy!
But that soil seems to be depleted. Your harvest is threatened. There’s grief in the air.
Here’s my sadness at what I see; here’s the grief of God: (PAUSE)
There seem to be two factions now in your American experiment –
a secularist faction and a fundamentalist faction.
I’ll be encouraging you to challenge them both with love, to hit the faithful center.
So, on the one hand the secular humanist community has seen the sins of religion
and rejects it all, can’t see the blessing of spiritual sight,
seems as blind to Love as to God, for God is Love…
Some in this secular community even consider empathy a weakness,
see no transcendent light as if from that shining city on the hill in your history.
These are the folks, my friends, that I see in your midst, who try to remove
all vestiges of God that they can from our common life –
whether in in the Pledge of Allegiance or in our national motto: “In God We Trust.”
In their defense, I can see that it’s due to the trauma these folks felt
from an arrogant church, from “religious” people who condemn to hell
those who don’t follow their particular sectarianism, their vice grip on Truth,
their rigid reading of the Bible… which brings me to the fundamentalist faction:
Here’s what I see: (PAUSE)
I see people of faith who are afraid of change, though change is at the heart
of the Lord’s Prayer when we pray for God’s new realm to come on earth,
such as, for example, the abolition of slavery that even your great founders
stumbled over, missed because of their own resistance to change.
I see a tendency for arrogant preachers to claim Truth on only their terms,
consigning to hell those who disagree with their narrow vision.
I see angry bigots claiming the American flag as theirs alone,
claiming white Christian identity for America as an entirely “Christian” nation,
interpreting the founders as somehow having that intention.
Well, yes, the founders were people of faith – a very diverse faith:
Presbyterians from NJ, Quakers from PA, Congregationalists from NE,
Baptists from RI, Catholics from MD, Anglicans from VA, and yes,
though he’s dressed in Christian clothes, even a De-ist like Jefferson
who said “I am a sect myself” and who fought hard for an ecumenical gospel,
a gospel that had room for hearty disagreement and new populations
like, eventually, Jewish, Muslim, and Buddhist communities, for example,
all of which practice – except for extremists – a divine kind of love
that our Christ gave his life for, showed us how to practice in hard conflict.
Friends in Christ, may I first say as humbly as I can that these irreconcilable factions
will tear you apart if you don’t challenge them both with careful compassion.
I understand that you are a “community church” which seeks the center of the gospel,
and, with other people of faith, believe in our one God for one world
with one word of compassion, justice, and peace for all,
not just for some, not just for those who toe the line of theologies of intolerance and fear
but for all! … as in your beautiful pledge of allegiance to “liberty and justice for all.”
So, please challenge with loving compassion your neighbor fundamentalist.
On the other hand – and it’s just as hard, I grant you that! –
challenge with love the atheist / secularist community to imagine how
“God” can be the transcendent, tenacious, force of Love and Justice that Christ intended.
Engage and connect with atheist and secular neighbors who may be as curious about you
as you are about them.
And what ever you do, don’t be tied to the idolatrous scourge of manipulative media
which floods the airwaves with prejudice that ignores our common humanity,
drives wedges between the factions, doesn’t accept that conflict is natural,
doesn’t seem to know that listening ears always trump deaf ears,
like the fertilizer of compassion comes now with my visit
to enrich the depleted soil so masterfully planted with the seeds
of God’s transcendent word of shalom – peace, love, justice.
In this fresh fertilization of the soil of your Declaration and your Constitution,
comes a softening of hardshell demonization
and a hardening of a soft gospel that doesn’t confront with love
those who diminish or ignore the love that is at the heart of Christ’s gospel…
Ah, friends, I fear I’ve gone on too long!
As you’ve been kind to welcome me, I’ll be kind to stop! (LOL)
Please just remember: the seed of God’s word of love
grows well in good soil that, when depleted, is fertilized
by your tenacious, diverse, and compassionate faith.
Grace and peace be with you! Amen.
Rev Dr Michael Caldwell is a member of the international ecumenical Iona CommunityThe Prophetess Anna’s Letter to America / July, 2026
Stowe (VT) Community Church
Lewis (NY) Congregational Church
Chesuncook (ME) Village Church
Isaiah 55.10-11 “Seed to the Sower” / Matthew 13.1-9, 18-23 Parable of the Sower
Practical Prophecy
Friends, the Bible is full of prophecy –
like this oracle in Isaiah comparing the word of God to a seed,
and yes, even like Christ’s parables,
comparing the sower’s seed to God’s word….
