Authors: Alydia Smith

Autumn blessings, Gathering community! As you prepare for Thanksgiving and other upcoming services, check out the links to prayers and more provided below, remembering that in the northern hemisphere, fall is our yearly reminder that it is natural to simply let some things change and to enjoy the beauty in...

A friend recently told me that they were exhausted from living in unprecedented times. Of late, I often feel bombarded with statistics about how we have never experienced this level of (insert disaster) before, so a part of me could relate. Another part of me is painfully aware that the...

The summer season seems to pass by so fast. We pray that you have found time for enjoyment, fun, and play as well as relaxation and restoration of body, mind, and spirit. We also think of all of you who have been dealing with flooding, fires, grief and other challenging...

Summer Blessings Worship Leaders, These past few years, I seem to have fallen out of sync with the pace of the Holy in worship. When in worship, I am still gathering myself, when I am to be listening to the word. When I am finally ready to listen, I am...

So, you have been asked to lead worship. When I do “Introduction to Worship Leadership” workshops, I always start with the same words: “You have an impossible task before you…” And then I expand with a common analogy fitting for the folks gathered, such as setting a feast where everyone...

As a team-building exercise in my CPE (Clinical Pastoral Education) unit, we went rock climbing. I hated it and broke every one of my well-manicured nails. As a representative of the church, I went to various events and spaces that were not meant for me, a single Black woman, and...

Before the Thursday lunch program for those living without shelter, Mark and I would always have amazing, broad theological conversations about everything. No matter how much I prepped, it was never enough to engage Mark at his level. Our conversations always ended with, “Yes, but Alydia, will it stop me...

Blessings in this Easter season! Easter Sunday is now a month past. May, with its promised spring flowers, has arrived. However, in Alberta as I write this, we seem to be still in the grasp of winter. Just when we think spring is peeking through, we wake to another blast...

Hope springs eternal… At least in the kitchen, where my dad always has something growing that was never meant to survive a Canadian winter. Currently a Jamaican yam vine is climbing the wall of my kitchen, a resilient and persistent sign of hope springing in cold places! As you witness...