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On the Way   The Rt. Rev. Audrey Scanlan

Bishop’s Blog

time to hit the pause button

Dear readers, I’ve been blogging for a while- on this site since 2017 and for two years before that, weekly, on our old website. Before that, I blogged for almost five years on a weekly basis on another website for another diocese. In the past I’ve had a food blog (before there were a million […]

investing in the new

April, 2020 Scene:  In the Subaru- My husband and I are in the car, driving 6 miles to Boiling Springs, one of our favorite spots to park and jump onto the Appalachian Trail for a hike in the woods.  We’ve had more time to hike, lately, because the pandemic has forced our churches to close, and we […]

soul fog

Three weeks ago when I led worship on a Sunday and the choir sang an anthem, I burst into tears within the first few measures of the music.  It had been months and months since I’d heard any live choral singing and this, coupled with the usual excitement of a Sunday visitation including a baptism and […]

The Kiss of Peace

For the last several years- almost a decade, now- my husband and I have traveled to California on holidays to visit our children.  Our eldest moved to Northern California back in 2009 right after college, and within a few years her sister followed, leaving two of our three children on the far side of the country.  These […]

Operating Systems

Someday, I hope that Covid and all its attendant worries and anxieties will ease into the background of my personal operating system so that I am no longer shaken, hyper-vigilant, or wary each time I leave my house to go out into the world. I did an upgrade on my computer this week.  My computer is […]

Easter. Or, on the road again.

Reflections on being in church again.  Bishop-edition. Yesterday, before the dawn broke, I got in my company-issued Subaru Forester and headed north.  I was making my way to Trinity Pro-Cathedral to celebrate Easter with the congregation there, just two hours up-river from my home in Mechanicsburg.  It was the first time in a year that I would be […]

Good Friday

Today. Today is Good Friday. It is the day in Holy Week in which we walk with Jesus to Golgotha and watch him- beaten, scourged, taunted and tortured- get nailed to the cross. If we dare, we stay on for the next three hours, waiting and watching as life ebbs out of him, punctuated by […]

Failing at Lent

Failing at Lent I’m one of those people who thrives on routine, plans and schedules. I love the predictable clicking by of the liturgical calendar, marking the seasons of our souls through Advent, Christmas, Epiphany, Lent, Easter, Pentecost and back to Advent again. For years I have lived with a Rule of Life that shifts […]

Soul Rhythms

We’ve just celebrated Groundhog Day- the annual event in which a Pennsylvania rodent (or marmot, to be more polite) tells us whether we can look forward to warmer temperatures and an early spring, or if we need to hunker down for another six weeks of snow, ice and winter weather. (I believe that this year’s […]

play

This is not a blog about New Year’s resolutions. This is not a blog about Covid-19. It is the story that came to me in the early hours, today, as I lay in bed, knowing that it was the first day of the New Year… and also a Friday.  (“First Fridays” are when I offer new […]

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