Parables are little prophecies.
Prophecy? Isn’t that passe’? Old fashioned? Archaic?
No! (LOL) God’s prophetic word is more urgent than ever! What a gift!
Prophecy, simply: human stabs at divine intention… so, today:
the words of a biblical prophetess without a prophecy – until today… Anna!
I retired from settled ministry feeling a call to prophetic writing.
Sounds grandiose, I know. You decide. I’m making it practical…
I’ve followed the call with the help of a spiritual guide
who challenges me to follow my dreams.
Out of this spiritual practice for me has come a closer relationship to the Holy
through a feminine figure I call Anna… Anna? Why Anna?
My first vague dream of her came just after Christmas,
in the annual reading in the lectionary from Luke 2 where Simeon and Anna appear
in the Jerusalem temple, receiving the Christ child with Mary and Joseph…remember?
And there was something in that text that hit me hard!
Luke calls Anna a prophetess but doesn’t quote her prophecy as he does Simeon’s!
And she began appearing in my dreams, in images, comforting and challenging.
I felt a call to listen to her, hear her, interpret her, understand her.
Her prophecies seem to come in letters. Today I’m reading her fifth letter – this time
a letter addressed to America! – on the occasion of our 250th birthday.
Anna wants to be known, hopes to be heard; she has a lot to say,
and has a pretty good sense of humor as well, as you will see… (LOL)
She seems to know the Bible, know our American history, and the history of the Church,
which confounds her. Try now to listen with open ears, open hearts…
Letter from Anna
Dear America!
Grace and peace of our God to you and yours!
Our faith in Christ brings joy and meaning to our lives
and I feel that joy to be with you in Spirit to share the gospel.
At the same time, I feel a sadness and anxiety in your country –
a grief I recognize because I felt it when I lived my mortal life 2000 years ago,
when Simeon and I greeted Mary and Joseph and their shining child in the Temple.
We were there in the temple praying for change, praying for the messiah to come
to save us from the oppression of our people at the hands of the Roman occupiers.
And wouldn’t you know it, out of our grief for the state of the world
came God’s clear anointing of this child! The child shined in their arms!
We somehow knew, out of our prayer practice – Simeon and I – that this was the one –
the one God sent to save us, to answer our prayer for a new world,
to give us God’s realm on earth as in heaven, as he would teach us to pray.
Now, fast forward two thousand years… I know that’s a stretch, but try me! (LOL)
Thanks to the gift of heaven, I’m still with the Christ child’s community –
you, here, today, in Spirit,and I have to tell you:
I’m feeling pretty concerned about your brave new world.
I’ll focus on America at your 250 th, and imagine what God sees,
for yes, I’m bold to speak for God! Somebody needs to! (PAUSE)
First of all, congratulations! You made it a quarter millennia – peanuts in God’s time
but a lot of governments die fast like the seeds in Christ’s parable which fell on rocks, got eaten by birds, or were choked by thorns.
Clearly the seed of God’s Word fell on good soil with your founders!
What an amazing harvest of democracy!
But that soil seems to be depleted. Your harvest is threatened. There’s grief in the air.
Here’s my sadness at what I see; here’s the grief of God: (PAUSE)
There seem to be two factions now in your American experiment –
a secularist faction and a fundamentalist faction.
I’ll be encouraging you to challenge them both with love, to hit the faithful center.
So, on the one hand the secular humanist community has seen the sins of religion
and rejects it all, can’t see the blessing of spiritual sight,
seems as blind to Love as to God, for God is Love…
Some in this secular community even consider empathy a weakness,
see no transcendent light as if from that shining city on the hill in your history.
These are the folks, my friends, that I see in your midst, who try to remove
all vestiges of God that they can from our common life –
whether in in the Pledge of Allegiance or in our national motto: “In God We Trust.”
In their defense, I can see that it’s due to the trauma these folks felt
from an arrogant church, from “religious” people who condemn to hell
those who don’t follow their particular sectarianism, their vice grip on Truth,
their rigid reading of the Bible… which brings me to the fundamentalist faction:
Here’s what I see: (PAUSE)
I see people of faith who are afraid of change, though change is at the heart
of the Lord’s Prayer when we pray for God’s new realm to come on earth,
such as, for example, the abolition of slavery that even your great founders
stumbled over, missed because of their own resistance to change.
