You can't live an obedient life and miss an adventure. Following the commands of Christ is not just about behavior. Behavior modification is not an end in itself in the New Testament. Transformation is about knowing the truth and the truth setting you free.

Lord, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—help me to make the choice to think about such things. (Phil. 4:8) Lord God, help me to feed the Spirit, not the flesh! Changing the way I think will change the way I feel!

All the nouns—the people, places, and things—I've believed were inseparable from who I was have been strategically targeted by God. Over the years, He has sought to supplant them with Christ alone. They weren't cast aside as worthless any more than the land was relegated to meaninglessness for the people of God. They had their role, but they simply weren't Jesus.

How has Paul kept his wonder? He never forgot who he had been.

When God desires to do "a new thing" (Isa. 43:19), He purposely seeks out a few righteous renegades who don't have a problem breaking the mold! Mold-breakers are usually people who don't care much about popularity or tradition.

We resemble computers intellectually and animals emotionally.

Not all single women want to be married. Not all boys like football. Not all homemakers like to cook. Not all messy people are lazy. And not all the obese are gluttons. There are glands and diabetes and a dozen conditions you never heard of that may account for things. Put your sermon through the counter-stereotype sieve.

Whether sexual orientation can change or not, hearts can change and turn any sexual orientation into an occasion for the glory of Christ. Those with same-sex attraction glorify Christ through sexual abstinence and through the enrichment of significant Christ-exalting relationships in other ways.

We're not a Church of preservation but rather a Church of proclamation. To achieve this end, we must be open to significant, if not revolutionary, changes in how the Archdiocese with its parishes and ministries is organized, how it's resourced, how it's staffed.

Our job in this lifetime is not to shape ourselves into some ideal we imagine we ought to be, but to find out who we already are and become it.

The amateur allows his worth and identity to be defined by others. The amateur craves third-party validation. The amateur is tyrannized by his imagined conception of what is expected of him. He is imprisoned by what he believes he ought to think, how he ought to look, what he ought to do, and who he ought to be.

Our job, as souls on this mortal journey, is to shift the seat of our identity from the lower realm to the upper, from the ego to the Self. Art