I see a tendency for arrogant preachers to claim Truth on only their terms,
consigning to hell those who disagree with their narrow vision.
I see angry bigots claiming the American flag as theirs alone,
claiming white Christian identity for America as an entirely “Christian” nation,
interpreting the founders as somehow having that intention.
Well, yes, the founders were people of faith – a very diverse faith:
Presbyterians from NJ, Quakers from PA, Congregationalists from NE,
Baptists from RI, Catholics from MD, Anglicans from VA, and yes,
though he’s dressed in Christian clothes, even a De-ist like Jefferson
who said “I am a sect myself” and who fought hard for an ecumenical gospel,
a gospel that had room for hearty disagreement and new populations
like, eventually, Jewish, Muslim, and Buddhist communities, for example,
all of which practice – except for extremists – a divine kind of love
that our Christ gave his life for, showed us how to practice in hard conflict.
Friends in Christ, may I first say as humbly as I can that these irreconcilable factions
will tear you apart if you don’t challenge them both with careful compassion.
I understand that you are a “community church” which seeks the center of the gospel,
and, with other people of faith, believe in our one God for one world
with one word of compassion, justice, and peace for all,
not just for some, not just for those who toe the line of theologies of intolerance and fear
but for all! … as in your beautiful pledge of allegiance to “liberty and justice for all.”
So, please challenge with loving compassion your neighbor fundamentalist.
On the other hand – and it’s just as hard, I grant you that! –
challenge with love the atheist / secularist community to imagine how
“God” can be the transcendent, tenacious, force of Love and Justice that Christ intended.
Engage and connect with atheist and secular neighbors who may be as curious about you
as you are about them.
And what ever you do, don’t be tied to the idolatrous scourge of manipulative media
which floods the airwaves with prejudice that ignores our common humanity,
drives wedges between the factions, doesn’t accept that conflict is natural,
doesn’t seem to know that listening ears always trump deaf ears,
like the fertilizer of compassion comes now with my visit
to enrich the depleted soil so masterfully planted with the seeds
of God’s transcendent word of shalom – peace, love, justice.
In this fresh fertilization of the soil of your Declaration and your Constitution,
comes a softening of hardshell demonization
and a hardening of a soft gospel that doesn’t confront with love
those who diminish or ignore the love that is at the heart of Christ’s gospel…
Ah, friends, I fear I’ve gone on too long!
As you’ve been kind to welcome me, I’ll be kind to stop! (LOL)
Please just remember: the seed of God’s word of love
grows well in good soil that, when depleted, is fertilized
by your tenacious, diverse, and compassionate faith.
Grace and peace be with you! Amen.
Rev Dr Michael Caldwell is a member of the international ecumenical Iona CommunityThe Prophetess Anna’s Letter to America / July, 2026
Stowe (VT) Community Church
Lewis (NY) Congregational Church
Chesuncook (ME) Village Church
Isaiah 55.10-11 “Seed to the Sower” / Matthew 13.1-9, 18-23 Parable of the Sower
Practical Prophecy
Friends, the Bible is full of prophecy –
like this oracle in Isaiah comparing the word of God to a seed,
and yes, even like Christ’s parables,
comparing the sower’s seed to God’s word….
Parables are little prophecies.
Prophecy? Isn’t that passe’? Old fashioned? Archaic?
No! (LOL) God’s prophetic word is more urgent than ever! What a gift!
Prophecy, simply: human stabs at divine intention… so, today:
the words of a biblical prophetess without a prophecy – until today… Anna!
I retired from settled ministry feeling a call to prophetic writing.
Sounds grandiose, I know. You decide. I’m making it practical…
I’ve followed the call with the help of a spiritual guide
who challenges me to follow my dreams.
Out of this spiritual practice for me has come a closer relationship to the Holy
through a feminine figure I call Anna… Anna? Why Anna?
My first vague dream of her came just after Christmas,
in the annual reading in the lectionary from Luke 2 where Simeon and Anna appear
in the Jerusalem temple, receiving the Christ child with Mary and Joseph…remember?
And there was something in that text that hit me hard!
Luke calls Anna a prophetess but doesn’t quote her prophecy as he does Simeon’s!
And she began appearing in my dreams, in images, comforting and challenging.
I felt a call to listen to her, hear her, interpret her, understand her.
Her prophecies seem to come in letters. Today I’m reading her fifth letter – this time
a letter addressed to America! – on the occasion of our 250th birthday.
Anna wants to be known, hopes to be heard; she has a lot to say,
and has a pretty good sense of humor as well, as you will see… (LOL)
She seems to know the Bible, know our American history, and the history of the Church,
which confounds her. Try now to listen with open ears, open hearts…
Letter from Anna
Dear America!
Grace and peace of our God to you and yours!
Our faith in Christ brings joy and meaning to our lives
and I feel that joy to be with you in Spirit to share the gospel.
At the same time, I feel a sadness and anxiety in your country –
a grief I recognize because I felt it when I lived my mortal life 2000 years ago,
when Simeon and I greeted Mary and Joseph and their shining child in the Temple.
We were there in the temple praying for change, praying for the messiah to come
to save us from the oppression of our people at the hands of the Roman occupiers.
And wouldn’t you know it, out of our grief for the state of the world
came God’s clear anointing of this child! The child shined in their arms!
We somehow knew, out of our prayer practice – Simeon and I – that this was the one –
the one God sent to save us, to answer our prayer for a new world,
to give us God’s realm on earth as in heaven, as he would teach us to pray.
Now, fast forward two thousand years… I know that’s a stretch, but try me! (LOL)
Thanks to the gift of heaven, I’m still with the Christ child’s community –
you, here, today, in Spirit,and I have to tell you:
I’m feeling pretty concerned about your brave new world.
I’ll focus on America at your 250 th, and imagine what God sees,
for yes, I’m bold to speak for God! Somebody needs to! (PAUSE)
First of all, congratulations! You made it a quarter millennia – peanuts in God’s time
but a lot of governments die fast like the seeds in Christ’s parable which fell on rocks, got eaten by birds, or were choked by thorns.
Clearly the seed of God’s Word fell on good soil with your founders!
What an amazing harvest of democracy!
But that soil seems to be depleted. Your harvest is threatened. There’s grief in the air.
Here’s my sadness at what I see; here’s the grief of God: (PAUSE)
There seem to be two factions now in your American experiment –
a secularist faction and a fundamentalist faction.
I’ll be encouraging you to challenge them both with love, to hit the faithful center.
So, on the one hand the secular humanist community has seen the sins of religion
and rejects it all, can’t see the blessing of spiritual sight,
seems as blind to Love as to God, for God is Love…
Some in this secular community even consider empathy a weakness,
see no transcendent light as if from that shining city on the hill in your history.
These are the folks, my friends, that I see in your midst, who try to remove
all vestiges of God that they can from our common life –
whether in in the Pledge of Allegiance or in our national motto: “In God We Trust.”
In their defense, I can see that it’s due to the trauma these folks felt
from an arrogant church, from “religious” people who condemn to hell
those who don’t follow their particular sectarianism, their vice grip on Truth,
their rigid reading of the Bible… which brings me to the fundamentalist faction:
Here’s what I see: (PAUSE)
I see people of faith who are afraid of change, though change is at the heart
of the Lord’s Prayer when we pray for God’s new realm to come on earth,
such as, for example, the abolition of slavery that even your great founders
stumbled over, missed because of their own resistance to change.
I see a tendency for arrogant preachers to claim Truth on only their terms,
consigning to hell those who disagree with their narrow vision.
I see angry bigots claiming the American flag as theirs alone,
claiming white Christian identity for America as an entirely “Christian” nation,
interpreting the founders as somehow having that intention.
Well, yes, the founders were people of faith – a very diverse faith:
Presbyterians from NJ, Quakers from PA, Congregationalists from NE,
Baptists from RI, Catholics from MD, Anglicans from VA, and yes,
though he’s dressed in Christian clothes, even a De-ist like Jefferson
who said “I am a sect myself” and who fought hard for an ecumenical gospel,
a gospel that had room for hearty disagreement and new populations
like, eventually, Jewish, Muslim, and Buddhist communities, for example,
all of which practice – except for extremists – a divine kind of love
that our Christ gave his life for, showed us how to practice in hard conflict.
Friends in Christ, may I first say as humbly as I can that these irreconcilable factions
will tear you apart if you don’t challenge them both with careful compassion.
I understand that you are a “community church” which seeks the center of the gospel,
and, with other people of faith, believe in our one God for one world
with one word of compassion, justice, and peace for all,
not just for some, not just for those who toe the line of theologies of intolerance and fear
but for all! … as in your beautiful pledge of allegiance to “liberty and justice for all.”
So, please challenge with loving compassion your neighbor fundamentalist.
On the other hand – and it’s just as hard, I grant you that! –
challenge with love the atheist / secularist community to imagine how
“God” can be the transcendent, tenacious, force of Love and Justice that Christ intended.
Engage and connect with atheist and secular neighbors who may be as curious about you
as you are about them.
And what ever you do, don’t be tied to the idolatrous scourge of manipulative media
which floods the airwaves with prejudice that ignores our common humanity,
drives wedges between the factions, doesn’t accept that conflict is natural,
doesn’t seem to know that listening ears always trump deaf ears,
like the fertilizer of compassion comes now with my visit
to enrich the depleted soil so masterfully planted with the seeds
of God’s transcendent word of shalom – peace, love, justice.
In this fresh fertilization of the soil of your Declaration and your Constitution,
comes a softening of hardshell demonization
and a hardening of a soft gospel that doesn’t confront with love
those who diminish or ignore the love that is at the heart of Christ’s gospel…
Ah, friends, I fear I’ve gone on too long!
As you’ve been kind to welcome me, I’ll be kind to stop! (LOL)
Please just remember: the seed of God’s word of love
grows well in good soil that, when depleted, is fertilized
by your tenacious, diverse, and compassionate faith.
Grace and peace be with you! Amen.
Rev Dr Michael Caldwell is a member of the international ecumenical Iona CommunityThe Prophetess Anna’s Letter to America / July, 2026
Stowe (VT) Community Church
Lewis (NY) Congregational Church
Chesuncook (ME) Village Church
Isaiah 55.10-11 “Seed to the Sower” / Matthew 13.1-9, 18-23 Parable of the Sower
Practical Prophecy
Friends, the Bible is full of prophecy –
like this oracle in Isaiah comparing the word of God to a seed,
and yes, even like Christ’s parables,
comparing the sower’s seed to God’s word….
Parables are little prophecies.
Prophecy? Isn’t that passe’? Old fashioned? Archaic?
No! (LOL) God’s prophetic word is more urgent than ever! What a gift!
Prophecy, simply: human stabs at divine intention… so, today:
the words of a biblical prophetess without a prophecy – until today… Anna!
I retired from settled ministry feeling a call to prophetic writing.
Sounds grandiose, I know. You decide. I’m making it practical…
I’ve followed the call with the help of a spiritual guide
who challenges me to follow my dreams.
Out of this spiritual practice for me has come a closer relationship to the Holy
through a feminine figure I call Anna… Anna? Why Anna?
My first vague dream of her came just after Christmas,
in the annual reading in the lectionary from Luke 2 where Simeon and Anna appear
in the Jerusalem temple, receiving the Christ child with Mary and Joseph…remember?
And there was something in that text that hit me hard!
Luke calls Anna a prophetess but doesn’t quote her prophecy as he does Simeon’s!
And she began appearing in my dreams, in images, comforting and challenging.
I felt a call to listen to her, hear her, interpret her, understand her.
Her prophecies seem to come in letters. Today I’m reading her fifth letter – this time
a letter addressed to America! – on the occasion of our 250th birthday.
Anna wants to be known, hopes to be heard; she has a lot to say,
and has a pretty good sense of humor as well, as you will see… (LOL)
She seems to know the Bible, know our American history, and the history of the Church,
which confounds her. Try now to listen with open ears, open hearts…
Letter from Anna
Dear America!
Grace and peace of our God to you and yours!
Our faith in Christ brings joy and meaning to our lives
and I feel that joy to be with you in Spirit to share the gospel.
At the same time, I feel a sadness and anxiety in your country –
a grief I recognize because I felt it when I lived my mortal life 2000 years ago,
when Simeon and I greeted Mary and Joseph and their shining child in the Temple.
We were there in the temple praying for change, praying for the messiah to come
to save us from the oppression of our people at the hands of the Roman occupiers.
And wouldn’t you know it, out of our grief for the state of the world
came God’s clear anointing of this child! The child shined in their arms!
We somehow knew, out of our prayer practice – Simeon and I – that this was the one –
the one God sent to save us, to answer our prayer for a new world,
to give us God’s realm on earth as in heaven, as he would teach us to pray.
Now, fast forward two thousand years… I know that’s a stretch, but try me! (LOL)
Thanks to the gift of heaven, I’m still with the Christ child’s community –
you, here, today, in Spirit,and I have to tell you:
I’m feeling pretty concerned about your brave new world.
I’ll focus on America at your 250 th, and imagine what God sees,
for yes, I’m bold to speak for God! Somebody needs to! (PAUSE)
First of all, congratulations! You made it a quarter millennia – peanuts in God’s time
but a lot of governments die fast like the seeds in Christ’s parable which fell on rocks, got eaten by birds, or were choked by thorns.
Clearly the seed of God’s Word fell on good soil with your founders!
What an amazing harvest of democracy!
But that soil seems to be depleted. Your harvest is threatened. There’s grief in the air.
Here’s my sadness at what I see; here’s the grief of God: (PAUSE)
There seem to be two factions now in your American experiment –
a secularist faction and a fundamentalist faction.
I’ll be encouraging you to challenge them both with love, to hit the faithful center.
So, on the one hand the secular humanist community has seen the sins of religion
and rejects it all, can’t see the blessing of spiritual sight,
seems as blind to Love as to God, for God is Love…
Some in this secular community even consider empathy a weakness,
see no transcendent light as if from that shining city on the hill in your history.
These are the folks, my friends, that I see in your midst, who try to remove
all vestiges of God that they can from our common life –
whether in in the Pledge of Allegiance or in our national motto: “In God We Trust.”
In their defense, I can see that it’s due to the trauma these folks felt
from an arrogant church, from “religious” people who condemn to hell
those who don’t follow their particular sectarianism, their vice grip on Truth,
their rigid reading of the Bible… which brings me to the fundamentalist faction:
Here’s what I see: (PAUSE)
I see people of faith who are afraid of change, though change is at the heart
of the Lord’s Prayer when we pray for God’s new realm to come on earth,
such as, for example, the abolition of slavery that even your great founders
stumbled over, missed because of their own resistance to change.
I see a tendency for arrogant preachers to claim Truth on only their terms,
consigning to hell those who disagree with their narrow vision.
I see angry bigots claiming the American flag as theirs alone,
claiming white Christian identity for America as an entirely “Christian” nation,
interpreting the founders as somehow having that intention.
Well, yes, the founders were people of faith – a very diverse faith:
Presbyterians from NJ, Quakers from PA, Congregationalists from NE,
Baptists from RI, Catholics from MD, Anglicans from VA, and yes,
though he’s dressed in Christian clothes, even a De-ist like Jefferson
who said “I am a sect myself” and who fought hard for an ecumenical gospel,
a gospel that had room for hearty disagreement and new populations
like, eventually, Jewish, Muslim, and Buddhist communities, for example,
all of which practice – except for extremists – a divine kind of love
that our Christ gave his life for, showed us how to practice in hard conflict.
Friends in Christ, may I first say as humbly as I can that these irreconcilable factions
will tear you apart if you don’t challenge them both with careful compassion.
I understand that you are a “community church” which seeks the center of the gospel,
and, with other people of faith, believe in our one God for one world
with one word of compassion, justice, and peace for all,
not just for some, not just for those who toe the line of theologies of intolerance and fear
but for all! … as in your beautiful pledge of allegiance to “liberty and justice for all.”
So, please challenge with loving compassion your neighbor fundamentalist.
On the other hand – and it’s just as hard, I grant you that! –
challenge with love the atheist / secularist community to imagine how
“God” can be the transcendent, tenacious, force of Love and Justice that Christ intended.
Engage and connect with atheist and secular neighbors who may be as curious about you
as you are about them.
And what ever you do, don’t be tied to the idolatrous scourge of manipulative media
which floods the airwaves with prejudice that ignores our common humanity,
drives wedges between the factions, doesn’t accept that conflict is natural,
doesn’t seem to know that listening ears always trump deaf ears,
like the fertilizer of compassion comes now with my visit
to enrich the depleted soil so masterfully planted with the seeds
of God’s transcendent word of shalom – peace, love, justice.
In this fresh fertilization of the soil of your Declaration and your Constitution,
comes a softening of hardshell demonization
and a hardening of a soft gospel that doesn’t confront with love
those who diminish or ignore the love that is at the heart of Christ’s gospel…
Ah, friends, I fear I’ve gone on too long!
As you’ve been kind to welcome me, I’ll be kind to stop! (LOL)
Please just remember: the seed of God’s word of love
grows well in good soil that, when depleted, is fertilized
by your tenacious, diverse, and compassionate faith.
Grace and peace be with you! Amen.
Rev Dr Michael Caldwell is a member of the international ecumenical Iona Community
Restorative Oracle 